restraint

The hardest thing I’ve ever done was absolutely nothing. And I had to do it on purpose.

My son was struggling. I could see it. The kind of struggle that makes a parent’s hands itch to fix, to solve, to step in. I knew what I needed to do. I had the answer. And I had the power to make it happen.

I just had to choose not to.

As a parent, we’re often supposed to act. But using my power to solve my son’s problem would have robbed him of the opportunity to come up with his own solution.

A similar battle shows up anywhere power lives. A manager watches an employee wrestle with a project they could resolve in ten minutes. Someone who is financially secure watches a friend barely scrape by. The person with answers sits across from a colleague who is searching. We feel the urge intensely. We can solve this. We possess what they lack.

Except our help often isn’t helpful. Stepping in feeds our need to be useful more than it serves them. Handling their problem actually steals the hard-won satisfaction of figuring it out on their own.

But here’s where it gets slippery.

What if I wasn’t practicing restraint with my son? What if I was just avoiding the discomfort of getting involved? I could tell myself I was giving him room to grow. But maybe I was actually abandoning him. Maybe I was protecting myself from the complexities of staying engaged.

A parent who never gets involved isn’t practicing restraint. They’re just plain absent. A manager who regularly watches their employees drown isn’t building capacity. They’re neglectful. The friend who has resources but never offers them isn’t trusting the process. They’re protecting themselves.

The difference between wisdom and cowardice can be razor thin. Both involve not acting. Both use the same language. Respecting autonomy. Not interfering. Letting people find their own way.

So how do we know which side of the line we’re on? We don’t.

My son eventually found his way through. But I still can’t tell you if my restraint helped or if he succeeded despite it. I sat with that uncertainty the entire time. I’m sitting with it now.

Grappling with that kind of ambiguity is hard work. Staying awake to each decision. Wrestling with it instead of applying a “rule to live by” we adopted years ago. Doing nothing on purpose instead of by default.

We get it wrong when we stop wrestling. When we decide on an approach before the situation arrives: always step in or never offer help.

Restraint requires us to stay present. We become aware of our own discomfort and ask what it’s telling us. And then we act (or don’t), knowing we might be wrong.