More…There’s Potential in Everyone

“If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to man as it is – infinite.”

-William Blake

Did you know you are more than you realize? Inside of you are untapped veins of
surprising potential.

It’s true.

Not only that, but your friends, husband, boss, children, they are more as well. They
have unexplored talent, hidden even from themselves. It’s not the fact they have
potential that surprises us, but it’s the unexpected ways it comes out.

And then there’s God’s limitlessness. Talk about “more.” We think at times we have the
Lord figured out so we can fully explain him to others, when kaboom! He explodes our
theories. God is not bound by time or even our theology. He can’t be conveniently
contained or even tidied up to fit our beliefs. He is so much more.

This is great news.

For one thing when we understand our potential to be more than we know, it allows us
to break free from other people’s opinions. In fact, my sister-in-law Candy, when she
was a child, would cry if you said the word “opinion.” We think it was the word “pin” that
made it sound threatening to her. And actually it can be painful to have people’s narrow
judgments pin us down. Especially if we buy into their assessment and allow it to restrict
our development.

I watched a child grow up who was continually told she was clumsy and it became a
self-fulfilling prophecy. To this day she trips over gnats and is bound by the duck tape of
people’s criticism. But in the same way I’ve also seen youngsters grow into more than I
thought possible, because they had people around them with open-handed
grace. Somehow grace adds space for people’s uncharted hearts to be safely explored.

I have to remind myself that people can only restrict us with our permission. As children
we are vulnerable, but once we grow into our adult years we are instructed to “put away
childish things.” It seems to me that one of those childish things is the judgments of
others that comes forth from their brokenness and ignorance. Unfortunately I have been
on both sides of that human ailment. I have been the one being critical and the one who
had it heaped on them. Giving up my childish right to hold a grudge toward the “heap-
ers” in my life, has accelerated my healing and deepened my realization and
compassion for my own inconsistencies.

We are fragile people…yet full of surprises.

Excerpt from Twirl…A Fresh Spin on Life

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