When Being Humble Means Making Yourself Small

I've been thinking about how easy it is to make ourselves small and call it being humble.

You might have worked hard to get where you are in your career, but when someone asks what you want for yourself, you find yourself talking about your team and what you hope to accomplish for them. Then you're nominated for an award, and instead of feeling proud of what you've accomplished, you're thinking about all the people who deserve it more than you do. Even if you win, you might find yourself talking about how much the recognition could help others without ever really acknowledging what it means to you personally.

Maybe someone compliments you on how well you've raised your children, and you immediately start talking about how much your partner has done and how you couldn't have done it without them.

You appreciate the people around you and want them to receive the recognition they deserve. But somewhere in all of that, someone was trying to recognize you, too.

If every answer about you starts with someone else, is it really about you anymore?

There is nothing wrong with wanting to make life better for the people around you. Being thoughtful and generous can bring so much good into our relationships, families and workplaces. There are times when putting someone else's needs ahead of our own is simply part of caring about them.

But when putting others first becomes so much a part of who you are, it can become difficult to recognize when you're doing it because you want to and when you're doing it because acknowledging something for yourself feels uncomfortable.

Perhaps you've never really questioned it because you've always taken pride in being someone who cares about others and doesn't need to be the centre of attention. People appreciate you for that, but somewhere along the way, being humble can become so closely connected to putting yourself aside that acknowledging your own contribution begins to feel selfish.

When Making Yourself Small Starts to Feel Like Who You Are

There may have been a time in your life when making yourself small made things easier. Maybe expressing what you wanted led to an argument, or you learned that keeping other people happy helped you avoid rejection or disappointment. Perhaps it was easier to agree or give someone else the credit than to risk upsetting them.

And when people began recognizing you for being thoughtful and always finding a way to bring everyone together, you may have found yourself wanting to live up to the person they saw you as.

After years of being recognized for putting others first, you may not even realize how much of yourself you've learned to put aside.

You might even find yourself feeling uncomfortable when someone encourages you to do something for yourself. You appreciate that they're thinking of you, but your first thought is about how it might affect someone else or whether you really need it.

And if you've spent years being the person who doesn't ask for much, admitting that you want something can feel like you're suddenly asking for too much.

After a while, making yourself small may no longer feel like something you do to avoid conflict or disappointment. It may simply feel like who you are.

Why Does Acknowledging Your Own Worth Feel Like Taking Something Away From Someone Else?

Why can it feel so uncomfortable to acknowledge something you've accomplished without immediately giving someone else the credit?

You appreciate the people who have helped you and want them to know how much they've contributed. But why does acknowledging your own part in something sometimes feel as though you're taking credit away from them?

If someone you cared about accomplished something they had worked hard for, you probably wouldn't think twice about telling them how proud you were of them. You wouldn't expect them to feel selfish for being proud of themselves, so why can it feel so uncomfortable when someone recognizes something good about you?

Maybe there's something you've wanted to do for years, but every time you think about pursuing it, you start considering how it might affect everyone around you. Before long, you're explaining why it would be good for your family or how it might help someone else, as though simply wanting it for yourself isn't enough of a reason.

You might even find yourself hoping that someone else will encourage you to do it, because then you won't have to feel as though you're being selfish for wanting it.

But why should wanting something for yourself feel selfish in the first place?

You Don't Have to Make Yourself Small

It's easy to spend so much of your life putting others first that you don't really think about it anymore. It's just how you've always been, and people have come to appreciate you for it.

But when being humble starts meaning that you can't acknowledge something good about yourself without feeling uncomfortable, I wonder how much of your own worth you've learned to put aside.

Being humble was never meant to mean that everyone else's worth matters more than your own.