I went through some personal meditations a few months back around "hubris". Pride, hubris, and humility all posit some linear scale of spiritual worthiness, social value, or self conception.
"Pride" suggests that one feels one's self to be above some average. The average could be a personal average or it could be social or, I suppose, it could be a dictated standard as if from a deity. In a community where everyone is prideful, no one would think to describe themselves as such unless they were particularly more proud than others. This is, of course, a judgment which can be made by anyone about anyone else, including one's self.
Humility is comparable, but in reverse - thinking of one's self as below the average. And again, it's a judgment which can be placed by anyone on anyone else, including one's self.
Hubris is interesting in comparison. "Hubris" is a claim by other people that one has placed one's self too close to the gods, (see the story of Icarus). The trick is that this can go either of two ways.
If one experiences nemesis, ie, "the fall", then the naysayers may have been right and one may have been experiencing hubris. I don't think anyone really declares themselves to have hubris until or unless they have experienced nemesis around it.
However, if one has not experienced nemesis, (perhaps "not yet"), then it's indeterminate. Either one has simply "not yet" experienced nemesis, OR there is no hubris at all and the naysayers are simply expressing fear of their own shadows. The very interesting point is that one cannot tell.
Another interesting point is that socially, when people believe that someone is experiencing hubris, the social group will act, often in concert, to create nemesis for the person whom they believe to be experiencing hubris. IMO, this is a simple act of jealousy, "If I can't have it, then I'm going to make damned sure that he can't either!"
Nemesis = jealousy, either of the "gods" or of other people.
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