The parable of the Good Samaritan in the Gospel of Luke is brought up in the course of a discussion between Jesus and a man of law with regard to the question of what one ought to do “to inherit eternal life”. Referring to the answer given by the law the man quotes a verse [...]

No one likes to think of themselves as dishonest. In fact, most of us don’t think they are. Yet who can assert that they have been fully righteous and honest in every situation they have encountered over the past month or year? How can this dichotomy be explained? What is it that pushes us to adopt dishonest behaviours and that shuts down our moral conscience when we do so?

In this insightful and thought provoking talk given at the RSA, Dan Ariely, best-selling author and professor of psychology and behavioural economics at Duke University, draws from experiments conducted among various groups of people in different parts of the world, as well as on personal experiences, to shed some light on these questions.

Why be humble?

If humility consists in resisting the pressure of pride—whose power we can sense—it most certainly requires an effort. As all efforts, it needs to be justified, for after all, if the illusions of an oversized ego are part of my fundamental nature, and as long as they remain within the limits of reason, why try and rid myself of them—assuming this is even possible?
There are at least two reasons that would provide motivation for such an effort:

The first reason is ethical and refers to what has been called “love of truth”. While it is in my nature to be blind to the true place I hold in the world, it is also in my nature, once I have become conscious of an illusion, to try and free myself from it. No one can content themselves—unless they are spiritually dead—with living knowingly in error without trying to come clear. We are naturally inclined to seek truth, whatever it may be, even if it is unpleasant for our ego. Given that pride is founded on lies and illusions, it is our ethical duty to strive to become more humble so as to free ourselves from these lies and to come closer to the truth of what we really are.

Keeping a logbook can prove useful in many ways for the practice of ethics. It provides precious help in the process of self-knowledge.
The first reason why putting down experiences is useful is obvious: in addition to helping us fight against forgetfulness, it helps us focus on our daily experiences, encouraging us to analyse them and to set up plans of action for the next day, so that we may correct our mistakes.
Example: I am playing with my 5-year-old daughter and my 8-year-old son. We split into teams, my son on one side, my daughter and I on the other. Slowly but surely I get carried away and I forget that my opponent is an 8-year-old child. I win hands down, as my daughter watches with admiration, and I don’t even give my son the chance to score the couple of points that would have allowed him to save face. Only at the end of the game do I suddenly realise the negative emotion that has invaded me—it looks a lot like pride. Too late. My son is humiliated, he doesn’t feel like playing anymore and will refuse to play this game from now on.

As with all omnipresent and invasive character traits, consubstantial pride is difficult to localise. But a number of characteristics make it possible to pinpoint it. These characteristics are more or less obvious depending on the individual, but no one is entirely devoid of them. Delving within is all it takes to uncover strong tendencies that express themselves more or less openly depending on the situations, and take different forms, at times obscure, at times subtle or twisted.

Humility is the most accomplished form of self-knowledge. It presupposes that you have a clear and lucid perception of what you really are and of the place you hold in the world. It presupposes also that you look at yourself with neutrality and even distance: humility also means being able to look at yourself with humour.

As explained in my previous post, humility can be defined as the articulation point between two modes of the self (psychological and metaphysical): it means acknowledging my metaphysical condition (the “I am nothing”) even when I am in the midst of social interactions, surrounded by others, just like others. It means being aware of my insignificance even when I go about my business, defending my rights and making sure I command respect if necessary, while constantly carrying within me that “double thought” Pascal alludes to.

Humility used to be a cardinal virtue. It is, however, not so appealing to our minds anymore. It may be that we subconsciously associate it with humiliation, because both words are derived from the same root: humus (earth, ground). To be humble would then mean to belittle oneself, to stay on the ground, to submit: that is hardly a prospect one would consider desirable.
Why then should we contemplate this concept today? What use can it be to our practice of ethics? Well, it can transform the relationship we have with ourselves and with others in an extremely beneficial way.

The goal of spirituality is the perfection of the soul. But what does perfecting the soul mean? From an ethical point of view, it is a matter of transforming the soul’s substance, thereby developing all human virtues within oneself. Such a transformation is not automatic. It requires that one first develops an accurate idea of what virtues are, as well as of the means for making them shine forth in oneself.

Ostad Elahi’s philosophy is, as we know, grounded in the personal efforts made to gain greater self-knowledge not with the perspective of self development but of spiritual development. However, as soon as you set out to concretely experiment this philosophy and to undertake the work of spiritual perfection of the self, you are bound to encounter several forms of resistance.

For my part, ever since I have started making efforts to keep some of my character weaknesses in check and to develop my human qualities and my faith, through a variety of practices, I have observed the same pattern: at the beginning of each new practice I am highly motivated and focused on my objective and my efforts do not encounter any insurmountable obstacles. But then it doesn’t take long, maybe a couple of weeks, before my attention begins to dwindle and—unless I receive some help from the outside—I fall back into the same old negligence.

The art of being kind—or how to demonstrate that kindness, contrary to what society often claims, is not a weakness but an ethical quality. This is no easy task but Stefan Einhorn, an oncologist at Karolinska Hospital in Stockholm, makes a very convincing point in his book The Art of Being Kind.

Stefan Einhorn begins by observing that kindness has a relatively bad reputation, and is often likened to weakness, simple-mindedness or just plain stupidity. Einhorn, however, defines kindness as a form of intelligence: “kindness as I understand it […] is not the fruit of stupidity but rather of common sense”. It is a quality that enables us to live according to an ethics of the heart by taking the well being of others into consideration. Kindness redefined then as “the art of being human among humans”, gives it new depth.