When Limits Are Lethal
We all have limits.
The other night, we were out at a restaurant that offered peanut butter & jelly chicken wings. They were phenomenal. 10/10 recommend. However, others at the table did not want to try them at all. One could say those were beyond their limit.
I experienced one of my limits the other night. There was a competition happening with high school students to see who could drink a smoothie made out of taco bell menu items. Nah. I’m good. 10/10 do NOT recommend.
Let’s get a working definition for this word I’m overusing right now.
Limit: a point or level beyond which something does not or may not extend or pass.
We may not even know it, but we likely have our “limits” scattered throughout every area of our life.
Limits are necessary but can also be dangerous when we apply them to the people around us.
It’s easy to get along with people who are like you. You know what I mean?
If you’re cheering for the LA Rams in the Super Bowl this week, you are WITH me. You are like me. We get along.
If you love Crocs (the shoes not the animal), then you are WITH me. If you don’t, consider us not friends.
*does sarcasm read well online?*
As it turns out, there are more serious things in life than football and shoes.
What about the person who disagrees with you politically? What about your coworker who annoys you? How about celebrities or influencers who use their platforms to promote something that you dislike?
Again, we all have limits. But could our limits turn lethal?
Lethal: of, relating to, or causing death; gravely damaging or destructive.
Of course I don’t mean this in a literal sense. But could our limits, whether they be internal or known, be lethal to our character, personal growth, and worldview?
I’m not asking you to become a religious-zealot and love everyone on the planet without limitation. I’m also not asking you to start tolerating any sort of abuse or mistreatment.
My questions come from observations and genuine concern. When I look across social gatherings or around on social media, there is so much hate. Some of it seems warranted. The majority of it does not. It appears as if one headline, one social media post, one comment can be enough to establish our lines that we won’t cross. That is a problem.
BREAKING NEWS - It is possible to disagree with people and not actively hate them.
How do we combat this?
Here are 3 reasons we tend to set limits and some solutions to what we can do about it:
1) We’re offended
If you just instantly thought, “no, I’m not!” then this conversation is for you!
We get to choose what we allow to offend us. So often, we only take statements at surface level value. We don’t take the necessary time to read the full article or try to understand all of the backstory that brought someone to the place they are. Honestly, how much of twitter would just disappear if people read the articles they shared?
I’m so easily offended when I drive. It’s always everyone else’s fault. Until I was driving as a fever was setting in. Then I quickly saw that I was the one making everyone else on the road angry. I so desperately wanted people to understand what was going on and how I was feeling.
It’s likely that if we were to truly seek to understand those around us or get the full story, we’d realize we have more in common than we don’t. How do we combat being offended? Well, there’s a list and a post coming at a later time to address that in detail. For now, let’s start here…
Hear their heart (get the full story)
Seek to understand before you choose to be offended.
2) We’re stubborn
Have you ever just had to be right? Equally as bad - Have you ever not been able to consider you could be wrong?
I remember listening to a podcast with Kevin Hart talking about how much he loved “Beyond Meat” as he was trying to eat vegetarian. Someone stepped in with support of their decision but also challenged him to look into the full ingredients of what he was eating and potentially find an alternative. None of that matters but Kevin’s response does. I’m paraphrasing but he answered by saying, “you know what? I’m going to look into that. There’s a chance I could be wrong on the ingredients I mentioned and maybe there is something better out there for me.”
I’m not anti “beyond meat” by the way. His response was something that is sort of anomaly in today’s world. He was open minded enough to consider he may not know it all. Are we?
John Crist is a comedian who goes as far to sell shirts that use the phrase, “Check your heart.” The joke behind that is it’s a saying in the christian community to use when someone is falling into sin (aka - making mistakes). They are asked to do some reflection. It can be cheesy. But I’m going to lean into it for a moment. Take the time to check yourself and ask questions like:
Am I being stubborn? Am I hearing them, really? Adding the really on there allows us to go deeper as we examine ourselves.
Check your heart (ask tough questions)
Be open-minded enough to admit you don’t know it all.
3) We’re ignorant
Have you ever thought that someone else may have had a different up bringing than you?
It’s mind blowing when you do take the time to think about it. There’s a family we know who, every year, goes to Chicago for a tree lighting ceremony put on by Disney. It’s a family tradition for them and their kids talk about it all the time. I did not even know it existed until this year.
It’s incredible when you think that a lot of life has been lived by those who sit across from us. It’s even more outrageous when you think about how their entire life’s experiences are informing their very decisions today we’re disagreeing with. Our posture towards others would change if we chose to apply this in our lives.
It may not mean we’re best friends with people we disagree with but we’d certainly stop alienating others over “headlines.”
We don’t know what we don’t know.
There are layers and layers of stories within the people who are around us.
To close ourselves off or establish a limit of people we’re wiling to hear from or associate with is, in my opinion, lethal.
Train the heart (adjusting posture)
Look for and learn about what you can’t always see.
Let’s set the right limits.
| Limit our Offense | Limit our Stubbornness | Limit our Ignorance |