It’s a question we ask ourselves as teenagers often but not as adults. As teenagers, testing the boundaries of what we can get away with is part of the natural process of growing up.
As adults, our perspective changes. We no longer ask how far we can go, but rather we foolishly spend our time believing that we know how far we can go. Showing others our confidence, we develop a false sense of security that becomes the envy of others.
Navy seals would tell us, that we can go a lot farther than we typically go. That we can physically endure a lot more than we choose to. A cancer patient, can tell a healthy individual, that they can go a lot farther than they are trying to right now because life can become radically different in an instant and you may not have as much time to get further.
A religious person can tell you that you can go a lot deeper in understanding your feelings to discern what is right and wrong in your life today. A teacher or mentor by showing you that there is a lot more to learn, do, and grow can help you realize that you have not gone as far as you can.
How far can we go, when asked, demands that we answer “further”. That our work is never finished. Our relationships never complete. Our work incomplete. Our self awareness too weak. That we know less than we think we do. That the key to evolving and growing as humans is to believe and practice that every new day given to us gives us this opportunity to go further. Even when it is an inch instead of a mile.
Needing humility to understand that we may trip and fall along the way. With patience to know that we may not see how far we have gone until much later. With understanding that our further will be very different than yours, and that’s OK.
Today we may focus on going further with a relationship. Tomorrow it may be a work project. The day after a hobby. Or our health. exercise or diet. Mid-day it may be family or children or best friends. Each of these would benefit greatly if you reminded yourself always to go “further” each and every day.