What if We Just Let Them?
Believe it or not, we have many choices when faced with watching a loved one heading in the wrong direction. I’ll just say wrong because it’s what you’re usually thinking. Maybe it’s backed up with, I’ve been there before, I have seen this, I know how this ends and it’s not good. And you know for sure that you just need to make it stop, before it even happens. Can you relate to this way of thinking? Has there been a time or two when you could see the train coming before anyone else could, and knew that you simply needed to jump out in front of it?
That’s how we save our people, isn’t it? But what if we aren’t supposed to save anyone. What if we’re not supposed to intervene at all? What if the most helpful thing we can do, is to simply let them…you know, do whatever they are going to do?
I know you believe what you believe, but does the rest of the story go as you had hoped once you have intervened? Sometimes we put our foot out in front, only to have it run over. Sometimes the train whizzes right by.
When I look back at my own experiences, I can see now that they never even asked to be saved. I just believed they needed it. So, who was I trying to help? Them? Or was I actually trying to save myself from the feelings I was going to endure while watching this train wreck?
I couldn’t have answered that question a few years ago, but I can tell you that their response to me offering help, only made the situation worse. For me. I mean, I can see now that my behavior must have looked like I didn’t trust their ability to make decisions, but that wasn’t how I felt. I was just hoping to prevent a real crisis.
Perspective is everything.
The more attitude they gave me, the more I would dig my heels in. Maybe if I could just say it in a different way, with more examples, or maybe some proof. My efforts rarely left me feeling like a savior. Sure, sometimes they did what I mentioned, begrudgingly, and other times I did it for them, happily, but in the end, I’m not really sure it went how I had hoped. What I truly wanted was to not feel uncomfortable anymore and that never seemed to go away. Discomfort seems to run amok in relationships. It’s what we do with it that matters.
What if they didn’t want to be saved or if they actually wanted to save themselves? This is the part that we tend to overlook, because we are so fixated on our own feelings. The feelings that we have come to know as fact. But if we take one giant step back, we might realize that we can’t actually save anyone who doesn’t want to save themselves. We may give them another hour, even another day, but after that, if they want to head back to the train tracks, they will. So, what did we really accomplish?
This was hard to accept at first, but after many years, I started to see that my need to jump in and save people who weren’t asking to be saved, was only creating gaps and holes in all of my relationships. I mean, why did I think I was in charge of saving people in the first place? And that is where we begin to create change.
What we see, relies mainly on what we are looking for.
Just because you believe someone is headed down a deadly path, doesn’t mean they are. Even if you feel it in your bones. Even if there were dozens of times you predicted something was going to go south, and it did. But how often do you keep a tally of the disasters that never arrived? We don’t give much attention to those times because we are hell bent on our feelings around it. And the feelings become things so quickly that we become fixated on the new upset we have created. So, in the end, even if the disaster doesn’t strike, you are still left feeling rattled.
So, let’s assume you have the feeling that something is about to end in a crash. Something that technically has nothing to do with you, yet you feel attached to it because you know it will affect your loved one. But how do you know for sure?
Just because we have seen something similar in the past, doesn’t mean it will end the same. How can it? No two incidents can be exactly the same. With each event that occurs, there is a timing involved that can change everything. There are different players (you know, people), different weather, varying mindsets…hundreds of tiny variables that we can’t possibly account for. Yet we are sure that this time, based on strong feelings and a history with a similar scent, the crash is inevitable. I can actually feel stuff like that. Can you?
Feelings are not fact.
There are feelings, and then there are facts. And they are not the same, even though we often have a hard time deciphering between the two. It’s just not that complicated. What I feel is what I feel. That is the only fact I can rely on. But I can’t prove my gut feelings are factual. Just because I have seen this before, isn’t proof that it will happen again just as it once did.
There was the time I told you that if you stood in the bathtub, you were going to fall and hit your head. And you did. It went just as I predicted. It went exactly as I said it would. It gave me all I needed to say, “I told you so.”
But that isn’t proof that I know things before they actually occur, does it? Because I can also remember the next time, when I yelled repeatedly with panic in my voice, knowing exactly what was going to happen next, and then it didn’t. That even though my child didn’t listen either time, for some reason, the next time it didn’t go as I’d expected. She didn’t fall. Instead, she stood up on the slippery bathtub floor, laughed at my absolute panic and then eventually sat down, without any injuries. She didn’t have to say I told you so because her laughter took care of that. Yet instead of feeling grateful that there wasn’t another wound on her head, I remained furious at her defiance. Yeah, well, sometimes we aren’t right, and other times, maybe you do just need to fall, before you can correct the way you do it next time.
It all comes down to control, doesn’t it? We want to control how it goes and how it ends, because let’s face it, it feels better to have a little control. Even if you aren’t safe from harm when I am holding your hand, at least I feel like I did everything I could to keep you safe. The problem is that there are some consequences of our need for control. There are consequences for our inability to allow others to succeed and fail, all on their own. Sure, sometimes when they don’t listen, more trouble comes. But maybe more trouble was just going to come. If not this time, maybe next time.
I know firsthand how difficult it is to let go. When I let go of your hand, then watch you fall, I feel miserably responsible. In fact, I feel the pain like it is my own. But me feeling the feelings for others, is really the worst consequence of all. For them and for us. We are supposed to feel what we feel, and then make a decision about what to do next. Maybe what we choose is to do nothing. Imagine choosing to do nothing? That feels like free-falling to me and it is not my strong suit, but it is an option and does give our loved ones an opportunity to be responsible.
L.O.V.E. Let Others Voluntarily Evolve. Imagine if we could look at love in this light, every single time. Even when we feel certain about that something rumbling underneath. Maybe we will be right, or maybe we will not, but they will have an opportunity they wouldn’t have had otherwise. Like I said, I would rather hold your hand and feel like I have some power in keeping you safe, but these days instead, I have found that instead of grabbing anyone’s hand, I just simply ask, “Is there anything I can do to support you?”
And if they say no, even with the burning in my belly, I simply Let them…
Let them do it how they want to do it. Let them figure it out on their own. Let them think about it and possibly ask for help later. Let them fall, if falling is the next thing coming their way. Let them, take responsibility for the falling and the getting back up part. That is what life is all about. We need to experience the fall, in order to learn how to get back up. And each time, we do get a little more graceful at it. And maybe over time, we fall a whole lot less.
Thanks for listening. And remember, if you change one thing. It can change everything.