The Humility of the Mystics (And Why We Need It Now More Than Ever)

Mystical Visions

Humility Then vs. Now

If you read John of the Cross, Teresa of Avila, Julian of Norwich, or really most of the mystics from that time, you’ll notice something right away: They didn’t just value humility, they actively asked for it.

Julian of Norwich had three spiritual wishes. One of them was to be made so gravely ill that she would come to death’s door, just to see God more clearly. And that actually happened. John of the Cross writes openly about asking God for things to go wrong, for hardships to come his way, to bring him back down to size, to deflate his sense of self-importance.

Now, it’s hard for us to wrap our heads around this today. Some of that’s just the medieval worldview, sure. But also, this whole mindset stands in complete contrast to what we’re used to now.

Modern Spirituality vs. the Mystics

J14th-century English mystic, Julian of Norwich

Think about modern Christianity, or even broader, self-help and new age movements. It’s often about “manifesting abundance,” “thinking positive thoughts,” “attracting wealth, health, success, love.” The law of attraction. The secret. Vision boards. It’s all: “How do I get what I want?” “How do I make life work for me?”

The mystics? They were saying: “Actually, God… don’t give me what I want.”“Please strip away everything that builds my ego.”“ Make me humble.”

This is the complete opposite of the current cultural narrative. And when you really sit with it, it’s wild. Because in this modern world, the idea of not getting what we want sounds like failure. But to the mystics, it was the only way to get closer to what matters.

Dear Universe… Please Ruin My Life?

You can’t imagine someone today sitting down with a vision board and saying:

“Dear Universe, I am now CEO of a multi-million-dollar company. I have a beautiful wife. Everything is going great. I’m winning in all areas of life. And… that’s a problem.”“ Please make my business collapse. Let my wife have an affair with my best friend. Afflict me with a disfiguring illness. #Blessed.”

It’s absurd. But that’s exactly the kind of thing the mystics were willing to ask for. Because to them, what inflated the ego was dangerous. And what brought them low?That was the door to God.

How This Applies to Us

Now, I’m not saying I wish for illness or tragedy in my own life. That’s not something I’m praying for. But here’s the thing: life is going to humble us anyway.

Whether we like it or not, things will go wrong. A business might fail. Someone we love might die. Our appendix might burst. We get sick. We lose something or someone. That’s just how life is set up, it’s not here to please us.

So when these things happen, we can either resist and resent them, or we can recognise them as reminders. As invitations. To step out of the illusion of control and reconnect with something bigger than our personal dramas.

Hildegard of Bingen

You’re Not Special (But You Are Loved)

Here’s the truth I keep coming back to:

My value doesn’t come from being Ewan Nicholson, the separate individual. It comes from my connection to the Divine. To what is eternal. To love. To presence. To stillness.

Whenever I start believing that I’m important on my own terms, how many likes, how many views, how many compliments, I will be humbled. Because this self I’m trying to defend, this identity I’m trying to build up… it’s passing. It will die.

As the Catholic mystic Thomas Merton once said, when someone asked him what heaven would be like:

“Whatever it’s like, there won’t be much of you there.”

And that hits. Because it reminds me: I’m not meant to cling to this small “me.”I’m meant to remember my place in something larger, deeper, more loving.

Final Thoughts

Reading these mystics is refreshing. It helps me snap out of the cultural noise that tells me to keep chasing more.

It reminds me that humility isn’t about shame, it’s about freedom. Freedom from the exhausting job of proving I matter. Freedom to rest in the love that doesn’t change. Freedom to remember that God, love, stillness, whatever you want to call it, is what really counts.

Take care,

Ewan