Sri Aurobindo
Letters of Sri Aurobindo
Volume IV - Part 2
But that [inability to recognise one’s defects] is a very common human weakness, although it ought not to exist in a sadhak 
whose progress depends largely on his recognising what has to be changed in him. Not that the recognition by itself is sufficient, but it is a necessary element. It is of course a kind of pride or vanity which considers this necessary for strength and standing. Not only will they not recognise it before others but they hide their defects from themselves or even if obliged to look at it with one eye look away from it with the other. Or they weave a veil of words and excuses and justifications trying to make it something other than it really is. X’s saying [“I would die if I had to admit my faults.”] is very characteristic of him – that has been his main stumbling block in the path of Yoga.