Pride and Prejudice

The saying goes, “It’s ok to lose your pride over the person you love, but don’t lose the person you love over your pride.” I say whoever coined this term must have never lost their pride to a person they loved … that didn’t love them back.

I am not a prideful person, but I can be. Thankfully though, I am also a person that loves. And I love hard. Hard enough to swallow my pride even when it’s not my fault. I ain’t too proud to beg, or chase, or cry. It’s nothing. Been there, done that, and some may find this admirable. But when all is said and done, and we still lose the person we’ve made a fool of ourselves for, then what?

Remember when Heath Ledgers character in 10 Things I Hate About You wooed Jessica Stiles’ character by singing and dancing up and down the bleachers during P.E. like a jack-ass? It was all sunshine and roses afterwards because she fell for it and he got his girl. But Hollywood never tells the story of the guy who cheated on his girl, was genuinely sorry for it, so he dressed up as a penguin and brought his ex-girlfriend a dozen roses at work only to catch her making out with her boss.

Yet, nobody wants to be the person to tell their friend DON’T wear that penguin suit, DON’T go to her work, and DON’T bring her flowers. But most of all, nobody wants to be the one to tell you to choose pride over love. I won’t tell you either, but I will tell you to have some sense of pride. Even if just a little bit. St. Augustine defined pride as “the love of one’s own excellence,” and while a little too much of that can come off as cockiness, what’s wrong with loving our own excellence?

Pride is always looked at as the ugly stepsister, but I’d like to look at her as the over-protective best friend. Pride is simply looking out for you that’s all. Pride can be a positive thing when it allows you to stick to your principles, and I hate to break it to you but everyone needs principles. Sometimes when we are in love, those principles get thrown out the window, which is the norm and almost inevitable. But know that sometimes this equates to settling for less. There is a difference between settling and compromising and when you settle for less you end up with less than you settled for to begin with. And there is no lesson to be learned in that except for duh: DON’T SETTLE FOR LESS!

Consequently, pride is not the real culprit when it comes to matters of love. It only becomes a problem when there’s too much of it. Or sometimes, too little. Then again, too much or too little of anything isn't ideal, nor healthy for you. What we need to do is find a sense of balance with it all, and determine when it's worth swallowing. 'Cuz the only think worse than losing the person you love to pride, is losing both.