Do not shrink your desires
Dreaming small is also a defect.
We see runaway ambition coming from afar. The opposite defect goes unnoticed and causes just as much harm or more: aiming low, settling, trimming desires "to avoid disappointment." The classical tradition called this pusillanimity: a small soul. And the opposite virtue, magnanimity: a great soul, capable of pursuing great things and setting to work on them.
It is not thinking you are great: it is desiring in a great way. And not for your own showcase, but for something worthy: your family, your work well done, the good you can do that no one else will do for you. That is why the magnanimous person can be truly humble: humility does not shrink dreams; it shrinks vanity.
God did not give you great desires for you to leave them hungry. Small ideals are fulfilled and disappoint; great ones pull you upward throughout your entire life.
Key idea
Humility is not at odds with thinking big: it is at odds with thinking only of yourself.
Your challenge for this idea
Write down what you would do in a big way if you were not afraid of failing, and take the first small step this week.
BASED ON
Magnanimity →