Can't Do It All?

Encouraging insights from writer A.G. Harmon, who teaches at the Catholic University of America (but with apologies to my friends for his male-only pronouns)...

“It is liberating, in fact–-to know what we are, to know both our capabilities and our incapabilities. Freedom is understanding what one can do so that one can go about doing it. It is not being trapped with the cage of anxiety that tells us we can do everything. Lucky is the man, said Walker Percy in The Last Gentleman, who does not secretly believe that every possibility is open to him.

“This can seem somewhat hard and defeating news to the young soul who wants to believe that the world is his oyster, and that he can be anything that he wants to be, as the current meme goes. But the longer, mature view holds that understanding what shape you have taken–-accepting your gifts and abilities, but also your inabilities and weaknesses–-allows for the potential, if not the guarantee, of progress (we are free to reject what we see, after all).

“Movement, action, become possible when a clear view of potential is fathomed. That can come only by an honest assessment of what form we have taken (or more precisely, for the person of faith, have been given). Instead of straining in frustration for the impossible, we can then move forward within a profile that shines with the sun of a genuine authenticity.” (Image, Fall 2012, p. 72)

Thanks, A. G.–I needed that today. It lets me move my current writing project forward.