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I went through this phase as a climber (fortunately it preceded my career as a programmer, so I learned my lesson), and I've gotten over myself, and realized th

• DigitalJack 14y ago
  You bring up a point that is interesting to me. Why does it matter to our own humility if there exist people that are better/smarter/abler than we are? It does matter to me, but I feel it shouldn't. Woe to me if I am ever the best at anything, I'm sure I'd be a paragon of intolerance for my lessers. And yet, some of the smartest people I know, people who very well know their own ability, are the among the kindest people I know. On the flipside, I know some "less gifted" people that are equally as kind.
  • maratd 14y ago
    > Why does it matter to our own humility if there exist people that are better/smarter/abler than we are? They're competition. On the one hand, you compete against them and how well you do will determine your life path. On the other, if you don't have any competition ... that's an even worse outcome, since you might be moving on a fruitless path in the wrong direction. > It does matter to me, but I feel it shouldn't. Well, to be perfectly blunt, that's the definition of insecurity. In other words, you're concerned you might lose the competition in some way or another. Money, social standing, happiness, you name it. Everybody is secure and insecure in their own ways. For example, just using myself as an example ... I don't care if you're a better coder than me, but it'll bother me if you know more about how a kernel functions and works. I know or at least I think I know, very little about how kernels work. It might be true, it might be untrue, but that's how I feel. Would fixing that really change anything for me? Probably not. It's not directly applicable to my work. Which is why I don't do anything about that, it would be a waste of my time and I don't think I would enjoy it. But it's a "weak spot", so my mind dwells on it. Well, dwells on it is a bit much. Maybe passing thoughts when the subject comes up?
  • bmj 14y ago
    From my experience as a climber[1], it has to do with my own comfort level, and feeling the need to compare myself to others. When I judged others as n00bs, or weaker than I was, it was done mostly to make myself feel better about myself. I came to conclusions that rather than comparing myself to people who couldn't climb as hard (and being motivated to remain "better" than them), it was more beneficial (both for my motivation and my attitude) to rather compare myself to people better. I had no delusions of being better than these folks, and it helped me understand my own weaknesses. So, humility matters, because I know I likely won't climb 8b without ditching my job. I can push myself, but it's done from the perspective of "wow, I have so much room to improve" rather than "I need to be stronger than all these weaker people." [1] I am probably an "above average" climber, having done 7c+ problems here in the States.