{"id":5390,"date":"2026-09-01T07:25:36","date_gmt":"2026-09-01T07:25:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jordiescartin.com\/?p=5390"},"modified":"2026-09-01T07:33:22","modified_gmt":"2026-09-01T07:33:22","slug":"from-reaction-to-agency-with-hold-still-act-a-practical-tool-for-the-moment-between-feeling-something-and-doing-something-about-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jordiescartin.com\/en\/from-reaction-to-agency-with-hold-still-act-a-practical-tool-for-the-moment-between-feeling-something-and-doing-something-about-it\/","title":{"rendered":"From Reaction to Agency with HOLD\u2013STILL\u2013ACT\u2122 A practical tool for the moment between feeling something and doing something about it"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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One of the parts of my work I value most is accompanying leaders who carry real pressure: difficult conversations, competing demands, and decisions that cannot wait until everyone has calmed down. In those moments, emotion is useful information. It becomes a problem when it chooses the behaviour for us. A rule I use, and often share with clients, is this: an emotion gets a vote, not the decision.<\/p>

A pattern I hear very often is this one:<\/p>

\u201cI knew I shouldn\u2019t reply straight away. I was angry, frustrated, hurt. But in the moment, I felt I had to do something. So, I reacted. Afterwards, I knew I could have handled it differently.\u201d<\/p>

From a systemic perspective, reactions do not stay ours. Once a reaction leaves us, it enters a relationship, and the relationship starts to organise itself around it. A very common loop looks like this:<\/p>

\"HOLD\u2013STILL\u2013ACT\u2122\"<\/p>

Two things hold this loop in place, and neither of them is the emotion. The first is how we explain the other person\u2019s defensiveness: by their character, rather than by our own sharpness a moment earlier. The second is where each of us starts the story. Both people experience their own move as a reasonable answer to the other\u2019s. Both are right about the part they can see. Neither sees the loop.<\/span><\/p>

The good news is simple: a loop does not need everyone to change. It needs one move to be different.<\/span><\/p>

That is why I developed <\/span>HOLD\u2013STILL\u2013ACT\u2122,<\/b> a short sequence for the seconds and minutes before you respond. I have used versions of it for years in coaching, leadership programmes and work with teams, especially where the cost of one badly timed message is high.<\/span><\/p>

1. HOLD \u2014 contain, without hiding<\/i><\/b><\/h2>

HOLD is not “don’t feel it” and not “don’t show it”. It is holding two things at once: not turning what you feel into a move against the other person, and not pretending it isn’t there.<\/span><\/p>

In practice this often means saying something small and true instead: <\/span>\u201cI\u2019m reacting to this. Give me a moment\u201d. <\/span><\/i>That is not discharge, because nothing is being aimed at anyone. It is not suppression, because nothing is being hidden. And it buys you the only thing you need right now, which is time.<\/span><\/p>

The question: <\/b>can I stay with this without making it the other person\u2019s problem to absorb?<\/span><\/p>

2. STILL \u2014 create space, and use it well<\/i><\/b><\/h2>

Still is not passive, avoidant or indecisive. But it can go wrong.<\/span><\/p>

If you spend the pause replaying what they said and rehearsing what you should have said, that is rumination, and it makes anger grow rather than settle. A pause spent building your case is worse than no pause at all.<\/span><\/p>

STILL works when your attention moves off the content and onto the shape of the interaction:<\/span><\/p>