Being Limited
Sometimes when someone tells you, “If you do that, I will do something not very good,” there could be two other reasons for that in addition to wanting to impel you: Limits and For-the-best Limits.
Limits are things that a person is unable to do even if they want to.
Limits are things like:
- “If you hit me, I will fall and not play with you.”
- “If you make me study really hard all day every day, I will not talk to your friends well.”
If you try hitting a person who is invincible, and they say, “I will stop playing with you if you keep on doing that,” they are trying to impel you not to hit them. Since there aren’t any people who are invincible, they actually cannot play with you because they are in pain and maybe even can’t move their body, because it doesn't work anymore – they have reached their limit.
If someone tells you they will not talk to your friends well, after you make them study all day, and they are ready for anything, then they are trying to impel you to let them stop studying. However, since they probably are not ready for everything, it is likely to be a limit. Most people cannot shift tasks so quickly after working on one for so long. They are limited.
Exercise: On another piece of paper, put a check next to the view that sees the situation as a limit of the person, and put an X next to the view that sees the situation as someone trying to impel the other.
| Situations | View A | View B |
|---|---|---|
| 1. “If you keep on making loud noises, I will not get ice cream from the ice cream truck.” | A. Loud noises hurt their ears and they will not be able to hear the ice cream truck if it goes by. | B. They have invincible ears that do not hurt. They are just not getting you ice cream because they are mean. |
| 2. “If you keep hitting the stove, I will not make you dinner.” | A. The stove is unbreakable, and they are just saying that because they are mean. | B. If you keep on hitting the stove, it will break. They need the stove to make dinner. |
| 3. “If you keep on breaking other people’s things, I won’t take care of you as well.” | A. They are just trying to get you to stop breaking people's things, and saying this is a way to get you to stop. | B. When you break other people's things, they have to pay for them. If they run out of money, they will have to get another job to get more. If they are working and not at home, they can’t take care of you very well. |
Answers:
- A.✔ B. ✘
- A.✘ B.✔
- A.✘ B.✔
How a Self Guider might answer some questions from a Misguided Person about limits:
Misguided Person: “Whenever I try to use this chair as a toothbrush, it doesn't work. What’s wrong with it? Even yelling at it doesn't help.”
Self Guider: “Chairs are limited in many ways and are not made to be used as toothbrushes.”
Misguided Person: “Whenever I try to play a new game on an old computer, it doesn't work. What’s wrong with it?”
Self Guider: “You might be expecting too much out of it. You could either play old games on your old computer or buy a new computer to play new games.”
Misguided Person: “Whenever I do extreme stunts off of ramps with my car, the Check Engine light on my car keeps flashing and annoys me. What's wrong with it?”
Self Guider: “It’s limited to normal everyday use. It wasn’t made to do extreme stunts for long, and when it warns you that it could break soon, it might actually be telling the truth that it has reached its limit. It’s telling you to help you get the best use out of your car.”
Misguided Person: “Whenever I give someone some work that I think they could do, they cannot. Even when I ask them: ‘What’s wrong with you?’ it doesn’t help.”
Self Guider: “People come in all different shapes and sizes. Their minds also work in different ways. Some reach their limits faster than others. This person might have reached their limit. There are three things you can do with people who reach their limits like that:
- Kill them so they cannot let their limit harm those around them.
- Move people with that limit to a different group where they can live in peace and not bother anyone else.
- Let them live in our part of the world and help them find jobs where their limits do not hold them back.
The world we live in now was built on valuing option 3, above all others. I have seen some groups of people that used option 1 and some that used option 2, but they didn’t work out too well. Many now consider people who use option 1 Bad Guys, and would try to stop them with force if they used that way on others.”