I’m lucky, in that I don’t have a bad commute to the office and back. Of all the major thoroughfares leading into downtown Birmingham, coming in from the East on Interstate-20 is the best by far. Yet if the weather is bad, or I happen to hear about an accident on my route that might slow things down, I bail to the back roads.

Did you find yourself nodding in agreement at the above? There’s something about being in control of your own destiny — and something restrictive and constraining about being stuck on an interstate staring at the same bumper stickers. I’ve seen drivers who pass an exit before hitting the roadblock, and then back up as much as a half-mile in the shoulder just to get off the interstate. But once you start along the scenic route, do you really get where you want any faster?

“As long as I’m moving,” I tell myself. You’ve got to do something. Yet there are times that doing nothing is precisely the best course of action.

A Chicken in Every Plot

Politicians offer sweeping solutions for many “big issues” in the U.S., all predicated on the notion that we must “do something.” Somehow, the act of committing time and resources to a perceived problem makes you better, because you “did something.”

I had a client that was facing a minor media issue. Very, very minor. On a scale of one-to-ten, with 10 being “catastrophic,” this was somewhere between zero and one. A couple of people in the leadership wanted to counter false and anonymous accusations made through email. They saw the email, but virtually no one else did. Yet they wanted a full-court media blitz.

When faced with pressure, we all revert to different habits. Some people freeze, and some people react. They have a natural impulse that tells them to “do something!”

It took some time, but I had to explain to them that their proposed “solution” would cause far greater confusion and distress than the original message. It would simply introduce the falsehoods to a much larger audience, a fraction of whom might end up believing it. I suggested they assume a posture I call “Active Waiting.” Passive Waiting would be the ostrich-head ignoring. Active Waiting is sitting still with a purpose, as an animal ready to pounce. Active Waiting is the admission that the timing of your chosen direction or activity is just as important as the action itself.

Petty Truth

When you are throwing a surprise party for someone, do you just lounge around their house doing whatever you want? No — you find a safe hiding place to wait, and you focus your awareness on the door. If your mind wanders off the task of Active Waiting, you run the risk of making a noise at the wrong time or casting a shadow in view of the window.

Active Waiting takes as much time and energy as “Doing Something.” It is doing something, even if it doesn’t resemble it from a given perspective. Like staying on the Interstate, it’s often the best course of action. Tom Petty had it right: The waiting is the hardest part.