In the last lesson I started teaching the following scale.
Inferior Minded (-10) —— Balanced (0) —— Superior Minded (+10)
I should point out that even though I lean toward the Inferior Minded side of the scale, I definitely have times of landing on the Superior Minded side – we all do. One of the reasons for this is when you work hard to be a good person, it’s easy to end up in the judger’s seat. For instance, I struggle not to look at those addicted to fentanyl and not feel a sense of superiority. We should be angry at terrible things like seeing those who choose to squander the gift of life for cheap thrills through substances, but the line of having healthy anger through observation versus judging them for it can be hard to draw. Similarly, it’s hard not to look at people like Nazis who did some atrocious things and not end up being judgmental toward them. It’s easy to see evil and think, “I’d never do that,” but we’re all capable of all kinds of evil given the right circumstances.
To take this a step further, I can also end up on the Superior Minded side with my spouse – we all can. Resentment is a risk for anyone in a relationship because hurt can easily turn into a dark seed that sticks to us and grows if we don’t regularly clear the garden of our heart. Just because I lean toward the Inferior Minded side doesn’t mean I’m immune to festering hurt that can lead me to the other side. And just because my wife leans toward a +5 on the Superior Minded side doesn’t mean she never ends up on the Inferior Minded side. The big difference is I’m better at being Inferior Minded than her and she’s better at me at being on the Superior Minded side. Neither of us is better than the other; we’re just different. That being shared, I would also claim that while my wife is more of a +5, if I end up sneaking to this side, I’m more of +8. As a +5, she can still be generous and kind as noted in the last lesson; she’s like a mother to the world taking on responsibilities that aren’t hers. If I ever end up as a +8, there’s no generosity or kindness; it’s just anger. My generosity and kindness were left on the other side. Now it’s just a judgmental and mean side that comes out. Am I a terrible person? No, I’m a person. We’re all capable of all kinds of sin. To think someone else isn’t capable of sin is raising them up too high. Given the right circumstances I know I could have an affair, which is why I have boundaries in place to protect me from setting myself up for failure. Similarly, I need to be working on my heart in order to prevent the chances of me sneaking over to a +8 because I hate that side of me (as I should).
One of the wisest things we can work on is being in the middle of the scale, which is ultimately a place of humility. This means the scale should say:
Inferior Minded (-10) —— Humble (0) —— Superior Minded (+10)
The middle being humble is an interesting thought because a lot of people confuse being humble with being hard or mean to themselves, but that’s not being humble. Being humble means we graciously accept compliments and kindness from others as we offer both compliments and kindness to others. It means we are willing to ask for help and offer to help others in return. Being humble is also about being self aware. It’s knowing our strengths and weaknesses, and accepting that our strengths have weaknesses and our weaknesses have strengths. Similarly, we want to be other aware. We want to consider other people’s strengths and weaknesses, and accepting that their strengths have weaknesses and their weaknesses have strengths. This awareness comes from a place of observation and not judgement. It’s not seeing ourselves as better or worse than others because in our humanity, we’re all equal. Our life choices will greatly affect what our lives look like, but at the core, we’re all the same – fallen people lovingly made in the image of God. This means we should be striving to compliment ourselves and others on a regular basis. We shouldn’t be doing one without the other because if we only look at the good of others, we end up on the Inferior Minded side and if we only compliment ourselves, we end up on the Superior Minded side. As the Golden Rule teaches: Treat others the way you want to be treated. At the same time, we need to flip it, so it’s also: Treat yourself the way you treat others. This flip is an important balance because a lot of “good” people end up being overly nice to others while being mean to themselves in some way that typically leads to burning out one day. The middle is all about balance. Being humble is all about balancing others and ourselves in love. This means removing judgement and condemnation for either side, which looks like contempt, greed, envy, and pride.
Several years ago, I had a very humbling experience… which means I was brought closer to the middle. This could mean I was on the Inferior Minded side and raised up… but that’s not what I’m referring to here. I was full on Superior Minded side, and I was humbled down toward the middle. It felt as great as you’re thinking it would be. So what happened? First some context.
Many years ago, my sister had been working on a project with her best friend and somehow ended up having her best friend’s husband’s laptop with her when she went to Toronto. Trying to be smart, she put the laptop bag in the trunk before locking the car and paying the parking attendant of this outdoor parking lot. Later when she returned to her car, the trunk was slightly open and the laptop was stolen. How’d the thieves know to check the trunk? Great question. They must have been watching the parking lot… or the parking attendant had a side gig. It was very traumatic for her because not only do you feel violated when you get robbed, it wasn’t even her laptop. She had to go to her best friend’s husband and confess she didn’t protect his laptop well enough. The worst part is she had his computer because she couldn’t afford her own, but now she had to replace his. That meant on top of the guilt and regret, she had to buy a laptop she couldn’t afford for someone else. Thieves (including scammers) are disgusting people because they cause so much harm to others.
Tip: Like all things, thieves can be on either side of the scale. For instance, they can be Inferior Minded and trying to earn people’s respect with stories of “treasure hunting” or showing off what they can buy because of what they stole. They can also be on the Superior Minded side because they somehow feel they deserve to be able to steal, which can be “I deserve to steal from you because you have more than I do,” or “I deserve to have the thrill of stealing no matter who it hurts.”
This event made me terrified of having my own laptop stolen. This was particularly scary because this was before OneDrive and you had to back things up with discs and eventually an external hard drive, which was annoying. As a writer, my laptop was everything to me. Because of this, I became hyper vigilant at protecting it. This included hiding my laptop whenever I wasn’t home. At my mom’s house, I had a pretty good spot, but I struggled to find a good place when I moved into my current house. To make matters worse, I later met someone who had a fire start in their house’s electrical panel. Within minutes the insides of the walls were erupting into hidden flames. The house was already ruined by the time the smoke and fire became apparent in the house. Fortunately, no one was hurt, but the house was lost. Hiding places might help a robbery, but how would it protect my laptop from a fire? Is it wrong I was more worried about protecting my computer than people?
I then figured out an amazing place to leave my laptop because robbers aren’t looking there and it would likely protect my computer from the house burning down. It was brilliant (or so I thought). Here’s a hint? It’s required for baking cookies. Yeah, my genius plan was to hide my laptop in the oven. Guess where this is going (and it’s probably worse than you think).
I told my wife my plan, and she thought it was terrible, but to me, it was perfect. I never used the oven, so I was fine. She just needed to make sure not to start the oven without first checking inside it. Growing up my mom often left a pan in the oven for storage, which meant she was good at checking the stove before turning it on. Why couldn’t my wife do the same? Well… for one, my wife never had to do this, and it’s hard to start a new routine. And two, she has ADD. People with ADD aren’t known for being methodical. They’re more distractable and reactive. Fortunately, my plan was working really well because if I was home, I would take my laptop out of the oven… minus one time… which was the time my wife needed to bake something… and she hadn’t developed the routine yet. Good news, she figured it out pretty quick and the laptop was fine… but I wasn’t. I was so angry at her. How could she not check the stove? It’s so simple. My anger was very much on the Superior Minded side because I wasn’t taking any responsibility. Instead of re-thinking my hiding place, I scolded her in my head. I might be dumb for putting my laptop in the oven, but I was smart enough not to be outwardly mean to someone who can out mean me because she’s better with words, tone, and look.
After that hiccup, my plan was back on track. At some point, however, I started taking over baking the chocolate chip cookies. Don’t get ahead of me. My wife makes the dough and then we freeze it (it helps the baking process). Later, I pull some out to bake as needed. If I was baking, I was home, which meant my laptop was safely out of the stove… or should be.
On January 10, 2023, Windows 8.1 was no longer going to be supported. My laptop from 2012 wasn’t going to be able to handle the upgrade, which put me in a difficult spot. I loved my laptop, largely because the keyboard was perfect with both shift keys being full sized and easy to use unlike many other keyboards. During the Black Friday sale before 2023, I begrudgingly bought a new laptop. I hate change, so I continued using my old one while I could. Fortunately, I had the perfect place to store this very desirable item for stealing – the stove. You can probably now accurately guess the ending to this story.
When I’m home, I would naturally have my favored 2012 laptop safely on the table, which meant I never got in the habit of checking the stove like I told my wife to do. The one night, after realizing I needed to make cookies, I pulled out the frozen cookie dough, turned on the oven, and starting making little cookie dough balls and putting them on the cookie sheets… until there was a strange melting plastic smell. That was odd. At first, I thought it was my imagination… but after a few moments, I switched to thinking there must have been something that spilled over in the stove from a previous use… but the smell continued. My laptop was on the table, so it was safe… and then it hit me: “I have a new laptop I’ve been keeping in the oven!” I quickly opened the oven door and was greeted by smoke. I grabbed oven mitts and pulled out my very cooked new laptop. Now here’s the fun thing. Before putting the laptop in the oven, I had pulled it out of the box to look at it. Being lazy, I left it on top of the box and put both inside the oven. Had I put it back it properly it might have not become like a Dali painting of a laptop. To the credit of the laptop company, after it cooled down, it still worked… kind of. The ports were pretty melted and the screen was like a seriously old senior citizen’s face, so it wasn’t going to make reading the screen very easy.
I’ll confess I took the less than a month-old laptop to the store and told them the laptop was defective. They were impressed by how “defective” it was. They told me I’d have to contact the manufacturer for that kind of defect because it would’ve had to been put in an oven or something super hot to end up like that (good guess). They offered me the option, however of buying another laptop at the same sale price I had received even though the sale was over. I ended up giving the melted laptop to my wife’s brother-in-law who is an engineer and really good with computers. He’s still using it for playing videos for his kids through a set up he made to send the computer information to his TV screen, and thanks me every time he sees me – it’s great.
A week later I mentioned the story to a client who told me that if I bought it with a credit card, there’s insurance for purchases that don’t work out. What? I praised God and sent in the paperwork… only to find out honesty is not the best policy when you’re trying to get insurance to replace a laptop you willingly chose to put in an oven and then stupidly turned on.
The biggest kicker is I bought the same laptop twice and I never noticed the keyboard wasn’t what I like – it had the one tiny shift key. Fortunately, when my laptop was taken in to have the information switched over, the computer people offered to increase my old laptop’s memory and I could continue using it with the new Windows. The new, second computer with the terrible keyboard ended up sitting in a box under the couch (where it couldn’t be cooked) for over a year until my wife needed it. Yes, that means I bought two laptops and never ended up using either of them. I claimed this was a humbling experience.
Now I look back at this situation not as my brilliantly melting a laptop, but an important life lesson (a very expensive life lesson) that taught me why there’s the phrase, “Pride comes before the fall.” I was very lucky that in this situation my wife was incredibly gracious and has never used it against me. She even graciously took the laptop with the small shift key. If God was worried about humbling me, he definitely found the right experience.
This week may you be humbled by reading this story in order to prevent you from needing your own brilliant moment.
Rev. Chad David, ChadDavid.ca, learning to love dumb people (like me)
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