Swallow Your Pride

I have a bad habit of being a little prideful. As much as I hate to admit it, it is annoyingly true. While I am a humble being, my pride kicks in when it comes to allowing people to help me. Naturally I am giver, it is in my heart, to help people and give when they are in need. I have a case of I can save the world syndrome. I don't mind giving my last to help someone in need, but it’s hard for me to allow someone else to help me when I am in need. I have a host of friends that are constantly on my case regarding this subject. They don't understand why I would rather go through than to let someone help me when they can. After all that's what friends are for right?

It has been my experience that some people not all, use the things that they do for you and hold it over your head. So to avoid this I prefer not to ask people to do anything for me. I had an excellence upbringing in my opinion. It wasn't perfect but I was raised by a mother and a grandmother who instilled values and wisdom in me. Unfortunately while my mother and father our still married I was not privileged to have been raised with a father in the house. Sadly to say he was a great disappointment. He never really did anything for us, and whenever we asked him for something he rarely came through. I can remember my freshman year of college, which was the straw that broke the camel's back for me. I had asked my father to buy me some groceries to take back to school and his response was "You are grown now, buy your own groceries." I couldn't believe it, the nerve of that man, but from that moment on I decided that I would never ask anyone to do anything else for me, thus I became prideful.

Being independent is never a bad thing, but being prideful is not good either. Hezekiah Walker said it best when he penned the hit song, "I need you to survive". We in fact do need each other to survive. We are all one big corporate body that should be able to lean and depend on each other in time of crisis. "And whether one member suffer, all the members suffer with it; or one member be honored, all the members rejoice with it" 1 Corinthians 12:26. This is something that I had to learn through the wisdom of family, friends and even my church family. It’s ok to lean on people and allow them to help you. God will never allow you to give so much of yourself and not be poured back into. I have become so thankful, of those friends and church family members who have had a sincere heart, and come to my rescue when I was in need. Not because I asked them to or to later hold over my head, but because they understood and recognized the fact of being one corporate body. Life is about learning valuable lessons, and I’m so glad that I have finally learned to swallow my pride, and accept the fact that I can't do everything by myself. If I can swallow my pride, I know you can to. It's very easy, just tilt your head back and swallow.