The Cost of Pride

There is a vision of strength that America uses to gauge whether that person is a person of strength or weakness and many of us fall for that definition. The unwillingness to ask for help when you need it is often viewed as stubbornness but some think of it as having pride in oneself. As with most things, a little bit of anything is okay but too much of that same thing can be extremely harmful.

While stationed in the US Marines, it was look upon as a good thing if you refused to give up or ask for help in completing a task. It was also seen as weak to seek the help of another and it was only later that I learned the degree of which was typically self-based and not a true measure. In other words, if one knew that they could do the job without assistance then it would be their opinion that everyone should be able to do the same thing. This I learned was not necessarily true. In fact, basing whether one was too weak or too prideful on your personal measurements was in itself prideful.

For a factory worker, running the line seems as easy as pouring milk from a boot but for someone who have never experienced that type of work may be a little overwhelmed. That does not make one better than the other nor does it make one less then the other. What it does is distinguishes the difference between individuals. We judge a college graduate to be of slightly more intelligence than say a farm hand but put that graduate in the field to perform the many task of that farm hand and you may see it differently.

During this economic turndown, I have tried several different things to pull myself out of this rut but to no avail. I had learned to ask for help when needed but soon became discourage when those who were supposed to be able to help never heeded my call and never showed up. Because of this, I began to feel the anger and hostility bubbling up inside of me as the lava in a volcano. Knowing that soon it could bubble over and spill into reality, I attempt to find any way that I can to keep it contained. I search for reasoning and begin to envy those whom I think may not be as effected as I am. Envy turns into jealousy and jealousy into rage. I then began to express my disappointments through any means necessary and wind up only hurting those closest to me. My pride has leaded me to blaming everyone else for my suffering instead of taking responsibility. Pride has made me wish to believe that my situation was not caused by something that I did or didn't do but was the result of something someone, anyone else must have done. Pride now trysts to convince me to take what I need and stop being weak by asking.

I have now fallen so far behind in my monthly obligations that it seems way too deep to climb out of. The look on my children's face when they look in the refrigerator or cabinets for something to eat creates a stabbing pain in my chest which doesn't seem to go away. Watching them leave the house with old clothes and worn shoes rips at my very soul. Having to explain why there are no electricity or that soon we may be homeless, robs me of any manhood that may have been hidden. They see not the many nights that I lay awake, the many job applications that I complete nor the stress that I carry so closely that my shoulders have seized up and the stiffness spreading all over my body.

Pride may have brought me to this point but it will rule over me no more. I will return to that person that I have always wished to be. A person who will no longer blame another for something that I do. A person who will accept responsibility for my mistakes and a person who will continue to ask for help as long as I need it. Because it's one's ability to ask for help when needed that is truly the measure of a real man. If its evidence of this you seek, how about this. Jesus had disciples and Superman had Super Friends.