“6 Behold, they do not desire that the Lord their God, who hath created them, should rule and reign over them; notwithstanding his great goodness and his mercy towards them, they do set at naught his counsels, and they will not that he should be their guide.”

This chapter is the probably the  most extended description of the pride cycle in the Book of Mormon.  Mormon is writing about a period in history that readily illustrated the rapidity of the cycle. Within just a few years, people go from righteous to wicked.

At the center of Mormon’s depiction stand this verse. It illustrates that at while material wealth is a precipitating factor, the real cause of the pride cycle is an unwillingness to be led by God. When we get wealthy, we begin to think that we earned that wealth ourselves. We get puffed up in our hearts. We begin to think we are worse. So we stop turning to God for guidance and comfort. 

Instead, he should be our constant source of guidance. In good times and bad, we must remember our nothingness and turn with all our heart to God. That is the key to breaking the pride cycle.