This is part of a series exploring the seven lower Sephirot (spheres) of the Kabbalistic Tree of Life. These spheres are the seven core emotions that drive human interaction.
This week we have been exploring the sephirah of Gevurah, the strength of restraint, boundaries, and restrictions.
when interference
would enable not empower
sustain your restraint
Human beings, by nature, are generous. When we see someone struggling, most of us are inclined to help. We don’t want to watch someone suffer needlessly.
Our inclination to get involved and help may be strong. Our intentions may be noble.
But the pull to assist someone in the moment may conflict with the bigger vision of helping that person develop the skills they need to thrive in the long term.
Consider a child who cries whenever they don’t want to do something. The smallest action — bringing a plate to the sink, putting on socks — brings on the waterworks and the whining. The constant battles will eventually drain even the most patient parents — and many parents are already at their breaking points. When you’re exhausted,
Plus, you don’t want to see your child suffering. Your child is also tired. You have compassion.
So you give in. You take on the chores, you help the child with their homework, you let the socks go.
The crying stops. Your child is happy again. All is resolved.
Or is it?
What you’ve actually done is
- reinforced for your child that crying is an effective strategy to get out of doing things that we don’t want to do.
- enabled your child instead of empowered
- initiated learned helplessness in your child
- denied your child the opportunity to learn important skills
Denying Growth
This doesn’t just happen with children and doesn’t always involve tantrums. This dynamic can and does plays out in all of our relationships — in the workplace, in friendships, partnerships.
In our effforts to keep the peace, maintain harmony, or simply move a project forward more quickly we might feel compelled to step in and take action.
Your intentions may be noble, but when you consider your long-term vision, you’ve done more harm than good.
If you want to help people grow, you must stop covering for them or giving in to their demands.
Netzach of Gevurah: Perseverance in Restraint
What is needed in these situations is Netzach of Gevurah, endurance in restraint.
Netzach always involves action for the sake of a greater vision, even one we can’t quite see clearly yet. It requires the ability to see beyond ourselves and beyond our immediate circumstances.
Gevurah is about the strength to create space for something to come into being on its own terms.
Gevurah is about refraining from taking action; not doing. Allowing.
Netzach of Gevurah is enduring restraint. Holding the space you created even when it feels difficult, in order to serve our long-term vision.
Stand Back and Trust the Process
This requires the willingness to endure the short term suffering of the crying child or the people who are angry at you for not helping them.
It also requires patience and perseverance; a willingness to be in the mystery and to trust the unfolding of life.
This is a revolutionary idea in a productivity culture that rewards taking quick “massive action.”
And yet it’s what nature sometimes demands of us.
A butterfly builds its strength to fly as it emerges from the cocoon. If you try to help a butterfly at this stage, it doesn’t build strength in its wings to fly.
In the same way, helping prematurely can prevent something or someone from developing to its full capacity.
Stand back. Trust the process.
Integration
- Where in your life is your impulse to “help” actually interfering in the process?
- Consider your relationship dynamics in your workplace, home, and other contexts. Where are your actions enabling instead of empowering? Where is your interference hindering growth?
Join Me Live
Each week during this Omer journey I am hosting a live interactive community gathering.
This is a space for deeper exploration of the week’s theme and how it’s showing up for you. There will be opportunity for connection, sharing, and reflection.
The calls are on Thursdays at 12 pm EST.
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