Humility
Sitting one day in contemplation, I had a sudden insight: “I am not God.”
I burst out laughing.
“Of course, I’m not God!”
But then I realized that some part of me does think I am God. God as an all-powerful being who can make everything OK.
Prevent, heal, save. That God.
It’s hard to surrender to the truth that I don’t have control. It’s hard to admit that life can be impossible, unfixable, painful. That too often, I can’t do a thing about it.
I am not that God.
What a relief.
Right-sizing myself lightens the suffering of those around me. I am better able to love when I’m not trying to fix or improve.
Heart-felt humility also lightens my own suffering. This beautiful, bold human capacity is all that I have, and it is enough.
This is what I know: that the small is huge, that the tiny is vast, that pain is part and parcel of the gift of joy, and that this is love, and then there is everything else. You either walk toward love or away from it with every breath you draw. Humility is the road to love. Humility, maybe, is love.
—Brian Doyle, One Long River of Song: Notes on Wonder