You’ve just taken an incredible picture on your phone. The timing for the sunset was just right as the waves were coming in. However, you notice that you’ve also captured an older, rusty parked car in the picture. Thankfully, you can use the simple ‘crop’ feature and edit what you don’t like out so that the final product that you and others will see from that point on will be nothing but a masterpiece worthy of the cover of National Geographic.
Bernard of Clairvaux says this is what is going on inside of our hearts as the sickness of pride continues to spread. As we evaluate our heart and lives, we begin to automatically crop out what we don’t like.
We crop out the weaknesses, faults, failures, and sins of our own hearts. Instead, we focus only on our strengths and gifts. Bernard says we will even use our imagination to exaggerate our strengths or create new ones so that our internal sense of confidence continues to grow. Relationally, we crop out the gifts and strengths of others, focusing mainly or only on their weaknesses and sins. We’d prefer not to notice anything in someone else that might make us feel smaller or less than. Here, we’ll use our imaginations again- to magnify the faults of others. “His eyes are closed to anything that shows his own vileness or the excellence of others, wide open to what flatters himself.”
When we’ve done these three things enough- cropping out our weaknesses, ignoring the strengths of others, and focusing on their weaknesses- they become automatic. An initial felt benefit of this is that the emotional rollercoaster of pride’s second step has given way to a more stable self-confidence. The long-term consequence, however, is that you begin to live in a highly photoshopped world, almost completely blinding you to the reality of your own weaknesses and the great strengths of others. I say "almost completely" because Bernard says at this stage, there is enough conscience still in tact, that we periodically realize our perception of ourselves and others is inaccurate.
If this stage is about what we see, the next will focus more on what we say. Stay tuned!
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