Humility

On his desk, Dr. Bob had a plaque defining humility:
"Perpetual quietness of heart. It is to have no trouble.  It is never to be fretted or vexed, irritable or sore; to wonder at nothing that is done to me, to feel nothing done against me.  It is to be at rest when nobody praises me, and when I am blamed or despised, it is to have a blessed home in myself where I can go in and shut the door and kneel to my Father in secret and be at peace, as in a deep sea of calmness, when all around and about is seeming trouble." [attributed to Andrew Murray, South African Missionary, 1828-1917]

~ Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, p. 222

Humility is attentive patience.

P A U S E = Patience And Understanding Succeed Every time.

Humility

In AA, we looked and listened.
Everywhere we saw failure and misery transformed by humility into priceless assets.
We heard story after story of how humility had brought strength out of weakness.
In every case, pain had been the price of admission into a new life.

CHANGE = Choosing Humility Allows New Gifts and Energy.

Accepting What Is & Letting Go of What Isn't

Humility is to make a right estimate of oneself. - Charles Haddon Spurgeon

What does it take to come to the place where we can exchange pride for humility?
First we must stop the blasphemous charade of pretending that we are no good.
"I'm worthless" has often been spoken in the name of humility.
But these words, or any other words that express the same sentiment, are a self-indulgence and a cop-out.
The essence of humility is summed up in the Serenity Prayer:

God grant me the serenity to
accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can,
and wisdom to know the difference.

Humility is truth.
To be humble is to know the truth about our limits, to recognize what can be changed, and to accept that all good things are possible with the help of our Higher Power.
Excessive pride prohibits acceptance because it prohibits the truth, and the truth is that some things are unchangeable.
Refusal to accept that truth gets us plenty of frustrations and anger - and no humility at all.

Today, I humbly ask God for the wisdom to accept what is and to let go of what isn't.

Days of Healing, Days of Joy by Earnie Larsen & Carol Larsen Hegarty

Wait And Listen

It is not speaking that breaks our silence, but the anxiety to be heard.

The words of the proud man impose silence on all others, so that he alone may be heard.

The humble man speaks only in order to be spoken to.

The humble man asks nothing but an alms, then waits and listens.

Thomas Merton
Thoughts in Solitude

शिप्व्रेच्केद इन साउथ कैरोलाइना

Seeing The Good

The beauty of my soul shines in many ways.
The greatest of these is love.
In the spirit of loving kindness,
every day a little ugliness is removed;
my perspective on life grows broader and deeper.

In the spirit of love, my life become fresher,
my soul humbler;
evil seems to disappear, and
I learn to distinguish sinner from the sin.

Do I see the good in people?

How Far?

“The patient and humble endurance of the cross
—whatever nature it may be—
is the highest work we have to do.”

Oh, how far I am at 84 years of age from
being an image of Jesus in his sacred life on earth!”

Saint Katharine Drexel

Prayer -- 01-22-2008

Sobriety Prayer

If I speak in the tongues of men and even of angels, but have not sobriety, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to more mountains but have not sobriety, I am nothing.
If I give away all that I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not sobriety, I gain nothing.
When I am sober, I am patient and kind.
When I am sober, I am not jealous nor boastful, nor arrogant or rude.
When I am sober, I am not irritable or resentful.
I do not rejoice at wrong as I used to do but rejoice in what is right.
When I am sober, I can bear all things, believe in all things, hope all things, and endure all things.
Sobriety never ends and never fails.
When I was using, I spoke like an arrogant child, thought like a stubborn child, and reasoned like a rebellious child.
When I chose sobriety for my life, I gave up my childish ways.
So faith, hope, love, and sobriety abide, but for me, the most important has to be sobriety, for without it, I cannot have the other three, nor can I ever have the serenity I yearn to possess.

-- #@#@#@# --

Great Spirit, today, let me teach only love and learn only love.

-- #@#@#@# --

I pray that gratitude will bring humility.
I pray that humility will bring to live a better life.

-- #@#@#@# --

Humility

You get just a little sobriety, and you get just a little humility.
Not much, just a little.
Not the humility of sackcloth and ashes,but the humility of a man who's glad he's alive and can serve.
You get just a little tolerance, not too much,but just enough to sit and listen to the other guy.
Somewhere along the line, if you've forgotten how to pray,you learn a little about that too. . . And you realize that if you put all this together, you get a little humility,a little tolerance, a little honesty, a little sincerity, a little prayer-- and a lot of AA.

-- Experience, Strength and Hope, pp. 201-202

Missionary Of Charity Prayer

The following prayer is the prayer every Missionary of Charity says before leaving his or her Apostolate. It is also used as the Physician’s Prayer in Shish Bhaven, the children’s home in Calcutta:

Dear Lord, the Great Healer, I knee before You,
Since every perfect gift must come from You.
I pray, give skill to my hands, clear vision to my mind,
kindness and meekness to my heart.
Give me singleness of purpose, strength to lift up a part
of the burden of my suffering fellow men, and a
true realization of the privilege that is mine.
Take from my heart all guile and worldliness,
That with the simple faith of a child, I may rely on You.

from Mother Teresa – A Simple Path

Perpetual Quietness Of Heart.

Perpetual quietness of heart.
It is to have no trouble.
It is never to be fretted or vexed, irritable or sore; to wonder at nothing that is done to me, to feel nothing done against me.
It is to be at rest when nobody praises me, and when I am blamed or despised, it is to have a blessed home in myself where I can go in and shut the door and kneel to my Father in secret and be at peace, as in a deep sea of calmness,when all around and about is seeming trouble.

- from a plaque on Dr. Bob's desk

Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, p. 222

Micah Blessing

This is what Yahweh
ask of you; only this

to act justly,

to love tenderly,

and to walk humbly

with your God.

Micah 6:8

Pride And Humility

The difference between pride and humility:
Pride is who is right;
humility is what is right.

Achievements

Truly humble people are centers of peace because they fear neither their own failure nor others' success.
Let us pray for the wisdom to judge as God judges: to look at our own and other's achievements from God's perspective.

Humility

Humility is not thinking less of yourself,

but thinking of yourself less.

I Am The Student

The Medicine people focus on their Being, not their doing.
After all, we are human beings not human doings.
The Medicine people are very patient and consciously trying to live a live of humility.
Medicine people are servant leaders.
Their main purpose is to serve the needs of others.
By this service attitude, they become the leaders people listen to and the leaders the people want to follow.
The Medicine people say everyone is their teacher.
Maybe we should try to live this way ourselves; humble, patient, honoring the Earth and listening to our teachers.

Creator, today, let me know all people are
my teachers and I am the student.

For You Alone

Give me the strength that waits upon You in silence and peace.
Give me humility in which alone is rest,
and deliver me from pride which is the heaviest of burdens.
And possess my whole heart and soul with the simplicity of love.
Occupy my whole life with the one thought and the one desire of love,
that I may love not for the sake of merit,
not for the sake of perfection,
not for the sake of virtue,
not for the sake of sanctity,
but for You alone.
For there is only one thing that can satisfy love and reward it, and that is You alone.
-- Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation

Let my eyes see nothing in the world but Your glory,
and let my hands touch nothing that is not for Your service.
-- Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation

Humility

Two definitions of humility are
(1) being aware of one's own defects of character, and
(2) giving credit where credit is due.
This means if you do something and are successful because God gave you certain talents, give credit to God when someone tells you how well you did; this is being humble.
If you are successful at something, but had help from friends, spouse, neighbors, give credit to those who helped you; this is being humble.
If you have done a task and you alone accomplished it, give credit to yourself; this is being humble.
Say the truth and give credit where credit is due.

Creator, let me walk a truthful road today.