Humility

Excerpted from “The Sacred Dictionary,” which highlights the living meaning carried by a single word

"The essential quality to attain, the key to them all, is humility.   If you...strive for this quality, all the others will follow in its wake." Daniel C. Matt, The Essential Kabbalah

humility = humilis, humus (Latin),  on the ground, lowly, Earth

Cultivating humility requires a rejection of human hierarchies, of the misguided notions that we are better or worse than One another. It insists that we desist from imposing superficial scales of worth and instead re cognize that every One belongs to the race to be human. True humility  comes from understanding that Life is not an earned privilege;  it is gifted to us irrespective of our actions and circumstances.  Our ancestors and parents assure its arrival.

When we agree to the way Life came to us we stand-under its continuous current, free to flow. Being humble means choosing lowness, not as in 'lower than X,' but as in proximal to the ground.  Grounded in an inclusive perspective that looks down on no One from feigned Highness. True humility is accessible when we know we matter, not wholly more or holy less than any One.  

Yet the after-effects of trauma can blur the distinction between humility and humiliation.  If we've been put down, treated as inferior and abused, we feel lowered and without worth. When we disconnect from our Intrinsic Value we are easily humiliated, spurring shame, a debilitating state whose reverberations often become more paralyzing than the trauma itself.  If we fail to live up to perfective expectations, and feel we let someone down, the spikes and dips keep us from solid ground. If we are unable to make the human missed-takes necessary to learn and evolve, shame can drive us to perpetuate perpetration against our sacred Selves. 

May we restore the Knowing that no matter what has happened to us, our Essence remains eternal and pure. May we humbly acknowledge that Existence transcends the physical contours and sheathing of our skin, that we truly are no thing yet integrally part of the cosmic void where Creation collides with form.  Where the skies meet earth is our true worth, the ground of our Being. Infinity landed.

May Our ability for humility Land us on sacred leveled ground!