“Humility is not thinking less of yourself. It’s thinking of yourself less.”
Clive Staples Lewis (1898-1963) was most famously the spinner of the Narnia tales. He was also a noted Cambridge and Oxford scholar/professor, J.R.R. Tolkien‘s buddy, and one of Christianity’s most noted modern apologists (which does not mean he was sorry for Christians). I was tickled to learn that he was known as ‘Jack’ to friends and family, as Tolkien was called ‘Gandalf’ by intimates. (Kidding about Tolkien.) I was pleased to stumble on this powerhouse quote* – in a Steve Rushin column in Sports Illustrated, not to my surprise – and to be reminded of this statement about the misapplication of humility, made by G.K. Chesterton.
* Perils of quotation and the Internet: not likely through any fault of his, the American super-pastor Rick Warren is given credit for this saying on several sites.
Further on-line meandering brought me to a rather elegant, corporate-lunchroom-ready poster of this quote on humility — which was attributed to the management guru Ken Blanchard. I hope Blanchard is not to blame, but this is at least a case of Internet-inspired amnesia, if not outright plagiarism.
“Facts are simple and facts are straight / Facts are lazy and facts are late / Facts all come with points of view / Facts don’t do what I want them to…” More 20th-century wisdom, this time from David Byrne and the Talking Heads.