Do You Ever Have to Restrain Yourself?

A few weeks ago, my wife gave me a copy of Barbra Streisand’s wonderful autobiography, My Name Is Barbra. It’s so well written that I feel like we’re sitting together having a chat (now, wouldn’t that be a dream come true).

In Chapter 12, Barbra mentions that what really interests her as an actress is the power of restraint. I was fascinated by the words “the power of restraint.” So fascinated, in fact, that I stopped reading and started to jot down some thoughts.

What is restraint and what does power have to do with it? Where does the power come from? Does restraint always involve power? How do we go about restraining ourselves?

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I’m assuming that the kind of restraint Barbra refers to is the restraint we often feel when we’re holding back or preventing ourselves from doing something we might otherwise engage in. Yet the first image that came to my mind was a dog on a lead.

Restraining your mutt is necessary because, if left to its own devices, it won’t always walk where you want it to. When your pooch heads in one direction, but you have another path in mind, the lead that connects you and your pet ensures that your preference wins.

The relevance of power to restraint is easy to spot in an example such as this. Your preferences will only win out if you’re able to overpower the tugging by your dog. If a toddler is holding on to the lead, then perhaps the dog’s forces will be more powerful and there will be no restraint.

Does something similar apply whenever we get the sense that we’re restraining ourselves? Someone in your team meeting might be prattling on and on and on and you’d really like to hear from others, but you let the yabbering continue. Or maybe you enjoyed that slice of pie so much that you really want to have another, but you resist.

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It seems that things like holding back and resisting are necessary aspects of restraint, but wanting must also be involved. If you didn’t want something, there would be nothing from which to hold back. The restraining process, then, involves wanting something, and also preventing yourself from getting it.

Why on earth would you stop yourself from getting something you want?

The simplest explanation I can think of is that while you want that particular thing, you also want another thing that’s incompatible with thing 1. Maybe, as well as wanting to silence your colleague, you also want to be seen as polite and respectful. And while you want to scoff one more slice of pie, you also want to maintain a healthy diet.

So there are always two wants involved with restraint, even though we’re usually only aware of the want we’re resisting. Viewed from this perspective, the experience of restraint means there’s a conflict going on. The conflict experienced as restraint is just the same old situation of wanting two incompatible things at the same time.

It’s always been intriguing to me that we’re often not aware of both wants at the same time.

What I mean is, while I’m sitting at the table thinking, “That pie is so amazingly delicious, I would love another slice…no, I shouldn’t…but it’s going to be ages before I have one again…No, no, no. One slice is enough,” it rarely occurs to me think, “A healthy diet is the best thing I can do for myself…I love eating healthy food…that slice of pie was a great little detour, but I really love staying on track.”

Are we only aware of one goal because the other goal isn’t as important?

That doesn’t seem quite right.

If one goal is more important than another, then restraint shouldn’t be necessary. Just go for the important goal. The way I make sense of restraint showing up is that both goals are equally important.

Maybe that’s where the idea of “power” comes in for personal restraint. Could it be that the amount of “power” that is required is proportional to how much you want the thing that is uppermost in your mind? If you really want a particular thing, but you’re not getting that thing, you must really want some opposite thing as well. And if you really, really, really want something but aren’t moving in that direction, you must really, really, really also want its rival. We might even expect that the force of restraint would be felt more strongly in the really, really, really situation than in the really situation.

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As I was putting these ideas together, I thought of the game of tug-of-war. If one team is more powerful than the other, there will be very little restraint and the contest will be over quickly. But if the teams are evenly matched, the forces on both sides will be counterbalanced and each team will restrain the other.

Back to being inside one head.

Something happens to the power of restraint when both wants are in the spotlight at the same time. By scrutinising the two opposites and finding out the importance of each of them, their oppositionality evaporates in a transformative manoeuvre that can be surprising and delightful.

Barbra seems to be aware of this. Earlier in the book she provided a vivid description of two incompatible states that were actually helping rather than hindering each other. Here's what she said: “At the core of my being are two fundamental qualities…a confidence in myself and also a deep insecurity. And the insecurity feeds the confidence and the confidence nurtures the insecurity. They work hand in hand.”

How awesome is that?

Rather than blocking each other, Barbra has found a way for these qualities to play nicely together. It would be fascinating to know how she did that. From what she’s written, she is definitely aware of both qualities at the same time. There were no thoughts like, “Oh, I really, really want to be more confident, so what’s stopping me?” No sirree. No restraint here. Just two qualities fuelling each other.

I wonder if one of the secrets to contented living is finding ways for our various facets to work “hand in hand” rather than battling with each other. A life in which we feed rather than fight ourselves seems like a sparkling adventure to create.