I once did a brief stint as a nanny. I absolutely loved the baby I took care of, but the mom and I had little in common. She was a young mom with her first child. I had been a stay-at-home mom for over twenty years and was looking to re-enter the workforce.
Each weekday at 7 am I would arrive at their house for work. I would take their precious six-month-old from her crib, change her, love on her, feed her breakfast, wash the dishes left scattered from the previous evening, then carry out a variety of household chores along with my nannying duties. This all took place while the baby’s mama worked-out, watched television, and spent time on the internet in her upstairs loft area.
Once per week I would purchase groceries for the family. How I loved those shopping trips. It was a time to escape the house, with my little sidekick, and be free from the weird, intermittent, scrutinizing gaze of the mom. While on one of these excursions I learned a valuable lesson. That fateful day a note was scrawled at the bottom of the usual, lengthy, handwritten grocery list. It read, “Some of these items may not be familiar to you. If you need help, feel free to call.”
That note rattled my cage. Who did this woman think she was? Did she presume I was a total ignoramus? Did she not realize that I had been purchasing groceries since before she was born? Yes, their family may have had a higher economic status than I. And admittedly, the dinners I prepared for them every night seemed foreign to my traditional taste buds. But if I could successfully follow the fancy recipes to cook their trendy, health-nut cuisine then surely … surely, they could trust me to read and execute a basic shopping list. The nerve.
I was indignant from the time I entered the grocery store’s sliding doors until I reached the last item on the list. It was then that I realized I was in big trouble. The final line simply read, “frozen concows”. Mind you, this was before the Smartphone era—no instant information available at my fingertips. I broke into a sweat and began scanning the frozen food shelves, like a pirate hunting for lost treasure. Concows, really? What kind of hipster, voodoo, culinary nonsense was I hunting for?
Thirty minutes later I had thoroughly examined every item in the massive frozen food section. No luck. My angel baby still sat contently in her toy laden grocery basket sling. I opened some organic fruit puffs, placed a few in her lap, then frantically called my husband. “What in the world is a concow?” I said, the moment he answered the phone. After several humorous quips, because that’s how my hubby rolls, he finally admitted he had no idea.
He and I spent twenty minutes brainstorming the dilemma. I tried to pick the word apart. I knew the root word con meant with. So, it would stand to reason that a con-cow must be a product that contained cow–or beef. But my husband quickly reminded me that con could also be an abbreviation for contra, which means false or against. Considering the family I worked for ate mostly vegan, that made more sense to me. We concluded the item in question must be a faux beef product. Feeling more equipped for the battle, I hung up with my husband and headed for the fru-fru frozen foods section to continue the search.
When I could find no meat substitute branded with that name, I finally broke down and asked a store associate for help. He took a moment to look over the same frozen section I had surveyed all afternoon then confidently declared that their store must not carry frozen concows.
Somehow, that didn’t seem right. And I could not—would not—return to my employer and admit to her that I had no idea what a concow was.
“Just call the lady you’re working for and ask,” my friend advised when I phoned her to vent. But I couldn’t. I didn’t want to admit to this mom, who didn’t even take care of her own kid or house, that she was more knowledgeable than a seasoned homemaker like me. Also, I didn’t want to give her the ammo to treat me like an underling when I was already feeling like one. After I made this shocking and shameful confession to my friend—while having a total meltdown, a still small voice from within pinpointed the problem. Pride.
Pride had been lurking in the shadows of my thoughts since I had first taken the nanny position and had finally reared its ugly head in the middle of aisle 15. I had never considered myself a stubborn or prideful person. But God has a way of using everyday frustrations to expose the hidden places of our hearts. I decided to humble myself and call my employer for help. She didn’t answer. “What now, Lord,” I asked. I looked down at the crumpled list in my hand—and viewed the last entry with fresh eyes. The scripty handwritten letters I had deciphered earlier as an “n” and “w” were actually “u”s. The item she wanted me to purchase was couscous. It was misspelled.
Pride can be as difficult to spot in our own hearts as concows in a grocery store. Why? Because often our eyes are so fixed on what we perceive as truth that we neglect to acknowledge the source of truth. As writers—detection become even more complicated. There’s a fine line between professional confidence, which we are always encouraged to project, and pride—the counterfeit. That means, if we are writing for Him we must remain ultra-vigilant against the corrosive nature of this sly vice.
Pride can undermine our teachability, ruin our professional relationships, and even poison the very words we have chosen to write for God. The funny thing about pride is—those who are plagued by it are usually the last to recognize the infection.
Have you ever dismissed a writing craft teaching because the instructor was much younger than you? Have you ever quit an agent or turned down an offer to submit to an editor because you felt you were not given your due respect? Have you ever secretly felt animosity toward someone who won a contract or contest because you knew you were more talented than them? Are your social media posts preachy in nature and directed toward a group of individuals you hope to reach? Are you easily offended when someone critiques your writing? Do you feel the need to work your list of writing achievements into a conversation to gain other’s esteem? If so, you may be dealing with pride. May God open our eyes, examine our hearts, correct our path, and conform our writing to glorify Him.
Scripture: Philippians 2:3, James 4:10, Proverbs 11:1
Fun Fact or Helpful Resource: One of the best, and most painful, resources I’ve ever found to help diagnose pride is Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth’s Evidences Of Pride test. It can be found here.
Annette Marie Griffin is a award-winning writer who speaks at local women’s group meetings and women’s retreats on the topic of biblical womanhood and finding our identity in Christ. She is the Operations and Events Coordinator at a private school for special needs students and is the editor of their quarterly newsletter. She has written custom curriculum for women’s retreats and children’s church curriculum for Gateway Church in San Antonio, Texas where she served as Children’s Ministry Director and Family Program Director for over twenty years. She and her husband John have five amazing children and two adorable grands. She’s a member of Word Weavers International, ACFW, SCBWI, and serves on the Board of Directors for The Creative Writing Institute.
