The Fallacy of Waiting: When Patience Becomes Permission to Do Nothing

Summer was just fun with my brother. We didn’t have responsibilities or big decisions to make — just sunshine, bikes, and laughs. Back then, life was simple. As adults, it’s easier to falter with good intentions — to mistake waiting for patience instead of taking the next right step.

A tree doesn’t heal by waiting. When a limb is cut or broken, it doesn’t simply sit in silence and let time pass — it grows around the wound. Sap moves. Cells divide. Bark seals. The tree participates in its own healing.

We often forget that part. We talk about “time healing all wounds,” but time is only the stage. Growth is the actor. The real healing happens through movement.

The Fallacy of Waiting -- Permission to Do Nothing

In the counseling room, I see this play out all the time. Someone says, “I’m waiting for the right moment,” or “I just need more time.” But waiting doesn’t create courage; action does.

Waiting feels productive because it keeps us safe from failure. It feels thoughtful, wise, even spiritual. But beneath that polished patience, there’s often fear — fear of discomfort, confrontation, or change.

We glorify waiting as wisdom when, often, it’s just avoidance wearing a halo.

When Virtues Turn Into Excuses

Patience, kindness, gentleness, and self-control — these are virtues we’re taught to cultivate. But like anything good, they can be twisted.

Patience becomes passivity when it excuses staying stuck. Kindness becomes enabling when it keeps us from setting boundaries. Gentleness becomes avoidance when we refuse to speak truth out of fear of tension. Self-control becomes paralysis when we overthink every move until we can’t move at all.

We twist the fruits of the spirit into shields against discomfort. But true spiritual maturity — true wellness — doesn’t hide behind peace; it moves through conflict with integrity. It is not permission to do nothing

Growth Has Seasons

The same goes for growth itself. You don’t harvest the same day you plant. You don’t get the apple tree the day the seed goes in the ground, and you don’t miss your bushels of apples the day you decide to skip planting, either.

Growth takes time — but not passive time. It takes nurturing, showing up, and tending to what you’ve planted until it bears fruit. Patience isn’t waiting for nature to do all the work; it’s participating in the process long enough to see the work pay off.

The Myth of the Magic Step

Many clients ask for the one thing that will make everything better. “Just tell me the step I need to take.”

But healing isn’t a single step — it’s a staircase. It’s thirty steps. A hundred, sometimes. The first one rarely feels like success. It feels small. It feels uncertain. It doesn’t look like the finish line; it looks like courage in motion.

People get frustrated when that first step doesn’t fix it all. But the goal of the first step isn’t completion — it’s direction. You can’t grow from where you’re not moving.

What Real Growth Looks Like

True growth is active. It requires honesty, participation, and risk.

It’s saying what needs said, even when your voice shakes. It’s showing up for therapy before you feel “ready. ”It’s forgiving yourself enough to try again after you fail.

Time may soften the pain, but growth transforms it. That’s what makes the scar — not the waiting, but the work beneath the bark.

The Empowerment Reframe

Maybe the finish line isn’t out there waiting for you to arrive. Maybe it’s being built, one movement at a time, every time you stop waiting and start growing.

Patience is still a virtue. So is kindness. So is gentleness. But only when they lead you toward something.

Time doesn’t heal all wounds. Growth does. And the moment you begin to move — even slightly — you’ve already started to heal.