I'm not good enough

In its various forms, the phrase "I'm not good enough" is very common. More significantly, that same concept holds significant influence over the thinking of many of us. In a way, it seems somewhat odd that an attitude of self-effacement should be so prevelent. Shouldn't arrogance be a much more natural temptation?

Before we look at the differences between these two responses toward the reality outside of our individual selves, it is important to be aware of the common ground on which they rest: both arise from a moral awareness. At first, this may seem like an overgeneralization. While saying that I am a coward or bragging of my generosity may certainly pass as moral statements, it seems unreasonable to attach ethics to phrases like "I'm good at basketball" or "my writing abilities are deficient." Properly considered, writing and playing basketball are not innately moral in nature. It is not virtuous to to excell, nor wrong to lack ability, in such skills. However, it is easy to forget that when we say we are good or poor at something, we are using language common to language of morality. In fact, it is impossible to say that I am good at basketball without their being some standard of good to which I refer. Similarly, saying I am poor at writing must be said with reference to this standard, which I am failing to attain. Just as statements of morality depend on particular standards of value, so any statement of "I'm not good enough" depends on a standard of "good enough."

In one sense, the tendency that many of us have to be painfully conscious of our inadaquacies is a demonstration of our individual moral consciousness, and not necessarily in the sense of feeling guilty over issues that are not matters of virtue or vice. In other words, we have a right and appropriate awareness of how we ought to be, and of the form we were designed to manifest.

However, while we often do truly stand as subjects of the standard "good enough", the problem is often that we make the standard "good enough" our own subject which depends on us. If we are the ones who set the standard, we are operating in defiance against either God's law, or what in fact God made us to be. As terrible as this sounds, and in fact is, it also seems as though there would be little risk that our own standards are actually higher than God's, and that therefore even our best is still an underperformance. This much is true. However, the error is that a system of self-justification or self-condemnation must, by rejecting God's standards, reject his grace as well. As much as the concept of grace seems opposite from that of law, it actually depends on it. Grace cannot exist without a real standard that has not been met.

Another significant problem exists with this self-declared verdict. Not only is it wrong in principle for the very reason that it is self-declared, but also that it has the tendancy to misapprehend the real things that are intended for us. Maybe God's design for me, even if realized perfectly, would not include the ability to yodel Russian folk songs while juggling greased turtles. Ridiculous examples put asside, we never have the right to concoct our own design or purpose, which comes from what we were made to do, both as humans and as individual children of God. That right is reserved for authentic existentialists and other characters of fiction.

Finally, as much as a feeling resembling guilt is in someways appropriate for our deficiencies in abilities for which we are intended but we lack, we should not ascribe a sense of moral guilt to it, appart from the sense of collective guilt whereby all of us suffer the maladies and ultimately, mortality, of a fallen world. We are works in progress, and if we were in all respects perfect, we would not be here.

Therefore, in light of all of this, our sentiment of "I'm not good enough" is only nonsensical in a materialist, Nietchian world in which the only virtues are those which we create out of the will to power and ultimately the will to survive and cope within an irrational and meaningless universe. As creatures made by God to be something wonderful, the sentiment makes perfect sense. However, if this attitude defines our own self-perception, it stands in denial of the voice of God, who in Christ has met this standard, and through His spirit and His promise in Christ is surely realizing it in us. Let us thank God for His work, trust Him to continue, and faithfully do ours.

reading

I feel as though I ought to feel some hesitation in writing the following in a blog whose dedicated purpose is to discuss theological and philosophical ideals, but as I yearn to express my voice to some ear - imaginary though it be for such as I within this vast technological realm - I cannot help but herein write out a more personal thought which now besets my mind.

The thought, in question, concerns the manner in which my own sense of value so easily tilts back and forth upon the fulcrum of intelligence, and my sense of intelligence upon the fulcrum of such petty and irrational marks of intellect as to how many books and of what sort I happen to have read.

For one who loves truth, or whose heart yearns to love it, facts themselves prove to share a great deal of importance with the manner of their expression. Indeed, truths and untruths can expressed, although not logically demstrated, not just through propositions, but also through how one chooses to deliver them. My observation on my self is such an expression, because it uses accurate language to make a very silly idea look as silly as it really is, even while I can go spend much time almost fully believing it.

Upon such silliness I can, and should laugh. However, my intense need for justification of myself by claiming the somewhat arbitrary title of a well-read individual becomes impossible to satisfy if is not properly evaluated and dismissed accordingly. In other words, my drive to read more old and famous books is really built, a great deal of the time, around an attitude of "one-up-manship", in which I am in I cannot consider myself a satisfactorally intelligent individual without being "better read" than the next person. In such a situation, I do not easily remember that there will always be a next person maliciously standing as a foil to my humble ambition to become the smartest (i.e. most well read) man alive. (Let alone the smartest human.) Nor do I stop to ask "why is the read man read," from which I would in all probability conclude that it is, in the best scenerious, because of an intense enjoyment of reading, and in worst ones, because of an overwhelming compulsion to attain some kind of status via association with smart people who read a lot. I certainly have no desire to be part of the latter group, and therefore should be like the former in that I do something I enjoy for its own sake without attaching strange kinds of associative importance to certain types of activity, particularly when I do, after all, happen to greatly enjoy reading for its own sake after I have forgotten that doing it is critical my self worth.

I should at least take note of my friend in 10th grade english class who did not did not meet his own expectations of brilliance according to the results of a rather challenging vocabulary quiz, and as a result cynically stated that suicide may be an appropriate recourse. His reaction evoked my pity and sorrow, that he so little respected the wonderful mind which God had given him and that he so needlessly sorrowed himself because of the sense of pride and the false measure of self worth which are so often fellow conspiritors in the downfall of many beautiful gifts of God. I realize that I have done the same, and wish no more bring such sorrow to others, nor before God because of my pride.