Disguise One: "I reform myself better than others. The way I organize, schedule, correct, clean, discipline, or make choices has made me superior to those who are unorganized, fly by the seat of their pants, use poor grammar, make horrible life choices, and are undisciplined in body, mind, and emotions."
This kind of pride is not the same as being proud of a job well done. Rather this kind of pride sees our good works as a reason why we have better value than others. It believes: "I deserve more than others. I'm a morally better person than others. I need Christ less than others." This kind of pride is commonly associated with Enneagram ones.
The cure is to trust that God is the standard for goodness not ourselves, and to believe that we acquire this goodness by inviting Christ into our hearts to do the good in us which we are actually unable to do for ourselves.
Disguise Two: "I need less help than others. I'm always in the position of giver, caretaker, counselor, nurse, pastor, deacon, or priest because I have more to give to others than they have to give to me."
Some people really are natural givers; this sort of pride is not about that. Rather, this kind of pride causes a person to feel that because they are usually the givers, they're less needy than others and other people have nothing to offer them. "I'm not like those I serve. I don't have a bunch of needs. I'm fine. Other people need Jesus more." This kind of pride is commonly associated with Enneagram twos.
The cure is to acknowledge that we need Jesus just as much as everyone else, and that because God made everyone in his image, others have just as much to offer us as we have to offer them.
Disguise Three: "I am part of an elite group that makes me better than others. Because I am part of a particular church, political party, nationality, profession, school, sports team, neighborhood or whatever, I have increased my value to be more than those who aren't in this group."
This is not the same thing as school spirit or rooting for the Dodgers. This sort of pride causes people to believe that they've secured their value or security by being apart of this group. They believe that others' primary problem is that they aren't in this group. The group provides these people safety and assurance. "I'm okay because I'm on the inside." This kind of pride is commonly associated with Enneagram sixes.
The cure to this kind of pride is to trust that God alone protects, provides, and gives us strength in difficult situations. No group of people can do this. Those outside our group need not feel like a threat to us so long as we cling to God as our source of courage and identity.
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