Conscious Nothingness: Why Become Small?
Conscious Nothingness: Why Become Small?
People are not born with innate humility. This virtue develops gradually over time and is closely related to last week’s topic of patience and acceptance. Simone Weil, a French philosopher and mystic said that "Humility is attentive patience." She believed that by decreasing self-importance we discover an open, passive, empty space within our minds where we are more receptive to truth and grace, explaining humility as the acceptance of human frailty and dependent upon grace. Do I even notice that I am unreceptive to truth?
Humility is to yield to the truth. — Qushayri
The feature of vanity—a characteristic of false personality—veils the truth from me and imagination takes its place. Consequently, I lie to myself about knowing things I cannot know and thereby close myself off from being open to learning when it conflicts with my imaginary picture of myself.
It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows. — Epictetus
What have I convinced myself of that I already know? How is that conviction preventing me from — and getting in the way of — learning about myself? Through the Fourth Way practice of sincere and honest self-observation, I can reveal non-judgmentally to myself ways in which I behave mechanically and without attention. Invoking self-remembering I can catch myself asleep. Much of my life has been lived in the second state of consciousness, which is “waking sleep,” and when clearly observed, this sleep can feel devastating without the antidote of self-remembering. Humility is the conscious dismantling of mechanical "waking sleep," thereby relinquishing the delusions of false personality. Without buffering or excusing this truthful observation I can convert the energy of this observation into presence and experience humility.
Humility is the virtue by which a man recognizes his own unworthiness because he really knows himself. — Bernard of Clairvaux
If after seeing my mechanical self for a longer period of time, I experience humility when I reflect upon my good fortune to have found a way out of sleep. Pure gratitude cannot be experienced without humility.
As an example, we all have learned from the history books that rather than surrounding himself with loyal flatterers or politically safe allies, Abraham Lincoln appointed his political rivals to his cabinet. These were men who looked down upon Lincoln and considered him an uneducated country lawyer. Many believed they were far better suited to lead the country than he was. Lincoln, in his humility, knew they were the sharpest minds available to save the Union. Having a higher goal in mind, as Lincoln did, helps us to make the humble choice.
We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility. — Rabindranath Tagore
It would be silly, vain, and a paradox for me to claim that I have learned humility or that there is an endpoint to this learning. Life continually humbles and teaches me, recalibrating my inflated imaginary picture of myself. Acceptance of being an infinitesimal small part of the universe coupled with the realization that I am privileged to be acquainted with higher consciousness can be the greatest achievement. Humility is the foundation for self-remembering, anchoring our awareness in the present moment so that unified Higher Centers can finally awaken. Humility transforms into gratitude for one simple moment of higher consciousness. How rarely do those moments appear!
Humility is the greatest courage. — The Teacher
Garden Statue
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