walk a tightrope

walk a tightrope (third-person singular simple present walks a tightrope, present participle walking a tightrope, simple past and past participle walked a tightrope)

1. (figuratively) To undertake a precarious course of action.

   The company constantly walked a tightrope between operating on little money and filling orders quickly.

   • 2022 October 3, Dwitght Garner, “Anthony Bourdain’s New Biography: Light on Subtlety, Heavy on Grit”, in The New York Times‎:

     The older me, the one who prefers wine to fizz, wishes Leerhsen had more to say about things like: a) the elite and vernacular food worlds pre- and post-Bourdain; b) how Bourdain walked a moral tightrope across the conventions of travel writing and reporting, no mean feat for a wealthy white man in skinny jeans; […] .

• walk on eggshells

• “walk a tightrope” in Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, Longman.