I hate it when someone recovers from a medical condition and god gets all the credit. It’s a miracle! He’s either good or mysterious, right? If I was a doctor that would infuriate me.
But there’s something even worse.
A few years ago, a friend of mine overcame a hardship at work. This friend – who had never been religious in the past – credited god for her success. She said she couldn’t do it on her own so god must have been helping her. Well, obviously she could do it and it’s absolutely heartbreaking that she couldn’t recognize her own inner strength.
People are resilient and should take credit for their personal accomplishments.
Of course, this inspired me to write a poem…
You Didn’t Need God
You said you couldn’t do it alone
But you did.
We are all powerful
In our own lives.
Scale that jagged cliff,
Surf those tempest-swept waters–
You are in charge.
You’re secretly surefooted,
Resourceful with undiscovered confidence.
What you think is strength in god
Is really strength within yourself.
You are more capable than you know.
The problem is, nobody likes a braggart.
I recently had a significant accomplishment at work. When people congratulated me, was I supposed to say, “Thank you, I really am great, aren’t I?”
Maybe if I lived back in Beowulf’s time. But in our culture? Of course not. The thing to do in our culture is to say “Oh, lots of other people contributed, it was a team effort, so and so in particular did a lot of work.” Giving some god the credit probably stems from the same impulse to avoid the spotlight.
I can see where people would use god as a way to avoid the spotlight, but this wasn’t exactly the case with my friend. She actually doubts her abilities without god. She explained this to me over lunch one day and I’m pretty sure I sat there with my mouth open the whole time. It was really sad.
There’s bragging, and there’s accepting compliments gracefully. If someone commends your achievement, a simple “Thanks, I’m just glad it all worked out,” won’t be perceived as bragging. If you take all credit for an obviously group effort, that too won’t sit well with your group or those who know it wasn’t all you. But denying you did anything good (unless you were just the nominal leader who did no actual work) is a form of humble bragging that draws more attention than just saying thanks.
I hate getting compliments, period (raises, otoh, gimme). It took me a long time to get that just saying a quick “thanks” and quickly moving on was easier and less attention-drawing than “Really, it wasn’t that great, I totally screwed up this part,” which ends up with them having to counter my counter, etc., and starts to look like fishing.