2015 Reading List
Dickson takes a deep academic look at the history of humility and its shift from an ancient term of denigration to an aspirational one. Most usefully, he links and develops the ways in which humility can make one a more effective leader. Unfortunately today humility is all too often ignored virtue--Dickson, however, does an admirable job in bringing it back to the cultural forefront.
Humilitas: A Lost Key to Life, Love, and Leadership by John Dickson
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Humility is the noble choice to forgo your status, deploy your resources or use your influence for the good of others before yourself. More simply, you could say the humble person is marked by a willingness to hold power in service of others.Read more at location 167
Wise leaders hold nobility with humility. Overbearing ego and debilitating self-abasement are generally avoided in all wisdom traditions. Many traditions call for balance. I would suggest a further step, also found in the ancient wisdom writings: that you look beyond balance, that you embrace the paradox of strength in weakness to find your true weight as a leader.12Read more at location 174
Second, humility is willing. It is a choice. Otherwise, it is humiliation. Finally, humility is social. It is not a private act of self-deprecation—banishing proud thoughts, refusing to talk about your achievements and so on. I would call this simple “modesty". But humility is about redirecting of your powers, whether physical, intellectual, financial or structural, for the sake of others.Read more at location 178
doubt it is controversial to describe leadership as the art of inspiring others in a team to contribute their best toward a goal. We might quibble over the wording—and I am calling this a description rather than a definition—but I suspect most would agree with the three main aspects of leadership identified here.Read more at location 238
Art. Leadership is more an art than a science.Read more at location 241
Others. The second part of the description is equally straightforward. Leadership is fundamentally about others.Read more at location 246
people”—to use Professor J. P. Kotter’s language, “motivating and inspiring” them.1 “The real power of effective leadership,” writes Brigadier Jim Wallace, former head of Australian special forces, “is maximising other people’s potential.”2 Goal. The third obvious aspect of leadership is that it is oriented toward a clear goal. There is something fundamentally aspirational and idealistic about leadership.Read more at location 264
Tools of leadership If leadership can be described as the art of inspiring others in a team to contribute their best to a goal, what are the “tools” at the leader’s disposal? Again, I doubt there will be much disagreement when I say that there are basically four.Read more at location 283
Ability. Leaders tend to be people who have excelled in some important part of the organization’s business. Read more at location 286
Authority. What I mean by authority is the structural powers handed to leaders by an organization—the power to hire and fire, set directions, approve budgets and overrule colleagues where there is disagreement. Read more at location 294
Persuasion. Good leaders tend not to rely on structural authority but instead have a knack of winning people over to their vision of things. Read more at location 306
Example. This is a deliberately broad category that includes everything from the leader’s listening ear to his work ethic to a courteous tone toward subordinates. Read more at location 320
said that all of us tend to believe the views of people we already trust. Read more at location 339
Leadership is not about popularity. It is about gaining people’s trust and moving them forward. Read more at location 355
massive influence can be exerted with minimal structural authority as long as maximal persuasion and life example exist.Read more at location 381
leadership is fundamentally about relationships Read more at location 403
Humbly acknowledging limitations and refusing to engage in competency extrapolation are not signs of weakness. They demonstrate realism and are therefore strengths. Read more at location 474
titled I Told Me So, philosophy professor Gregg Elshof explores the ubiquitous nature of self-deception in public and private life, in secular and religious communities. Read more at location 493
Albert Schweitzer (1875–1965) was a supremely gifted philosopher, historian and biblical scholar, as well as being a highly accomplished musician. Read more at location 652
The Quest of the Historical Jesus Read more at location 654
In his autobiography, Out of My Life and Thought, Read more at location 658
Needless to say, arrogance is as ugly as humility is beautiful.Read more at location 771
Humility is not an ornament to be worn; it is an ideal that will transform.Read more at location 775
It probably won’t surprise you to learn that in a society that placed such a high value on honour, humility was rarely, if ever, considered virtuous. In the 147 pithy maxims of the Delphic Canon (6th century BC), considered by ancient Greeks to be the sum and substance of the ethical life, there is no mention of the theme of, let alone the word, “humility". The range of moral advice found in the Delphic Canon is impressive: • “Control yourself.” • “Help your friends.” • “Practise prudence.”Read more at location 815
“Return a favour.” • “Nothing to excess.” • “Act on knowledge.” • “Honour good people.” • “Don’t curse your sons.” • “Rule your wife.” • “Mete out justice.” • “Despise no one.” • “Worship divinity.” • “Don’t mock the dead.” • “Don’t let your reputation go.” • “Respect the elder.” • “Respect yourself.” • “Die for your country.” • “Don’t trust fortune.”Read more at location 821
Ancient Israel, no less than ancient Greece, was an honour-shame society. Humility before God was appropriate, of course, as was humility before judges, kings and priests, but lowering yourself before an equal or lesser in early biblical times would not have seemed fitting.Read more at location 926
Perhaps reflecting on the Maker’s soft spot for the downtrodden, one text from the second century BC urges humility toward both the great and the lowly. The Jerusalem sage Yeshua Ben Sira told his students: “Humble your head before the great. Incline your ear to the poor and return their greeting in humility.” The first line is to be expected: everyone knew you should be lowly before the great. The final expression is striking and may be the first attempt in history to use the word “humility” to describe how ordinary people should treat equals (or, in this case, a social inferior).Read more at location 937
But only once do you get an explicit statement: Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. “Yoke” is a common way of referring to a rabbi’s system of teaching,Read more at location 971
another occasion Jesus seems to have delighted in turning upside-down ancient notions of greatness and servitude: Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man [his favourite way of referring to himself] did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.7Read more at location 981
Interestingly, what established humility as a virtue in Western culture was not Jesus’ persona exactly, or even his teaching, but rather his execution—or, more correctly, his followers’ attempt to come to grips with his execution.Read more at location 992
Logically, they had just two options. Either Jesus was not as great as they had first thought, his crucifixion being evidence of his insignificance, or the notion of “greatness” itself had to be redefined to fit with the fact of his seemingly shameful end.Read more at location 1013
Christians took the other option. For them the crucifixion was not evidence of Jesus’ humiliation (humilitas) but proof that greatness can express itself in humility (humilitas), the noble choice to lower yourself for the sake of others. The first datable reference to this innovation in ethical reasoning comes from a letter written by the apostle Paul to the Christians in the Roman colony of Philippi in northern Greece. The letter is dated to about the year 60, almost exactly the same time as Seneca penned his morbid account of crucifixion quoted above. The contrast is astonishing. In the quotation that follows Paul urges his readers to live in humility, choosing to think of others as better than themselves. He then drives the point home by quoting a hymn, presumably one known and sung in Philippi, that speaks of Jesus’ humilitas on the cross: Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus [then comes the hymn]:Read more at location 1025
Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death —even death on a cross!10Read more at location 1035
A curious sign of this strange reversal of thinking is found in Sir Edmund Hillary’s decision to mark his achievement by leaving a small crucifix on the summit of Everest. I don’t know why Hillary did this; he wasn’t an overtly religious man. Perhaps it was a token of his own humility, trying to honour a “higher power” at the moment of his own triumph. Then again, maybe it was just the one symbol of Western civilization that he could fit into his small pack. In any case, it is worth noting that what to the ancient mind would have seemed a perverse symbol of accomplishment, to the modern mind makes perfect sense: of course you would put a cross at the highest point of the world!Read more at location 1056
Put another way, while we certainly don’t need to follow Christ to appreciate humility or to be humble, it is unlikely that any of us would aspire to this virtue were it not for the historical impact of his crucifixion on art, literature, ethics, law and philosophy. Our culture remains cruciform long after it stopped being Christian.Read more at location 1087
The humility built into the very idea of the clinical trial: I don’t know whether this treatment based on anecdotal observation and consistent with my theories really works is the opposite of the argument from authority.”4Read more at location 1153
This generating effect of humility, whether in science or business, is beautifully described by the great literary critic G. K. Chesteron, in his cheeky book Orthodoxy. In his battle against early twentieth-century rationalism and self-reliance, which he believed was sapping the energy out of religion, the arts and life itself, Chesterton argued that human pride is in fact the engine of mediocrity. It fools us into believing that we have “arrived", that we are complete, that there is little else to learn. Humility, by contrast, he said, reminds us that we are small and incomplete and so urges us on toward the heights of artistic, scientific and societal endeavour:Read more at location 1159
Instead, I mean opening yourself up to the vulnerability of being wrong, receiving correction and asking others how they think you could do better.Read more at location 1190
language, she has learnt humilitas. In his book Leading Change John P. Kotter explains how he tracked the careers of 115 of his former students from Harvard Business School.Read more at location 1207
Marcel’s success to the way he gave humble attention to the difficulties and mistakes he endured through the years. “He reflected on good times and bad,” writes Kotter, “and tried to learn from both. Confronting his mistakes, he minimized the arrogant attitudes that often accompany success. With a relatively humble view of himself, he watched more closely and listened more carefully than did most others.”7 Humility generates learning and growth.Read more at location 1211
One thing I know from undergraduate psychology and from years of counseling in a church context is that, in the end, nothing is more valuable to us, and value-adding, than good relationships. Knowing that we are loved and valued by those we love and value is the predictor of a healthy sense of self-worth.Read more at location 1242
Note: So true
Relationships are where security is really found. And since humility— holding your power for the good of others—can only enhance our relationships, I feel confident saying that humility not only signals security, it fosters it as well.Read more at location 1248
It is a fascinating truth worthy of every leader’s reflection: mistakes of execution are rarely as damaging to an organization, whether corporate, ecclesiastical or academic, as a refusal to concede mistakes, apologize to those affected and redress the issue with generosity and haste.Read more at location 1273
Jim Collins’ follow-up to Good to Great, his 2009 book How the Mighty Fall Read more at location 1276
Stephen R. Covey, the author of the bestselling The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, writes in a more recent book: Humility truly is the mother of all virtues. It makes us a vessel, a vehicle, an agent instead of “the source” or the principal. It unleashes all other learning, all growth and process. With the humility that comes from being principle-centered, we’re empowered to learn from the past, have hope for the future, and act with confidence in the present.9Read more at location 1277
According to Aristotle, arguments work—or don’t work—because of three, interrelated factors: logos, the intellectual dimension; pathos, the emotional or personal dimension; and ethos, the social and ethical dimension of persuasion.Read more at location 1315
Pathos is the part of a message that appeals directly to our inner self, to our emotional and aesthetic needs.Read more at location 1324
is a simple fact of social psychology that we tend to believe people we like and trust; moreover, whom we find ourselves liking and trusting in the first place is itself hugely influenced by our upbringing, education, social class, circle of friends and so on.Read more at location 1335
you hear it but too often overlooked by leaders seeking to influence those in their care: The perceived character of the persuader is central to his powers of persuasion.Read more at location 1345
Mere reputation cannot match true character.Read more at location 1357
The chapter opens this way: “Business is tied together by its systems of communication. This communication … depends more on the spoken word than it does on the written word; and the effectiveness of the spoken word hinges not so much on how people talk as on how they listen.”5Read more at location 1373
Brigadier Wallace started out as a captain in the elite Special Air Service. Some of the stories he tells of SAS training and missions seem straight out of the movies. Most people want to be led, and there is therefore a natural momentum in favour of the leader. But what continually gets in the way is ego. Where we can’t control that, suppress it, then people quickly realise it’s about us, and any natural advantage fades and leadership becomes hard work. The real power of effective leadership is maximising other people’s potential, which inevitably demands also ensuring that they get the credit. When our ego won’t let us build another person up, when everything has to build us up, then the effectiveness of the organisation reverts to depending instead on how good we are in the technical aspects of what we do. And we have stopped leading and inspiring others to great heights.3Read more at location 1502
That day helped us to believe that a music career was not just for supermen inhabiting unapproachable glory; it was for people just like us. The inspirational (and aspirational) effect of humility is real.Read more at location 1541
In a morally and religiously diverse culture such as ours, humility is a much-needed key to harmony.Read more at location 1546
Humility applied to convictions does not mean believing things any less; it means treating those who hold contrary beliefs with respect and friendship.Read more at location 1597
G. K. Chesterton made precisely the point I am trying to emphasize: What we suffer from today is humility in the wrong place. Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction; where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself but undoubting about the truth. This has been exactly reversed … We are on the road to producing a race of men too mentally modest to believe in the multiplication table.Read more at location 1609
There is a failure of ethical imagination in our culture that probably makes my argument sound quaint and idealistic. We have forgotten how to flex two mental muscles at the same time: the muscle of moral conviction and the muscle of compassion to all regardless of their morality. Secular society no less than religion often operates on a narrow-minded logic: you can only love those whose lives you approve of. You can only be friends with people who agree with you. The logic can take you in two directions. The religious version reduces the number of people it loves—to match the few lifestyles it approves. The secular version increases the number of lifestyles it approves to the point of accepting virtually everything, thus fulfilling G. K. Chesterton’s famous quip about open-mindedness: “An open mind is like an open mouth: its purpose is to bite on something nourishing. Otherwise, it becomes like a sewer, accepting everything, rejecting nothing.”6Read more at location 1624
But there is a third way, based on a different logic. It’s where we learn to respect and care even for those with whom we profoundly disagree. We maintain our convictions but choose never to allow them to become justification for thinking ourselves better than those with contrary convictions. We move beyond mere tolerance to true humility, the key to harmony at the social level.Read more at location 1635
CHAPTER 11 Steps How It’s Possible to Become (More) Humble Read more at location 1639
It is deceptively simple: We are shaped by what we love.Read more at location 1654
We are shaped by what we admire.Read more at location 1669
More important than any of the tips below is the observation that the journey to attaining a measure of humility probably begins with the simple recognition of its inherent beauty. Ponder the aesthetic quality of the virtue, observe it in those you respect and then watch it grow in yourself.Read more at location 1669
Reflect on the lives of the humble.Read more at location 1672
More important than books, of course, are the people in our lives who exhibit humility. Reflect on them. I trust most readers will be able to think of a few people around them who hold their power for the good of others before themselves. My suggestion is that you watch them closely, talk to them about their decisions and try to emulate them.Read more at location 1687
Third, conduct thought experiments to enhance humility. A thought experiment is an imaginative exercise designed to open up the possibilities of a dilemma and so bring clarity. Read more at location 1694
Thought experiments can help develop humility in business and personal settings by imagining humble courses of action in advance of confronting potentially tense situations.Read more at location 1704
Fourth, act humbly. This piece of advice may sound a little crude and simplistic but it works. Just force yourself on occasion to act humbly. I am not talking about “pretending". I am recommending that you develop the humility muscle by exercising it, even if it doesn’t feel up to the task.Read more at location 1712
My fifth tip flows from the previous one: invite criticism. Invite criticism from friends and colleagues.Read more at location 1731
I am not advocating a horizontal approach to leadership. I firmly believe that lines of responsibility and authority ought to be respected in healthy organizations. I am simply pointing out that allowing constructive criticism and encouraging it at the team level is one powerful way to foster a little humility. Read more at location 1753
Finally, forget about being humble. In offering these “tips” for cultivating humility, I am reminded of something C. S. Lewis, the famous Oxford don and author of the Chronicles of Narnia, said about the truly humble person. He insisted that humility is quite unlike the property of, for example, having brown hair. It is not something you style in yourself or even especially notice in others. You don’t suddenly meet someone and think, “Wow! What dazzling humility!” It is a rather low-key virtue. It often takes a while to spot in others, partly because the truly humble person is not at all concerned about appearing humble. He is not thinking of himself at all. Lewis put it this way: Do not imagine that if you meet a really humble man he will be what most people call “humble” nowadays: he will not be a sort of greasy, smarmy person, who is always telling you that, of course, he is nobody. Probably all you will think about him is that he seemed a cheerful, intelligent chap who took a real interest in what you said to him. If you do dislike him it will be because you feel a little envious of anyone who seems to enjoy life so easily. He will not be thinking about humility: he will not be thinking about himself at all. Read more at location 1757
If anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step. The first step is to realise that one is proud. And a biggish step, too. At least, nothing whatever can be done before it. If you think you are not conceited, it means you are very conceited indeed. Read more at location 1770
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