I was watching a short film today, it was corporate and basically an advertisement for a shoe company. It was about one of their shoe designers who broke a record for running up and down a specific mountain in Montana. It is stonefly implied that he is able to do this because of the shoes he had designed.

He beat the record by four minutes, which is pretty cool.

I had spoken with someone at the company before watching the video and in it she called that man amongst the most humble people she had ever met. This is a notion that is repeated almost word for word in the film itself.

While watching this and considering humility it occurred to me that you sort of need a reputation for doing impressive things to be remarked upon as humble. You can be humble without such conspicuous acts, but to gain a reputation as humble requires the acts without talking about them.

Which begs the question of how people find out about those impressive things which aren’t talked about or done publicly.

To be truly humble do you need to not only be quiet but actively secretive?

Does secrecy around your actions imply a certain pride in them? If people knew about your heroism or good behavior, surely they would cheer and applaud, so you’d better keep quiet about it.

I’ve always found the secrecy of good acts to be really compelling.

It feels right to shut up about how cool you are, it feels right to be humble.

The real trick is to not be all proud of yourself for how humble you’re being.