Belief in the absence of limits is a recipe for disappointment

A reader and I have been in a dialogue about a column I wrote last year (June 10, 2007) in which I responded critically to "The Secret," a best-selling book promoting logocentrism (the idea that what I think participates in or even creates reality). She writes:

This following short movie (www.thesecret.tv/ planet-earth/), I believe, is the ultimate message from "The Secret." Enjoy ... it is truly beautiful. -- S.P., Las Vegas

First, thank you for thinking of me. The film is beautiful indeed. The camera work! Sheesh! Stunning. And the music opened my heart and soul.

Yet, with all deserved kudos to its aesthetic triumph, I found that it actually buttressed my concerns contained in the original column. Note this sentence on the introductory page of the link you sent to me: "There is no limit to how high you can increase your vibration, because there is no limit to the good thoughts you can think, or the good words you can speak, or the acts of kindness that you can do."

I think we're going to continue smiling at one another from opposite sides of this discussion.

Central to my spirituality is the confession that begins any and all serious spiritual paths: "I am not God." One of the consequences of not being God is finitude. I'm very uneasy about spiritual teachings that promise the absence of limits, or suggest that enlightenment is the discovery and acceptance that there are no limits. For me, it's an invitation to hubris.

It disturbs me, and, both in my former life as a priest and my current life as a therapist, I fear that such ideas are, on their best days, guaranteed to disappoint. The idea of limitlessness has consequences, such as those immortalized in the Greek myth of Icarus. He's the boy who fashions wings to fly off an island, but does not heed the gods' warning not to fly too high. The sun melts the wax that holds the wings together. Icarus is destroyed, ultimately, by his disregard of limits.

For me, freedom is not found by reaching for freedom, but by surrendering in humility to limits. I reach for eternity not by reaching for eternity but by digging deeply into this life of time, space and finitude. It is by standing firmly on the earth that I reach for heaven.

Limitless good thoughts? Good words? Acts of kindness?

I am at a loss for words to describe how passionately I disagree. Even a cursory observation of my own heart and life, not to mention the life of anyone around me, is really all, I think, my argument requires. To wit:

Neither I, nor any other human being, can decide to be good. That is, by a mere act of effortful will. Sooner or later, every human being, despite every sincere effort, will encounter the limits of being good. That is, things mean and small and dark will have their way with me. Spill out of me. Spill on you.

Denying those limits increases, rather than decreases, the chances of evil erupting. My character, to whatever extent I am in possession of character, is built chiefly upon my embrace of the limits to my goodness, not built on the goodness of my goodness. Respect for my finitude is the way I keep the darkness in front of me, where I can keep an eye on it. Or, as my teacher once said, "Confessing evil makes evil less likely."

Love, too, is constrained in my finitude. Consider these two popular (but in my opinion vapid) admonitions: "Love everyone!" ... "Love yourself!" Now, I did not say these were not great goals, good ideas, supreme ideals. But in and of themselves, these admonitions make about as much sense as "Bite yourself on the nose" or "Sit in your own lap!"

I can't, and don't, love everyone. Don't even especially want to. That's one of my limits. I can't, and don't, always regard myself with mercy, gentility and positive regard. It's one of my limits.

Then, the uber-example of my finitude: death. I am finite. There is a limited number of days I will be here. Someday I'm going to lie down and not get back up. Might be 34 more years. Might be this afternoon, even as I'm faithfully answering reader mail here at the computer. My favorite vision is to die while shopping at Victoria's Secret for a woman with whom I'm head-over-heels in love. Now that's a cool death!

The good life, for me, is found in making peace with being human. And human beings are finite. Ordinary. They have limits.

Steven Kalas is a behavioral health consultant and counselor at Clear View Counseling Wellness Center in Las Vegas and the author of "Human Matters: Wise and Witty Counsel on Relationships, Parenting, Grief and Doing the Right Thing" (Stephens Press). His columns appear on Tuesdays and Sundays. Questions for comments can be e-mailed to skalas@reviewjournal.com.