prey to their own pride
My mid-afternoon nap was disturbed today by news that I would be required to go down to SAFTI MI tomorrow for an SAF Day Exco meeting. Aroused at my 39th wink by the ringing purveyor of my requisite presence, I tried to be as cordial as possible to the person on the other end, masking the combined annoyances of somnolistic intrusion and a disrupted schedule the next day. Message received, I hung up and decided to take another 41 winks, to make up for the one lost.
For the unaware, I will be involved in this year's SAF Day Parade in a pretty vocal way. While the Parade Commander orchestrates the drills on the parade square, I will be the one directing the audience on the grandstand with commands to sit, stand and applaud. (Come to think of it, it's almost like that with Shandi, my beagle. Only that the audience will likely be more obedient and I doubt any of them will hump my leg.) Yes, I will be the emcee. It's not a big deal really, as a friend recently pointed out: the guest of honour is only going to be the President of Singapore, with the Defense Minister and a plethora of generals, local and foreign, in attendance. And seeing how I, in the same capacity, once demoted a Lieutenent-Colonel to a Lieutenant at a previous parade, there's no pressure this time, really.
So tomorrow, I will be attending the Exco meeting chaired by a one-star general and staffed by more epauletted crabs than at an all-you-can-eat buffet at Long Beach. I'll have to admit, there's a certain egomaniacal pleasure in being able to saunter into a room filled with so much top brass you see your own reflection. It can be even more satisfying when everyone there knows and celebrates you because of the quality of your speech (which, I've been told, is sweeter than mountain honey and smoother than 30-year-old scotch. Ok, maybe I'm paraphrasing a little). Yes, praise can be intoxicating. But therein lies the danger.
The danger in becoming self-important. With prior successes and the immoderate praise of men, the temptation to believe that you really are as amazing as they say you are becomes heavier. It is like a concrete block dropped from a height onto one end of a see-saw, where on the other end sits precariously one's sense of self-awareness. You lose yourself if not for a grounded self-awareness. It is as the wise say: a good man is unfazed by criticism; a great man is unmoved by praise.
In the course of my NS, I have seen too many good men fall prey to their own pride. Men of stature who because of their rank and status believe it their right, nay duty, to lord over those whose shoulders bear less impressive embroidery than theirs. Men of rank who hide their conceit behind a spurious facade of good humour but with every subtly raised eyebrow and pursed lips threaten their pandering minions' fall from false grace. Ironically the delusions of grandeur of these men are painted for them by those very vassals who would say and do all to get into their boss' good books; it is a shame that in their desperation they do not realise they will appear as mere footnotes in a chapter entitled Ego. How ironic then that I consider these men to be my best teachers during my NS. They have afterall, left the deepest impression on me. In military speak, they are the negative examples to what I ought to be.
So when I walk into that meeting room tomorrow, surrounded by men important and self-important, it will not be with a head held high in recognition of their favour. It will not be a head hung low either, in a practised attempt to appear modest. With a level head, I will go to my seat and take it. For I know my place and I know who I am. And that is what matters most.
For the unaware, I will be involved in this year's SAF Day Parade in a pretty vocal way. While the Parade Commander orchestrates the drills on the parade square, I will be the one directing the audience on the grandstand with commands to sit, stand and applaud. (Come to think of it, it's almost like that with Shandi, my beagle. Only that the audience will likely be more obedient and I doubt any of them will hump my leg.) Yes, I will be the emcee. It's not a big deal really, as a friend recently pointed out: the guest of honour is only going to be the President of Singapore, with the Defense Minister and a plethora of generals, local and foreign, in attendance. And seeing how I, in the same capacity, once demoted a Lieutenent-Colonel to a Lieutenant at a previous parade, there's no pressure this time, really.
So tomorrow, I will be attending the Exco meeting chaired by a one-star general and staffed by more epauletted crabs than at an all-you-can-eat buffet at Long Beach. I'll have to admit, there's a certain egomaniacal pleasure in being able to saunter into a room filled with so much top brass you see your own reflection. It can be even more satisfying when everyone there knows and celebrates you because of the quality of your speech (which, I've been told, is sweeter than mountain honey and smoother than 30-year-old scotch. Ok, maybe I'm paraphrasing a little). Yes, praise can be intoxicating. But therein lies the danger.
The danger in becoming self-important. With prior successes and the immoderate praise of men, the temptation to believe that you really are as amazing as they say you are becomes heavier. It is like a concrete block dropped from a height onto one end of a see-saw, where on the other end sits precariously one's sense of self-awareness. You lose yourself if not for a grounded self-awareness. It is as the wise say: a good man is unfazed by criticism; a great man is unmoved by praise.
In the course of my NS, I have seen too many good men fall prey to their own pride. Men of stature who because of their rank and status believe it their right, nay duty, to lord over those whose shoulders bear less impressive embroidery than theirs. Men of rank who hide their conceit behind a spurious facade of good humour but with every subtly raised eyebrow and pursed lips threaten their pandering minions' fall from false grace. Ironically the delusions of grandeur of these men are painted for them by those very vassals who would say and do all to get into their boss' good books; it is a shame that in their desperation they do not realise they will appear as mere footnotes in a chapter entitled Ego. How ironic then that I consider these men to be my best teachers during my NS. They have afterall, left the deepest impression on me. In military speak, they are the negative examples to what I ought to be.
So when I walk into that meeting room tomorrow, surrounded by men important and self-important, it will not be with a head held high in recognition of their favour. It will not be a head hung low either, in a practised attempt to appear modest. With a level head, I will go to my seat and take it. For I know my place and I know who I am. And that is what matters most.
