Humility, development work, and other questions
“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.”
For many years, I have been puzzled by this quote, as I have been contrasting it with a thought by CS Lewis, which states that a truly humble person does not think of himself lowly, but rather is not thinking about himself at all. I always thought that this conflicted with the above quote. But a new meaning for that phrase dawned on me recently.
We recently held a conference at work with the senior staff, talking about such lofty things as vision, mission, sense of purpose, the types of things we are getting involved in, the work we do, etc. This was a very interesting time for me, and I left with more questions than answers about the work we do here. Who do short term missions trips benefit more? The people going, or the people they are going to help? How do you do development work without creating dependence? Would we be better off to simply provide food relief, and get out and let people work out their own method of survival? Do we really know what is best for them?
I’ve always maintained that I have gotten more out of my overseas experiences than I could ever possibly give back. But how many people come over with the attitude that they are doing a big favour to the poor and needy in the third world? That they can use their superior education and knowledge to help those who are less fortunate? I am not saying that we don’t have good intentions. Anyone who is willing to sacrifice time, money, safety, security, etc. in order to try and help fellow human beings has at least some intention of trying to good. But how we do it speaks a lot about who we are, and so much of our attitudes about who we are, and about who the people are that we are helping, comes through in what we do. How can you teach something without showing an inherent belief that you know more about the subject than the person you are teaching? One thing I’ve noticed in just about every expat I’ve met here is a belief, most often unknown and not directly stated, that they have superior knowledge or capabilities to those that they are helping.
I think this sort of help is fraught with danger. Either the person you are helping detects your air of superiority and rejects you, or they believe your air of superiority is justified, and they feel helpless and dependent on you. The humble response would be to accept the areas where they can genuinely receive help from us through our access to resources they could not obtain on their own, while still maintaining their own independence and using those resources to better their own position. The humble giving attitude is this: that we may have had some opportunities in life that have allowed us to become more educated, more affluent, but that we don’t necessarily know the best way to live our lives, let alone the best way for other people to live theirs. We help out where we can, and we try and learn from the people we are helping. I may question the survival methods of an African villager, but I must admit that I can never fully understand the reality of their life. Even when I spent some time in the village, I knew that if something went wrong, that help was only a phone call away for me. They do not have the same safety nets that I do, so they learn over time how to fend for themselves.
So, to me, “in humility, consider others better than yourself” has come to mean this: there is no way that I am superior in every way to any person that I meet. There is the age old maxim that we can learn something from everyone we meet. I think our success or failure in building relationships with others is directly dependent on our remembrance of this truth. We must seek to understand, instead of to be understood. We must learn to listen, so that we can speak to people instead of speaking at them.
Of course this is harder to do in practice than it sounds on paper. If I want to communicate with a villager, I have many barriers to overcome. There are language and culture barriers. There is the inherent assumptions we may have about each other purely based on our appearance. White men are often viewed as important, wealthy, and possessing great influence. When I first visited the villages and listened to them tell me of their problems, I felt very helpless since there was little I could do. I don’t have the influence to get a maize mill built, I don’t have the money to improve roads, and I don’t have the power to affect the weather. I can only hope and pray that they find a way, and that the organizations that come to help them do more good than harm.
This is why I must submit to a higher power in all that I do. Many question the wisdom of my choices, and see weakness in my decision to surrender to a God whose existence I cannot prove. But I can see no point to our time here apart from the belief that there is a Creator, and that we have been designed with a purpose. There are too many questions that to me have no answer apart from that belief. I humbly admit that I have no idea what help is truly needed by the people of Malawi. I do not even know with certainty the needs of my friends, family, or even myself. I know some of our wants, and many of our felt needs, but I don’t truly know our actual needs. The word need is abused, unless it is accompanied by the words “in order to”. I need more money is an incomplete thought. I need more money in order to: give my kids a better life/have a bigger house/feed my family/go on a much needed vacation, etc. The completion of the sentence reflects our value set. Once we know what we are hoping to accomplish with what we believe we need, then we can start to see what we truly value. If you need to work harder at your stressful job in order to earn enough money to afford an escape from your stressful job, then couldn’t the same means be accomplished by leaving the stressful job for a less stressful job that paid less. How can you better provide for your family? By spending time with them and helping their growth, or working long hours to give them money while they are raised by others? I do not want to seem judgmental. Each person has a situation that I cannot possibly fully understand. But I believe we all have more choices and options than we often realize. I encourage you to take an honest look at how you spend your time and money, and see what it tells you about what you value. Does it match what you believe your values to be?
This is my problem with writing. I set out to make a point, and I get lost on tangents, trying to find a neat way to wrap things up and pull them together. And I lack the editing skill and the initiative to pull things apart. I have many such incomplete thoughts. Maybe I’ll just start posting them, and you can take out of them what you will. After all, this is only a blog site.
For many years, I have been puzzled by this quote, as I have been contrasting it with a thought by CS Lewis, which states that a truly humble person does not think of himself lowly, but rather is not thinking about himself at all. I always thought that this conflicted with the above quote. But a new meaning for that phrase dawned on me recently.
We recently held a conference at work with the senior staff, talking about such lofty things as vision, mission, sense of purpose, the types of things we are getting involved in, the work we do, etc. This was a very interesting time for me, and I left with more questions than answers about the work we do here. Who do short term missions trips benefit more? The people going, or the people they are going to help? How do you do development work without creating dependence? Would we be better off to simply provide food relief, and get out and let people work out their own method of survival? Do we really know what is best for them?
I’ve always maintained that I have gotten more out of my overseas experiences than I could ever possibly give back. But how many people come over with the attitude that they are doing a big favour to the poor and needy in the third world? That they can use their superior education and knowledge to help those who are less fortunate? I am not saying that we don’t have good intentions. Anyone who is willing to sacrifice time, money, safety, security, etc. in order to try and help fellow human beings has at least some intention of trying to good. But how we do it speaks a lot about who we are, and so much of our attitudes about who we are, and about who the people are that we are helping, comes through in what we do. How can you teach something without showing an inherent belief that you know more about the subject than the person you are teaching? One thing I’ve noticed in just about every expat I’ve met here is a belief, most often unknown and not directly stated, that they have superior knowledge or capabilities to those that they are helping.
I think this sort of help is fraught with danger. Either the person you are helping detects your air of superiority and rejects you, or they believe your air of superiority is justified, and they feel helpless and dependent on you. The humble response would be to accept the areas where they can genuinely receive help from us through our access to resources they could not obtain on their own, while still maintaining their own independence and using those resources to better their own position. The humble giving attitude is this: that we may have had some opportunities in life that have allowed us to become more educated, more affluent, but that we don’t necessarily know the best way to live our lives, let alone the best way for other people to live theirs. We help out where we can, and we try and learn from the people we are helping. I may question the survival methods of an African villager, but I must admit that I can never fully understand the reality of their life. Even when I spent some time in the village, I knew that if something went wrong, that help was only a phone call away for me. They do not have the same safety nets that I do, so they learn over time how to fend for themselves.
So, to me, “in humility, consider others better than yourself” has come to mean this: there is no way that I am superior in every way to any person that I meet. There is the age old maxim that we can learn something from everyone we meet. I think our success or failure in building relationships with others is directly dependent on our remembrance of this truth. We must seek to understand, instead of to be understood. We must learn to listen, so that we can speak to people instead of speaking at them.
Of course this is harder to do in practice than it sounds on paper. If I want to communicate with a villager, I have many barriers to overcome. There are language and culture barriers. There is the inherent assumptions we may have about each other purely based on our appearance. White men are often viewed as important, wealthy, and possessing great influence. When I first visited the villages and listened to them tell me of their problems, I felt very helpless since there was little I could do. I don’t have the influence to get a maize mill built, I don’t have the money to improve roads, and I don’t have the power to affect the weather. I can only hope and pray that they find a way, and that the organizations that come to help them do more good than harm.
This is why I must submit to a higher power in all that I do. Many question the wisdom of my choices, and see weakness in my decision to surrender to a God whose existence I cannot prove. But I can see no point to our time here apart from the belief that there is a Creator, and that we have been designed with a purpose. There are too many questions that to me have no answer apart from that belief. I humbly admit that I have no idea what help is truly needed by the people of Malawi. I do not even know with certainty the needs of my friends, family, or even myself. I know some of our wants, and many of our felt needs, but I don’t truly know our actual needs. The word need is abused, unless it is accompanied by the words “in order to”. I need more money is an incomplete thought. I need more money in order to: give my kids a better life/have a bigger house/feed my family/go on a much needed vacation, etc. The completion of the sentence reflects our value set. Once we know what we are hoping to accomplish with what we believe we need, then we can start to see what we truly value. If you need to work harder at your stressful job in order to earn enough money to afford an escape from your stressful job, then couldn’t the same means be accomplished by leaving the stressful job for a less stressful job that paid less. How can you better provide for your family? By spending time with them and helping their growth, or working long hours to give them money while they are raised by others? I do not want to seem judgmental. Each person has a situation that I cannot possibly fully understand. But I believe we all have more choices and options than we often realize. I encourage you to take an honest look at how you spend your time and money, and see what it tells you about what you value. Does it match what you believe your values to be?
This is my problem with writing. I set out to make a point, and I get lost on tangents, trying to find a neat way to wrap things up and pull them together. And I lack the editing skill and the initiative to pull things apart. I have many such incomplete thoughts. Maybe I’ll just start posting them, and you can take out of them what you will. After all, this is only a blog site.
posted by Chuck @ 5:48 AM
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