Loving or Enabling?
As a mother of young adult daughters, I have often found myself wrestling with the desire to do more or give more to my girls in an an effort to help ensure their success and happiness. And I’ll admit that, in the past, I’ve also had the same feelings for my clients. I had an unhealthy attachment to their having breakthrough results. Is this something you also struggle with when it comes to serving people you care about or your work teams?
Last week I was asked by a younger mom to weigh in on a matter she was grappling with for her son. “What’s the difference between unconditional love and enabling?” she asked.
Her question made me pause because there can appear to be a very thin line between enthusiastic support and enabling. Fully understanding the difference opens us and those we care about to massive, personal growth. Let’s take a closer look.
Enabling involves our seeing the person we want to support as smaller, less capable than they likely are. As long as we continue to view them this way, we keep them small and energetically see them as incompetent - which can create a self-fulfilling loop.
Enabling means picking up the tools and doing the work for them, depriving them of valuable learning.
Enabling therefore strips the other person of having the tough, yet beneficial life experiences that build resiliency and self-worth.
Enabling tends to be based on an unhealthy attachment to a specific outcome. We envision the way it has to turn out and have judgement if the outcome isn’t the way we want it to be. In doing so, we steal the desired vision from the other person. In effect, we are hijacking their experience of test-driving options and experiencing a variety of possibilities.
As leaders, parents, and next level visionaries, it is crucial that we learn to make space for others to explore and contribute from their own perspectives. Fresh approaches and innovation are birthed from the school of hard knocks. What doesn’t work propels us to find another solution. Allow for a different approach.
Loving support entails providing the tools and allowing them to use them as they see fit.
Back away from their results.
Allow them their experience.
Show them instead that you believe in them.
In the end, they’ll thank you for it.