Article January 13, 1997 Issue

Self-imposed limitations—unthinkable!

Edna R. Simons

My friend's pet parakeet, Charcoal, taught me an important lesson about freedom and opportunity. Here's the story. Charcoal is free but he doesn't know it. When he is let out of his cage in the morning, he is allowed to fly anywhere in my friend's house. Does he? No. He never ventures down the open stairwell to enjoy the wide expanse of the main floor. Instead, he stays upstairs, limiting his world by half!

Here was my question—did I sometimes behave like Charcoal, allowing self-imposed limitations to fool me into thinking that freedom isn't available to me? My answer was that none of us have to be unwitting victims of any limitations of thought that would narrow our horizons or result in unwanted consequences. Instead, we can lay claim to our complete freedom now.

Did I hear you say "Easier said than done"? Perhaps that very notion is what would keep us away from the freedom we're seeking. Let's never for a moment limit our sense of what God's great power can do. Instead of feeling overwhelmed, we need to start step by step—our hand in God's—to understand that freedom is ours by reason of His mercies, and by virtue of what we truly are as the limitless expression of His nature. Discerning God's tender, constant care for each of us, and glimpsing our actual, spiritual selfhood, break the chain of negative thinking that would shackle us to self-imposed limitations.

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