Michael was a very brilliant student, he was so intelligent that he found favour in the sight of all his teachers. But over time he developed a very bad habit, pride. As the most intelligent student that he was, he was as proud as a peacock. He thought that everyone should grovel before him, he took advantage of every slight opportunity to show off his intelligence. As a result, he lost all his friends. At first, he thought that all his friends were jealous of his intelligence, so he despised them all.
Pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.
— proverbs 16:18
Michael who was once a very intelligent student, started performing poorly in his exams, his TRUE friends offered to put him through his in the areas he found difficult but he bluntly refused. He was still trying to feed his ego. A once intelligent boy became an average student all because of pride.

Pride is an unreasonable overestimation of one’s own superiority in talents, beauty, wealth, rank etc, which manifests itself in distance, reserve and often contempt for others. It is also the quality or state of being proud or having disdainful behaviour.

A person may be proud and still would not that he/she is.
I was once in such a situation, so I completely understand how it feels.
Who Are The Proud?
People who take advice from no one,
People who feel they’re better than everyone else.
People who refuse to acknowledge God for their success.
People who look down on others.
People who find fault in others.
People who don’t take responsibility for their actions.
People who find it hard to forgive others.
People who are quick to make enemies.
When you discover that you possess at least two of the aforementioned qualities, just know that;
YOU ARE PROUD!

Pride is a silent killer, pride kills you slowly from within. Your friend’s birthday was last month, you didn’t wish him/her a happy birthday, you felt that they are lesser humans compared to you and that you are better than them.
But on your birthday, you would want to be wakened up from bed by the melodious sound of a trumpet, get a beautiful cake and an awesome gift from your lesser human friends.
The questions are;
Who did you do the same for?
Do unto others as you would have them do to you. Pride is the founding father of selfishness. And we live in a selfish world governed by selfish people. Pride brings about disconnection from every aspect of life.
Haven’t you observed that when you feel you know something too much and pride yourself in it, the universe has a very special way of humbling you?
But those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.
— Matthew 23:12 —
The main effect of pride is disconnection. Disconnection from people, disconnection from yourself, disconnection from God.
And finally, Pride leads to destruction.

Pride disconnects you from friends and relatives you genuinely care about. Michael lost relationships with his friends because of his Pride. Pride does not do anything good in a man.
I lost relationships with most of my classmates, I thought that I was being mature and most of what we did together was all childish stuff but I didn’t know that they were angry with me, a good friend of mine told me, but we became enemies, Later on, I discovered that I was Proud.

Funnily enough, at then, I didn’t have anything worth anything, so what was I proud of? Nothing. Funny isn’t it? Pride destroys, pride never exalts. Pride is the cause of 90% of divorce and other disconnection. When you begin to feel as though you are better than everyone else and everyone else is beneath you, just know that your end is nigh.
No genuine friend of yours will tolerate your pride, so they’ll disconnect from you. If there’s anyone encouraging you when you are doing something wrong, just know that that person does not like you. The person is against your progress.

You might not agree with this but, when you finally develop pride, your friend leaves you, it’ll take a piece of you. I know how it felt to lose all my friends as a result of my bad addiction. I lost myself during that period because I wasn’t quick to admit that I was proud.
If you are proud, you’ll eventually lose yourself, you’ll begin to feel bad. You might not agree with me, but eventually, it’ll happen. You can lie to everyone except yourself. PRIDE Lead’s to DESTRUCTION.

Whoever has been marked for destruction will have pride as a habit. A man who has been successfully disconnected from God is condemned already. Pride slowly, cunningly and tactically leads to destruction. Goliath was a very proud soldier, he prided himself in his arrogance and had the effrontery to speak against the name of the lord.

He was killed by a young boy, David. With a sling and a shot. The mighty who boasts will fall in the hand of a minor.
In the story above, Michael from a ‘genius’ student to an average student, pride led to his downfall. A proud person will fall eventually, it’s only a matter of time.
The proud do not take advice nor counsel from anyone and as such, they are set for destruction.

Pride makes a man lose connection with God. If there’s anyone that hates pride the most, it’s God. And he gives grace generously. As the Scriptures say, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”
— James 4:6 —
There have been so many bible references of God humbling the proud. Pride disconnects you from God. Pride kills.

As earlier stated, when you discover that you no longer take advice from anybody; you are proud. Pride is the stage you get to before being destroyed. Here are 6 steps to getting rid of Pride;
Make your mind to getting rid of your pride,
Accept your past, present and future mistakes,
Don’t keep malice with anyone,
Take responsibility for your actions,
Have the willingness to learn,
Acknowledge God.

The first step to getting rid of pride is making up your mind. Acknowledge the fact that you are proud, but you don’t want to be proud anymore. The HUMAN MIND is the greatest asset bestowed upon us by God, being proud is a state of the mind, the first step is getting it off your mind.
You can do anything you want to do only if you put your mind to it. When you put your mind power to work, the possibilities are endless, you can soar great mountains and cross mighty oceans.

One of the greatest challenges of the proud is humbling his/herself before anyone. When you are wrong, don’t feel too ‘big’ to say sorry to someone, also when you are right and the person is wrong, try and resolve your differences amicably.
Don’t be too headstrong as to not accept your mistakes, you are a human being so you are prone to making mistakes.

Accepting your mistake is not foolish. It gives you inner peace. A lot of friendship and relationship has ended due to this very habit. Apologize to people even when you are right. It won’t take anything from you. Stop feeding your ego. Don’t feel too big to say sorry.

Never let the sun go down on your anger, don’t stay too angry at someone for a long time. Anyone who finds it difficult to forgive others is proud.

The proud is like a child. The day you grow up is the day you start taking responsibility for your actions. Don’t be ashamed, no one is going to laugh at you for taking responsibility for your actions.
Most people find it hard to admit that they are at fault and it’s bad. You are mere human, you are prone to making mistakes. Don’t feel bad. No matter how bad or good your actions are, take responsibility for them.

This is the most difficult step, most people find it hard to admit that they don’t know something, they find it more difficult to ask someone to put them through.
In life, one destiny depends on the other. You were created to impact the lives of others and others were created to make impacts on your life as well. You trying to stop a plan orchestrated by God is pride, the end result is destruction.
Don’t be afraid to ask someone for help in learning. We learn every day either through experience or through teaching.

Here’s a tip;
If you don’t know a particular thing and someone else regardless of age, race and sex knows it, ask that person to teach you. Do you know why? People may find it odd, but ignorance is a disease. Don’t be ashamed to ask someone to teach you anything you don’t know, that you ought to have known.

When anything happens to you, give thanks to God. There was a man in the Bible who was regarded as a rich fool.
He had a bountiful harvest, he asked his servants to gather all his proceeds and store them in barns; This is the work of my hand, Gather them and store them in barns that I may eat and drink for many more years to come.

But that night, he died. The Lord said unto him; “You fool, your soul will wok be required of thee tonight” He died because he refused to acknowledge God for making his bountiful harvest a success. Anything that has at one time or another worked out well for you is not by the power of your hands, it is by the grace of God. Most people better than you have done the same thing you did, but it didn’t end or turn out well for them. It is not because you are too good, it is God. When you take the glory that belongs to God, you are proud.

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