It’s a great paradox of Christianity, and though it has its roots in Heraclitus, it echoes throughout the history of Christianity (and other religions).

Elevation and abasement. A woman looking at herself in a mirror and adorning herself does not feel the shame of reducing the self, that infinite being which surveys all things, to a small space. In the same way every time we raise the ego (the social ego, the psychological ego, etc.) as high as we raise it, we degrade ourselves to an infinite degree by confining ourselves to being more than that. When the ego is abased (unless energy tends to raise it by desire), we know we are not that.

A beautiful woman who looks at her reflection in the mirror can very well believe that she is that. An ugly woman knows that she is not that (79).

T. S. Eliot, in Four Quartets, phrases it, “The way up is the way down.”

I sometimes wonder if that is what Krishna meant-
Among other things – or one way of putting the same thing:
That the future is a faded song, a Royal Rose or a lavender spray
Of wistful regret for those who are not yet here to regret,
Pressed between yellow leaves of a book that has never been opened.
And the way up is the way down, the way forward is the way back.

He similarly begins one poem in the quartet with the line “In my beginning is my end” only to end the poem with its reversal, “In my end is my beginning.”

Arthur Bennet phrases it still differently:

Let me learn by paradox that the way down is the way up, that to be low is to be high,
that the broken heart is the healed heart,
that the contrite spirit is the rejoicing spirit,
that the repenting soul is the victorious soul,
that to have nothing is to possess all,
that to bear the cross is to wear the crown, that to give is to receive,
that the valley is the place of vision.

Of course, it all has its roots in the Gospels. John 3:30 sums up the proper relationship succinctly: “He must increase, but I must decrease.” Yet it’s not just in this one short passage that we see this paradox that the way down is the way up.

Amen, I say to you, that you, who have followed me, in the regeneration, when the Son of man shall sit on the seat of his majesty, you also shall sit on twelve seats judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And every one that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands for my name’s sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall possess life everlasting. And many that are first, shall be last: and the last shall be first. (Matthew 19:28-30)

In case we didn’t quite get it, there’s a repetition a few verses later: “So shall the last be first, and the first last” (Matthew 20:16). And in Mark, we read a negative re-statement: “Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you will be your servant; whoever wishes to be first among you will be the slave of all” (10:43, 44).

Yet what is appealing about this? Why do almost all religions include a sense that the way to true greatness for humanity is abasement? Perhaps it’s because it’s one of the hardest things to do as a human.