Trying Hard

Many things – such as loving, going to sleep, or behaving unafectedly – are done worst when we try hardest to do them.  

– C.S. Lewis, Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Literature  

I would add to that: humility. In fact, I would suggest humility is the perfect example of working against your goal when you try hard to achieve it. 

Humility is such a difficult attribute to work towards, because when I am working towards humility, I am most often going to end up taking one step forward and two steps back. Rather than trying to achieve humility, I must forget about it completely. 

Instead, I should do my best to honor the fellow man and woman: my wife and children, church family, parents, siblings, the elderly, the sick and lonely, etc. By honoring them, and I mean truly and sincerely honoring them, I, and most likely without realizing it, develop humility.  

The trouble comes when I begin to recognize my own state of humility…