Dial It Back: Restraint

My friend Linda sent me an article called “7 Psychological Superpowers Few People Have (That You Can Use to Set Yourself Apart)” which I love. I love it because the title is long enough to be a paragraph. I love the content. In fact, I love it so much I want to blog about practically every single sentence and since I am quarantined, I ask myself: “Why not?” So here goes…

In the opening paragraphs, this article claims that one superpower that many of us refrain from accessing is: RESTRAINT. He makes quite a case for finding and exercising it.

When I practice restraint as a superpower, several wonderful things happen:

* I am curbing my urges and compulsions.

* I am pausing to prepare.

* I am doing less, which frees me to choose to do better.

Although it never occurred to me before, it seems so true: “Success, happiness, or whatever word you use to articulate what you want, often involves what you don’t do.”

The pandemic, at whatever stage it is in when you read this, provided participants a chance to do less. At various times I found this to be a blessing, frustrating, anxiety inducing, depressing, binding and freeing.

It forced me to curb some of my urges; I learned that much of what felt like an obligation pre-quarantine was truly non-essential. Much of what was initially disquieting has turned into deep silence and joy. Restraint was hard and good.

How might restraint serve you? What has a lack of restraint cost you in the past? Tomorrow, I will present a little exercise that might help you process these questions. In the meantime, think about it and see what you come up with!