One afternoon my boss asked me to do a presentation for my ongoing development. And so I did. I knew that this had nothing to do with my employment, it’s just an opportunity to observe me facilitate training, give me feedback both good and bad. I presented and gave it my best shot, made a few mistakes and received feedback. I need to put this straight. My boss is very good at coaching and mentoring, and I didn’t see anything wrong with the way my boss gave me feedback. For some reason when she gave me each of my opportunities, it felt like a stab in my heart. After our session, my co-trainer spent time with me to help me out with my facilitation skills. He sat down with me and asked me, “Why are these sessions affecting you?” I gave my reasons, in my head they were all valid. Then he mentioned “What’s triggered? Is it your pride?” I wanted to respond right away, but the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. Pride seemed to be the only reason why I was stressing myself out over these feedback sessions. Expectations were set to me: they don’t expect me to be perfect, they would provide opportunities every time, the activity doesn’t affect my employment, and that these sessions were set for ongoing development. So what’s wrong with going through them? Pride. The weird thing about this experience was that I never thought it was a pride issue. It never came to me that it was just my ego that was hurt. I remembered Saul. His pride and jealousy of David caused him his kingdom and his life. I thought that it was easy to deal with pride. Indeed, it is not worth your inheritance and your existence. However, now that I’m going through this battle with pride it is not as easy as seems. If I was to describe the feeling it was like you have pressure in your chest that won’t go away. It was as if there was something stuck in your heart. Now that I have accepted that my problem is with pride, the burden got a lot lighter. Is there pain? Yes, there is. I’m praying to God to help me deal with it. I’m excited about what God can do for me in this aspect of my life. Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Romans 12:3 New International Version (NIV) 3 For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you.