GFM Blog Series, Week 4: Krista Rodkey!

GFM Blog Series: This spring semester we’re going to introduce what we hope will become a new GFM tradition—our blog is going to feature a short, open-topic reflection each Monday, written by graduate students & faculty members.  This week, Krista Rodkey, philosopher extraordinaire, writes on the tricky subject of pride in academia. 

We’re on the lookout for people willing to post, so if you’re interested, contact Kerilyn Harkaway-Krieger (kharkawa@indiana.edu).

_________

Krista’s Musings on Pride in the Academic Life

I thought I’d write a bit about the difficulties of spotting and resisting pride while in grad school. It’s no surprise that academia, a place where individuals are constantly measured and known for their achievements, is a breeding ground for pride (and its neighboring vice, envy). In my own life, I find it difficult to know how to distinguish between the natural and appropriate desire to rejoice in my accomplishments and the less innocent desires: (a) to think I am, on account of my accomplishments, more important than my fellows, (b) to get caught up in enjoying the pleasures of pride, making it a habit to reflect on my accomplishments as a source of comfort, and (c) to take pride as the source of my motivation—to do my best not in order to honor God, but in order to be proud of what I have done.
 
This is pride as we expect it to look: pride in individual achievements and personal merit. But though problematic, it is in some ways refreshingly simple. How often have we smiled at the transparent boasts of others? My sense is that this kind of pride is fairly easy to spot (in others and ourselves) and to then resist. Far more insidious is what I would call ‘sophisticated pride’—a pride that is itself too proud to make boasts, too proud to overestimate the value of its own accomplishments, too proud, in fact, to indulge in the usual weaknesses of pride. Chesterton, in one of his stories, says “It is the humble man who speaks too much, the proud man watches himself too closely.” Because of this kind of self-watchfulness, the person of sophisticated pride rarely betrays himself with direct expressions of pride. His pride is not in this or that achievement but in himself and his own judgment. He is self-sufficient and doesn’t ask for people to affirm him. He might in fact undervalue his accomplishments, dismissing the compliments of others because his is the only opinion he values and trusts.
 
Sophisticated pride runs counter to the gospel both in its self-sufficiency and in its reliance on self-judgment. The Christian message is that we are all broken and in constant need, that we are blind and imperfect self-knowers. Yet sophisticated pride is dangerous because it doesn’t look like pride. Often it appears as a desire not to inconvenience others or to indulge in pride of the simple sort. This is, I think, one reason why it is so seductive in the academic setting—as grad students we take self-sufficiency and objectivity seriously; we think of it as pulling one’s own weight, not looking at one’s own work with biases or blinders, etc. But it is pride none the less, and I hope that naming it as a form of pride helps unmask its true nature, making it easier to spot and resist.
 
I know that I have at times obsessed over finding my own flaws, academic and spiritual. It looks at first like a perfectly reasonable move—how better to avoid delusion and vanity? There is also something reassuring about knowing that you won’t look a fool for over-valuing yourself. However, I’ve come to realize that this strategy is dubious. After all, at times ignorance of one’s faults can be a good thing. I think of the grandfather in one of Flannery O’Connor’s short stories: he betrays his grandson, repents, and is eventually reconciled. Only some time after the reconciliation does he see the magnitude of the betrayal, and he realizes that “his true depravity had been hidden from him lest it cause him despair.” So when I start to obsess about knowing all my faults, I try to remind myself that my ignorance might be a form of grace. The result can be freeing—acknowledging that God is the one who ultimately appraises the heart, I can give up on self-judgment and focus on the task is at hand.
It seems like it is traditional to end these reflections with a list of practical suggestions. With some trepidation, I’ll give you mine:
 
--When faced with a choice between indulging simple pride and cultivating sophisticated pride, opt for the former. I think it is better to openly sing ‘songs of self-congratulations’ than to stuff pride under the rug and have it develop into who knows what. If singing your own praises ends up making you feel a little silly, so much the better.
 
--Be critical about the impulse to avoid inconveniencing others. I don’t have a car, so I have to ask people for rides. Sometimes I talk too much instead of listening. Sometimes I ask people to do me a favor. Obviously this shouldn’t be used as an excuse for selfishness, but I think if you consider this as giving others an opportunity to be generous to you, there is something honest and right about it.
 
--If you are like me and occasionally tormented by the desire for exact self-knowledge, just breathe and tell yourself that there are worse things than mis-estimating your own worth. I try to imagine myself as having the psychology of characters in the Winnie-the-Pooh or the Jeeves stories, which makes mistakes of self-estimation in either direction seem less critical and more amusing!