Freedom and Limits

My grandson, age two and a half, is in a very important stage of development. He is no longer just taking what comes, as an infant must. He is now interacting with the world and with people to shape his experience in ways that he chooses. We adults take that for granted, but for a two year old it is an exciting and frightening challenge. He is wondering, how far can I go? Are there limits to my power? What do I do when I cannot make things go the way I want? What about what other people want? The way he, and others, answer these questions will shape his personality and his life in profound ways.

He stays at our house one day a week, and I spend most of the time playing with him. He has developed a little ritual in our play. He picks up two similar toys, a red truck and a blue truck, for example. He holds them out to me and says, “Papa, which one do you want?” I pick one and say, “The blue one.” He then looks carefully at both of them and says, “I’m going to play with the blue one, you play with the red one.”

With this little game he has exerted his will. He has exercised control over another person, one who is bigger and stronger than he is. He has shaped our experience in the way that he wants. He has learned that he has power to influence the course of events, something we all need to have.

Of course, he does not yet realize that that things are much more complicated than this. I am his grandfather. I am a pushover. I let him win. But actually, I determine which truck he will get by choosing it for myself. Like an omnipotent and omniscient deity, I allow him free will, but I know how he will choose. I am bigger. I could countermand his decision and take the blue truck—or both trucks. But I figure he needs the experience of choosing and winning to encourage him and support him in his development. His parents, his teachers, and the other two year olds at day care will teach him what it means to be the loser and to fail to get his way.

We are all engaged in the process of sorting out freedom and limits, of establishing our competence and self-understanding in a complex world. We need to exercise power and accomplish goals. We also need to understand our limits and the rights of others. Above all, we need to know that we are creatures of a wise and loving creator who gives us great potential and great freedom within rightful limits and asks us to submit everything to the one who made us.