The Art of Not Acting

Sometimes the hardest thing to do is knowing when not to act.

I have spent 49 years learning the difference. I have always been action-oriented. When I want to do something, I do it. When there is a problem, I solve it, or at least I try to. When something bothers me, I want to resolve it. Sitting with uncertainty has never been my natural inclination.

Since I was a little girl, I was the person who always got up and danced first. I would put on many performances for friends and family. I once woke my neighbours at 6 a.m. to show them a new dress I'd been given. They indulged me, crawling out of bed, cradling their cups of coffee while I proudly showed it off. I just knew who I was, and I trusted what I knew.

...Until I didn't...

Somewhere along the way, life began to dull my light. Experiences made me question who I was, what I believed about myself, and where I belonged. I took paths that carried me further away from my own nature, and I began acting in ways that were disconnected from who I really was. My trust and belief in myself slowly gave way to needing external things, people and circumstances to tell me who I was, what I should do and how I should feel.

I also became very good at adapting. I've always thought of myself as a chameleon of sorts. I could party all night with rock stars one day, then sip tea and blend in seamlessly with royalty the next. It is a good skill to have, and I don't think there is anything wrong with being able to move comfortably through different worlds. But when you don't know who you are underneath all that adapting, it can become confusing. You can try on so many costumes and play so many parts that eventually you don't know where you left your clothes, or what you're supposed to change back into.

My dear friend and teacher, Pete Bernard of The 8th Fire, once told me that even chameleons have a place to come home to. They know who they are. And I didn't.

For decades, I had become so good at adapting to the world around me that I had lost touch with the part of me that wasn't supposed to change. That disconnection affected my ability to know when to act, but more importantly, it affected my ability to know when not to act.

For a long time, my impulsivity looked like courage. It looked like intuition. It looked like decisiveness and confidence. But underneath it was often doubt, fear and a lack of trust in myself. I would act because I didn't know how to sit with uncertainty. I would move because standing still felt like losing control. I would reach, push, fix, resolve and pursue because I didn't yet understand that sometimes things need space to unfold.

I was listening to the noise instead of listening to myself.

And underneath all of that was a fire. A fiery dragon that has always been a part of me. She is passionate, fierce, creative, protective and ready to move. She is the part of me that wants to do something, change something, fix something, create something and make things happen. She is not the problem. I never needed to get rid of her. I needed to learn how to live with her, and eventually, how to tame her.

There is a difference between having fire and being ruled by it.

Over the last twelve years of deep work, healing, practising, learning and unlearning, I've slowly developed another kind of strength. I've learned how to pause. I've learned how to listen without immediately responding, and how to sit in the uncomfortable space between what happens and what I do about it. That has been a very different kind of practice for me.

I've learned that this isn't passivity. It is discernment. It is learning to recognize the difference between something that genuinely needs my attention and something that is simply stirring up an old part of me that wants to react.

And that distinction can be incredibly subtle, especially when the outside world continues to question you, judge you, doubt you or tell you what you should be doing, who you should be, or why what you're doing doesn't make sense to them.

I have failed many times in the eyes of others. My dreams have dissolved beyond recognition. Plans have changed. Things I believed would happen didn't. People have questioned my choices, my timing and sometimes even my intentions. There have been plenty of moments when I could have allowed those outside voices to convince me that I was wrong about myself.

But somewhere along this journey, I've learned to know the difference between someone else's perception of me and my own knowing.

I see.

I trust.

I don't need everyone else to understand my path in order for me to know that I am walking it.

...That, for me, is the evolution.

I'm not becoming less fiery. I'm not becoming less passionate. I'm not becoming less of a chameleon. I'm learning how to bring those parts of myself home.

The dragon is still here, and she always will be. But she doesn't need to respond to every perceived threat. She doesn't need to burn everything down simply because something feels uncertain. She can feel the fire without immediately acting from it. She can wait.

The chameleon is still here too. But she doesn't change colours because she's afraid of being seen or because she needs to become whatever someone else wants her to be. She adapts because she can adapt, while still knowing who she is underneath.

And that is a very different thing.

After 49 years, I'm finally learning that I don't have to act simply because I can. I don't have to respond to every question, defend every decision, chase every opportunity or fix every problem. I don't have to prove that I know. I don't even have to explain myself every time someone doesn't understand me.

Sometimes I can just wait and see what happens. Sometimes I can let the silence speak. Sometimes I can trust that what is meant to unfold doesn't require me to force it into being.

I still don't know every step of the way. I still have doubts, and I still have moments when the old fire rises and wants to burn through everything. The difference now is that I can recognize it. I can feel the impulse without automatically following it. I can hear the noise without allowing it to become my truth. And I can choose.

That space between impulse and action has become one of the greatest freedoms I've ever found. For so much of my life, I thought strength meant doing. Taking action. Making things happen. Fixing what was broken. Moving forward. I thought standing still meant I wasn't doing enough.

Now I understand that sometimes strength is knowing when to do nothing at all.

There is a kind of power in holding space for yourself, your dreams and your path without needing to know exactly where everything is going. There is power in allowing things to unfold in their own time, even when every part of you wants to reach in and move them along.

I used to fear the silence. I would get bored with it, even. I filled it with action, noise, distraction and movement because I didn't yet trust what might be waiting for me there.

Now I know that the silence is where I come home to:

The dragon is still fiery, and the chameleon is still changing colours. But neither one is lost anymore. The dragon has learned that she doesn't have to burn everything down, and the chameleon has learned which colour to change into. Most importantly, though, they both know where home is, and they know the part they each have within it.

And after 49 years, I finally do too.