At a high-end Japanese restaurant, a customer is berating a server. It doesn’t seem to be anything serious, like spilling food on expensive clothes, but something has clearly upset him. After finishing his meal, the customer, still fuming, now yells at the valet parking attendant. He accuses the attendant of not handling his newly purchased, expensive Benz with care, shouting, “Do you even know how much this car costs? It’s over a hundred million won!” Watching this, his companions try to smooth things over, saying, “Hey, Mr. Kim, the car’s not damaged, don’t get so worked up.” Then, with a benevolent smile, he gets into a black Carnival that pulls up just then, the automatic door sliding open. With that smile, he thinks to himself, “Mr. Kim still can’t afford a driver and has to drive himself around, taking out his frustration on restaurant staff. He’s definitely a step below me.” He feels a sense of smug satisfaction. At that moment, his phone vibrates. A text message arrives from Chairman Hong, with whom he was supposed to play golf the next day. “I’m sorry, but let’s reschedule. My dog suddenly got sick, so I have to take him to the vet,” the message reads. The benevolent smile instantly vanishes, and with a surge of humiliation and anger, he clenches his teeth.
This is the world of those who strive to elevate themselves. They feel happy when they confirm their superiority over others and unhappy when they feel the opposite. Even if they feel superior to the majority, they cannot feel satisfied if they are lower than even one or two people in front of them. They must have more money than others, be better looking, have better education, and higher social status. Reputation is also essential. So, they never rest. Even on trips meant for relaxation, they must focus on having experiences and collecting evidence that reaffirms their position. True rest makes them anxious. For anxious people, even rest must have some effect of elevating themselves. But no matter how hard they struggle, there will always be people higher than them. Even if they work their entire lives, dedicating their whole being, they are always subconsciously aware that they are less than Jeff Bezos’ two-year-old grandson, but they try not to consciously think about it. Thinking about such things makes them feel like they are less than cosmic dust. In such moments, they try to calm their minds with meditation or self-help books and continue on their way. As time passes, they must try to smooth out wrinkles and straighten their spines, pretending not to age. But the fear of death, which will suddenly come one day, always lurks like a snake beneath their consciousness. This is the fate of all those who love themselves and dream of high places. It is more like a curse than a fate.
On the other hand, the fate of those who “humble themselves” offers satisfaction and freedom. Here, “humbling oneself” has nothing to do with feigning humility or creating a specific impression through words and actions. It truly means genuinely believing, from the depths of one’s heart, “I am no better than anyone else.” (This is often described as the state where the ego is dead.) With this mindset, one cannot arbitrarily become angry at restaurant staff or parking attendants. Because they are not higher than them. At the same time, even when encountering people who treat them condescendingly or ignore them, they are not emotionally hurt but rather feel pity for the other person. One who knows they are not higher than others also knows that others cannot be higher than them. Because they are well aware of the ceaseless work of the desire to rise that torments that person’s heart, they feel pity instead. Sometimes, we see people who worry about having low self-esteem, but they are by no means those who “humble themselves.” Because if there is no desire to rise in the first place, self-esteem and pride become unnecessary.
Those who try to humble themselves can be satisfied with anything. Therefore, they are free. Because they know that a life spent eating only Korean beef and sushi is no better than a life spent eating only ramen. Because they know that the meaning of life does not exist in such trivial games of high and low. On the other hand, those who strive to rise think that it is better to commit suicide than to live their whole lives eating only ramen. The reason they constantly seek out delicious food yesterday, today, and tomorrow, is because they are empty inside, no matter how much good food they keep putting in. Because their existence itself is empty, they are left with nothing if they lose their real estate and personal property, business cards, and clothes. Perhaps only a bug remains. To forget that fact, they secretly indulge in constant pleasure. They need agonizingly intense pleasure to the point of forgetting their own existence. The lives of those who strive to rise constantly oscillate between satisfaction from false pride and humiliation from comparison, and then end. The emptiness and void they feel frequently during such a life, and the pangs of conscience that come after darkness falls, make them need sleeping pills. If they participate in things that humans should never do because they cannot overcome the desire to rise, they develop panic disorder. Panic attacks are a punishment that comes when the conscience denies its own existence.
The dream of Icarus. The dream of the Tower of Babel. The dream of Lucifer. The dream of flying as high as possible is thus unhappy. Therefore, it is pitiful. As the common saying goes, there are no wings for falling. But as Nietzsche said in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, those who “descend themselves” lead a fulfilling life with satisfaction and freedom. Even though Nietzsche himself failed to do so and went insane. Perhaps because his towering pride was stronger than his conscience to humble himself.
“Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate.” Romans 12:16 KJV
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