Ambition is a gift and needs a proper place in our lives. When it seeks power alone, it leaves us empty—but when rooted in love, service, and God’s glory, it becomes magnanimity (“greatness of soul”), helping us live with courage, gratitude, and joy.

SLIDES GEORGE READ IN OUR GATHERING

“I am not denigrating ambition, nor am I against progress and success. But true growth is something other than the uncontrolled drive for upward mobility in which making it to the top becomes its own goal and in which ambition no longer serves a wider ideal. There is a profound difference between the false ambition for power and the true ambition to love and serve. It is the difference between trying to raise ourselves up and trying to lift up our fellow human beings.”

—Henri Nouwen, The Selfless Way Of Christ

Magnanimity is often lived — in quiet, simple ways off the radar screen of most of the world. The person who daily endeavors to be a better spouse, parent, friend, or child of God is truly seeking “greatness of soul. A magnanimous person may defer to others’ preferences, to endure criticism with patience, to respond gently to a child’s temper tantrum, or to avoid defending their opinion in non-essential matters. These are relational ways of living “greatness of soul.”

—Edward Sri, Virtue and The Art of Living