Pursuing Humility

Humility doesn’t get enough press these days.

Which is understandable, when you consider that it is the antithesis of what the world wants. 

The world is focused on getting more. 

More money, more fame, more everything. 

That’s not a game worth spending your precious life pursuing. 

It’s a rat race designed to confuse and distract from what’s going on around you. 

It is a race designed to cement your focus on yourself. 

Take a different road. 

Seek humility by caring for others, extending them grace, and loving them more than you love yourself.

It’s not an easy road, and you won’t walk it perfectly. 

But it’s worth your effort. 

In fact, it’s worth spending a lifetime pursuing.

Discipline is patient.

“Only those who have the patience to do things perfectly,” Friedrich Schiller said, “will acquire the skills to do difficult things easily.” 

You have to show up day in and day out. You have to keep showing up and doing the work necessary even when results are small or unseen. 

When you feel as if you’re not making the slightest bit of difference. 

And when you everything in you says, “Give up.”

Discipline knows that reward comes to those who wait.  

To those who apply themselves to their craft with focus and determination over the long haul. 

There are zero overnight successes. Not in art. Not in music. Not in sports. And not in life. 

Behind every supposed overnight success is a lot of sweat, hard work, and patience. 

It may take years to reach your goal. 

And that’s ok. 

All that sweat and patience is building within you the character and discipline you need. It is shaping you into the person you need to be. It is making you worthy of your accomplishment. 

You wouldn’t rejoice if things came easy. You’d do what most people do with easy achievement—ignore it. 

The goals you're chasing are valuable and life giving because they are hard. Their difficulty is their magic. 

They are asking for the drive, determination, and patience required. In short, they are demanding discipline. 

Don’t quit when things get hard. 

Don’t give up because it’s not easy. 

Don’t move on to something new instead of sticking it out and seeing it through. 

Be patient. 

Stay the course. 

Apply discipline and remain patient. 

Results will come. Just give it time. 
 

Inconsistency is an opportunity

You’re inconsistent. 

You think and act in ways that fail to mesh with your values in principles. 

Not just you, but all of us are walking and talking hypocrites. 

But that’s not the whole story. 

The rest of the story is that each time you catch yourself living inconsistently with your values is an opportunity. 

An opportunity to:

• change,
• correct course,
• confess,
• ask forgiveness, and
• begin again. 

Of course, it’s also an opportunity to:

• bow up,
• double down,
• give up,
• quit, and
• blame.

Hypocrisy isn’t the end of your story. It’s an intimate and defining part of it. 

How you respond to your inconsistencies will go a long long way towards determining what happens in your life. 

Choose the first set of responses rather than the second. 

They are hard and uncomfortable steps to take but lead to healing, hope, and happiness in the end. 

Most of all, they lead to growth and your best self.  

At what cost?

You’re given a choice each time you’re hurt. 

You could return fire and respond in kind. Or you could let it go and move on. 

Be wary of the path you choose. 

In selecting your response, you decide the person you’ll become. 

There are few, if any, neutral decisions. Each one helps form the picture of who you are today, and who you’ll be down the road. 

It may feel good to dish sarcasm, wit and venom upon your foes, but at what cost? 

A victory pursued, or even attained, in the wrong way is a hollow one. In fact, it’s not a victory at all. It’s a loss. In becoming like your enemy to beat your enemy, you become the thing you hated in the first place. Becoming evil to beat evil allows evil to win. 

You’re not called to take the path that feels good. You’re called to take the path of righteousness. The path that leads to kindness, gentleness, and character. 

Choose the right path regardless how difficult or hard it is. Stay out of the mud. 

Do it enough and you’ll become the man or woman you hoped to be. And that will make all the mud slung your way worth it, even if no one else can tell.