Humility, More than Eating Humble Pie

I blog a lot about pride, and I feel that a lot of people talk about it too, but what about humility? I like to think I am a humble person; I like to think that I am rarely proud, and I like to think that, that statement is 100% true. The problem is this, it isn’t, I am not humble all the time and neither is everyone else. Pride is a sin, and by pride I mean being proud of oneself, hubris. I don’t mean being prideful of a job well done, of one’s nation, or of a great accomplishment, but pride taken far enough to exalt oneself above else. Now, humility you would think would be the opposite, but it’s not, at least 100%. Pride is putting yourself first, naturally humility would mean putting yourself last. The thing though is this, if I were to put myself last every time after a while I would get angry, that is, if I were in the wrong mindset. Whenever I think of humility (well not every time) I think of “It’s a Wonderful Life” where George Bailey is fed up of putting himself last and feels he always gets the short end of the stick. That is what happens when we shove ourselves down, and that is not true humility. True humility is putting others before ourselves, loving those around us and focusing on them before we think about ourselves. It’s doing a favor, sharing a meal, giving time to someone else because they were made by God and thus are immeasurably valuable. George Bailey later realized that in putting his peers before himself he stored up his treasure in Heaven and in his time of need was prayed for by his town and taken care of by God, that is the result of true humility. When we put ourselves last we focus on ourselves, we say things like “Oh I shouldn’t do that because it’ll make me look…” we constantly become self absorbed with our actions. In putting others first, and God first we take our focus off of ourselves and onto those around us. And that, is humility.