Who Enables You?
Who does the heavy lifting so you don’t have to? I’m used to the sweet but determined voice I regularly hear echoing throughout our house: “Honey, can you come in here a minute?” That’s the universal signal that my magnificent wife Kathleen has encountered a computer problem. She’s learned that she doesn’t have to actually figure it out herself, because I’ll come and fix it for her. When it comes to learning new things on her Mac – I enable her. As long as Phil is around, she doesn’t have to take the time to figure it out.
We all have those areas in our lives. For me it’s cooking. I love eating, but hate cooking. If I was a bachelor, I’d order out 7 days a week. But Kathleen enables me because he’s a great cook and willing to fix dinner. You could say she’s just being nice (and she is) but she’s not helping me learn to cook myself.
We all have areas where we enable people, and most of the time it’s not a problem. But occasionally, we train (or let) other people do the things we need to do for ourselves:
— We enable co-workers to take advantage of us when we refuse to say No.
— We enable our children to fail when we keep covering for their mistakes.
— We enable friends to damage their lives when we let them drink past their limit.
— We enable clients or vendors to cheat when we allow them to break agreements without consequences.
The list is endless. But turn it around. Who enables you? The tragedy of enabling behavior is that because others enable us, it keeps us from reaching our potential. Life is tough. Living creatively is hard. Success is difficult. But to break through to the next level, you have to make it happen. You have to do the heavy lifting.
Does someone in your life enable you? Does that behavior keep you from discovering what you were born to do? When are you going to actually stop it?
Phil Cooke, PhD. has been called “one of the most innovative communicators of our generation.” As a media producer, writer, speaker, and consultant, his client list includes major film studios and TV networks as well as major Christian organizations like Voice of the Martyrs, The Museum of the Bible, The Salvation Army, and others. He’s also coached and consulted with many of the most influential churches and nonprofit organizations in the world, helping them use media to tell their story. You can hear his podcast here.
