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Humble people are seen as more trustworthy, better team players, and even more effective leaders. Yet most of us can’t stop bragging…
— from the article, “Why you should pretend to be more humble than you are” on FastCompany.com, January 28, 2025.
Journalist Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic recently tackled the challenging subject of humility in the magazine, Fast Company. He titled his January 28 article, “Why you should pretend to be more humble than you are”.
Speaking for myself, I’m one of the most humble people you will ever meet. Assuming you get to meet me, someday. But occasionally, people somehow get the wrong impression and conclude that I’m an arrogant asshole… (to use an expression popular with my ex-wife Darlene.)
Taking into account my natural humility, it’s probably not surprising that I never considered “pretending to be more humble than I am”, as recommended by journalist Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic last month. Reading through his article, it looks like a relatively simple process, to make other people believe you are more humble than you really are. Especially, it looks easy if you are naturally humble. Like I am.
Mr. Chamorro-Premuzic begins by suggesting that “humility is one of those traits everyone claims to love, but few actually want to practice.”
We love interacting with humble people, because… well, they act humble. The question is, are they authentically humble… or are they merely acting humble?
Mr. Chamorro-Premuzic says it doesn’t matter. If you follow his advice, you may be able to fool all of the people, all of the time.
We will, for the time being, ignore the previous claim, made in 1684 by French Protestant Jacques Abbadie in his book, Traité de la Vérité de la Religion Chrétienne:
…ont pû tromper quelques hommes, ou les tromper tous dans certains lieux & en certains temps, mais non pas tous les hommes, dans tous les lieux & dans tous les siécles…
…which roughly translates as “You can fool all the people, in certain places and at certain times, but you can’t fool all the people in all places and in every epoch.” Amen.
(I had no idea, until today, that “tromper” is a French verb meaning “to deceive, to mislead, to fool.” But maybe they’ve misspelled it.)
Here are a few ideas for acting humble, for those of you who are not naturally humble like me.
Master the Art of Self-Deprecation
Humor is your best friend here. (Actually, it’s always your best friend.). When somebody praises a great piece of work, or a great idea, casually drop a self-deprecating remark, like, “It was a total accident. I wasn’t even paying attention.” (In my case, that’s usually a true statement.)
Play the ‘Curious Newbie’ Card
Even if you’ve been doing something for years, act like you’re still learning. Say something like, “I’d love to hear how you’d approach this,” or “What would you do differently?” This doesn’t mean you actually have to take their advice, of course. In fact, I would advise you not to take their advice. You’ve been doing this for years, and they just graduated from college with a degree in Ancient French Literature. Remember, you’re not actually humble; you’re just pretending to be humble.
Pretend to be Listening
Since we’re in the mood for pretense, you can appear humble if you act like you’re actively listening to what the other person is saying, which is usually worthless drivel. You can, for example, repeat back to them what they just said, using slightly different wording, to make them believe that you heard and understood their worthless drivel. Human communication experts call this “verbal mirroring”. But to do it, you have to actually listen to what they are saying, which seems like a waste of your time. But you will appear humble, and that will pay dividends over the long run.
I’m passing this advice on to our Daily Post readers, who may be every bit as humble as I am… so I won’t be offended if you ignore these suggestions. They weren’t my suggestions in the first place. I stole them from a Fast Company magazine article.
I could never come up with such clever ideas, on my own.