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Arrogance
Arrogance is probably a more destructive human emotion than anger because the latter at least needs an external catalyst, while arrogance does not. We can hide the anger, but arrogance is apparent to all around us. Anger in many cases is transient in nature and it may subside in due course and may be easy to forget and forgive, but arrogance is an ongoing phenomenon fueling fire on a continual basis.
An arrogant person is constantly occupied in boosting his own ego and does not hesitate to employ devious means to earn undue respect, prestige or salutations.
If we study the history of mankind, we will find that it is replete with stories of people who fell from grace or were destroyed or ruined by arrogance. Here is a short story from Greek Mythology:
Icarus- main character of the story- arrogantly believed that he could fly with artificial wings; his arrogance lead to his literal downfall, however, as he flew so close to the sun that the wax with which his wings were fastened melted. In Western philosophy and literature, this story of Icarus is considered to be the classic example of arrogance.
I know of a major US corporation that was doing very well for years. They copied a competitive product to grow even faster. The competitor claimed that the product infringed their patents but was willing to settle for only 200 million dollars. But being rich, the former was just too stubborn and arrogant. It fought in the court for almost 10 years, lost in the end, and wound up spending almost 9 billion dollars by the time the dispute came to an end.
These stories such as the ones described above support the common knowledge that the people who are affected with arrogance usually become 'blind' and stubborn, live in a dream world, and cannot see what others see. Nor do they realize that they have a serious mental disease.
Usually they walk around with a large ego, surround themselves with like minded selfish friends and they tend to see-with jaundiced eyes-arrogance in others, not in themselves! They are out to prove to the world how smart and superior they are compared to others.
Jain masters-who have identified this vice, among others, as dating all the way back to Lord Adinath's era-have suggested the use of humility and politeness in day to day interactions, and have structured many religious practices to fix the problem. They
