Accepting(?) Limits

I've been thinking for some time about limits--my own and others'. When is it okay to accept one's own limits, and when should we push forward towards being better at whatever it is? And as a teacher, where is the balance between pushing students, honoring the time of their process, and sometimes accepting that they're simply not capable of something?

For instance, I've always had almost exactly the same amount of flexibility, which isn't much for a dancer. I marvel at how I've never gained or lost flexibility in my inner thighs, whether I stretch them or not or whether I take time off dancing or not. They've always been right between 150 and 170 degrees of flexibility, which isn't bad, but not a full split. A teacher requiring that full split would probably never get it, regardless of how much they pushed me.

It's easy to see this with other physical capabilities too, like turnout; sometimes you can improve to a degree, and sometimes you're stuck with what your hips have given you. As a teacher, I know that to succeed in the very best companies, my students are going to have to have nearly perfect turnout, unless they are outstanding in every other area to compensate. But realistically, most students aren't capable of or don't desire to dance with the "best" companies, or both, and I'm very reluctant to force their bodies into positions they can't handle for the sake of an aesthetic they will likely never need.

And some things take time too; I used to get so frustrated with teachers who would give some incredibly difficult correction, like "use your turnout," and seem to expect that I would 100% use my turnout perfectly from then on and forevermore. Such things are a process. Now I try to communicate that to my students, that I don't expect them to get it immediately, certain corrections are a long process, and if they keep working, they'll get it eventually.

But then, we've all had that teacher who spurred us on to greater heights we didn't know we could reach, and every student should have those kinds of teachers in their life. So where is the balance between pushing and inspiring and letting kids know it's okay to spend time in a process of improvement (because we should never stop that process anyway) and sometimes it's even okay to accept that you'll never be able to do something as well as you'd like?

Where is that line? I really don't know. Right now I'm feeling my way through it with each individual student, and to some extent I know that's all one can do, is tailor it to each person. I can see my students improving satisfactorily, and I can also see them learning how to handle their frustration and insecurity better, which hints that I'm on the right track. But still... I'm all ears on thoughts, if anyone has them.