Proverbs 11:2 ESV: When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom.
You would be surprised where a prideful spirit can take you! Pride is sneaky and hard to uncover, and it can show up as actions that would seemingly be a rightful response to people or situations.
I tend to be of a breed of strong women, just like the women in my family before me. This can be an amazing trait for business. I am also very analytical, so I do not step into a situation or concern that arises before I have done my due diligence. There is a problem with this trait—it tends to make me a bit of a lone ranger. I do not always ask for advice from my husband, who is my business partner, or my team, all of whom are a wealth of amazing wisdom.
In today’s business climate with COVID and all the economic uncertainty, it will take just those kinds of strong and courageous businesspeople to make it through the storms. Claiming that I am one of those people may be construed as prideful. However, I do give credit to God for all I am, and I know I can do nothing without Him. A caveat, though—I am human, and I can get to thinking that I know more than others.
The Bible is very clear that pride comes before the fall. My thoughts on this particular piece of scripture have allowed me to see through many decisions that I made on my own, without counsel from my husband or team, that might have been the right decision, but there were many better ways to achieve the outcome. It also could have been that the decision was just a bad one, or the timing was all wrong. This is where my pride was involved without me even knowing it was there. How did it get in? It got in through my busyness—too busy to talk to anyone.
However, over the years (I do wish it would have been sooner) we have been in business, I have learned to train my staff and help my husband see that I need strong A-type personalities, as well as courageous souls, to come alongside me and speak sternly but respectfully into my thought processes before I make decisions for our company. I have also learned, through my very wise husband, to slow down; great decisions take time.
In this time of the pandemic, if we let our pride dig us into a hole, it will manifest in these areas:
First, where we believe what we think is the whole truth. We will be sadly mistaken because these are unprecedented times, and nobody knows their right hand from their left. God is the only one who knows the future and the outcome of these times.
Second, if we are prideful enough to believe business practices from our past are going to work for us today. God is resetting how our businesses are to be run. If we do not move with the changing times, the fall will come.
Third, if we are prideful enough to think the bottom line is the most important thing in business, when your bottom line is in the black and you have ruined all your relationships through your prideful actions, you are soon to learn that relationships are far superior to money.
Take time to seek God to see where your own pride barometer is; then take time to open up to others and ask for their input. Always be thankful for someone’s input, no matter what you do with it.
Quick tip: Never throw out any information someone gives you before you have taken it before God and asked Him to dissect it with you. Believe me, your pride can throw out valuable solutions just because your own solutions will seem better in your own mind.
