Your cravings as a human animal do not become a prayer just because it is God whom you ask to attend to them.
Dag HammarskjoldRead
Humility is just as much the opposite of self-abasement as it is of self-exaltation. To be humble is not to make comparisons. Secure in its reality, the self is neither better nor worse, bigger nor smaller, than anything else in the universe. It is ? is nothing, yet at the same time one with everything. It is in this sense that humility is absolute self-effacement.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Humility involves recognizing one's place in the universe without self-deprecation or arrogance.
This quote by Dag Hammarskjold emphasizes that humility is a balanced state of self-awareness that neither inflates nor diminishes one’s self-worth. Instead of comparing oneself to others, true humility comes from acknowledging one's connection to everyone and everything, with a sense of peace and equanimity about one’s existence.
Themes
HumilitySelf-AwarenessBalanceSelf-WorthConnection
In practice
Example use cases
In a motivational speech about leadership, one could use this quote to highlight the importance of humility.
More from Dag Hammarskjold
All quotes →It is not we who seek the Way, but the Way which seeks us. That is why you are faithful to it, even while you stand waiting, so long as you are prepared, and act the moment you are confronted by its demands.
Dag HammarskjoldRead
Do not seek death. Death will find you. But seek the road which makes death a fulfillment.
Dag HammarskjoldRead
The world cannot live at peace without the United Nations. For this reason: it creates a reasonable guarantee that all this change in the world, these tremendous political and economic developments, can be channelized, kept orderly. The United Nations is a mold that keeps the hot metal from spilling over.
Dag HammarskjoldRead
In a dream I walked with God through the deep places of creation; past walls that receded and gates that opened through hall after hall of silence, darkness and refreshment--the dwelling place of souls acquainted with light and warmth--until, around me, was an infinity into which we all flowed together and lived anew, like the rings made by raindrops falling upon wide expanses of calm dark waters.
Dag HammarskjoldRead
He is one of those who has had the wilderness for a pillow, and called a star his brother. Alone. But loneliness can be a communion.
Dag HammarskjoldRead
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