“There is something in humility which strangely exalts the heart.”

– Saint Augustine

As I often have said before, I love paradoxes.  They are the sort of things that stretch my mind and challenge me to look at the world from more angles than just my own.  Humility and exaltation.  Do they seem compatible to you?  When you first think of one leading to the other, what comes to your mind?

I think of the images that the word, “humility,” conjures for me; and what comes to mind is a weak, frail, obsequious little man who stammers and hesitates while he is trampled under the feet of the strong and powerful.  This is what I was taught that humility looked like.  It isn’t a very attractive image, yet people always want to encourage us to be humble.  Is choosing humility the act of allowing ourselves to be walked on by others?  Is there some system of rewards and punishments that will compensate us for choosing pain with the reward of some pleasurable gift at a later date?  Why would anyone ever choose to be humble?  Yet here is St. Augustine, telling us that humility exalts the heart.  Paradoxes.  I love them.

Last night I had the pleasure to attend a Rhythm Renewal workshop led by Jim Donovan, a man who facilitates transformation through the use of rhythm.  I realized when I read St. Augustine’s words this morning that maybe I had learned something about humility last night; and I will share it with you here.  After a couple of hours of rhythm and joy and opportunities and celebration, we were invited to think of something that might be an obstacle in our lives.  We would close our eyes and listen to the beating of a drum and consider forming an intention to either transform that obstacle or leave it behind.  This was well-timed for me, since I was weary from events of the prior day that showcased man’s inhumanity to man in the pain of someone very dear to me.  There is nothing like injustice to call forth my anger; but even righteous anger can stand in the way of our desire to heal the hurt.  Erasing all thoughts and judgments from my mind, I sat with the intention to remove anger from the situation — it seemed impossible, but there was nothing to lose in seizing this opportunity.

The drum began to beat.  I released all thoughts except the intention to lose my anger.  Soon that thought became wordless; and it simply swirled in the air around me, no longer connected to me, but still present.  Images of the faces of those involved in the incident also swirled past, again and again.  As I watched all these things slip in and out of view — in and out of my awareness — pure white Light began to fall down all around me.  It entered the top of my head and warmed my whole body — my whole being.  It flowed and overflowed, pouring from my heart and my hands.  I knew that if I had opened my eyes at that point, the entire room would have been illuminated by this beautiful, healing Light.  My knee, the one that always seems to ache to one degree or another, was soothed by the warmth generated by the energy that filled me and surrounded me and lifted me from my chair.  Love encapsulated me and held me there as the Light became all that I was and grew me far beyond the boundaries of my own flesh.

As I hovered in the Light, suspended beyond my own limitations, I saw my anger drift by again.  It seemed so distant and so insignificant compared to the feelings that had kept me awake most of the night only yesterday.  The images of the people drifted by again, but something had changed.  They also were bathed in the light; and as I watched it pour from my heart and wash over them, my view of them was transformed.  No longer was there a right and a wrong person, although one had inflicted a lot of pain on the other.  There were only people, each afraid in her own way and each needing to find the transformation that would allow her to stand in her own power without hurting or being hurt by the other.  I felt my own fear subside, and I realized that the anger that swirled away really was a coating I had placed on my fear.  I was humbled as I realized that I had given my power over to the fear of another person and had stood in the way of my own ability to help.

This, I think, is what humility is about.  It is not about weakness or self-deprecation.  It is about getting out of our own way.  It is about taking the emotions that block our light and figuring out what they are telling us about ourselves and allowing the Light to fill us with love and peace and forgiveness.  It is then that the healing can begin.  It is then that our hearts are exalted.