The Summit

What It Actually Is

In Evagrius's account this one arrives last, usually after things have gone well: the quiet conclusion that you got here yourself, and that the people struggling around you must be missing something you have. It rarely feels like arrogance from the inside. It feels like competence, and like an entirely reasonable reluctance to be dependent on anyone.

How You'd Recognise It

• — You'd rather watch fifteen tutorials than ask the person sitting next to you
• — You've decided someone isn't worth listening to within a minute of them starting
• — When something goes well you can name precisely what you did to cause it
• — You take the advice later, alone, and don't tell them it worked

Set Against It

Every thought has a virtue that answers it rather than fights it. For this one, that is Humility (tapeinophrosynē).