We're stuck between having to do timid actions and full NATO escalation. This feels like constant creep.
That’s not what NATO says: “NATO’s essential and enduring purpose is to safeguard the freedom and security of all its members. It does this through political and military means, ensuring the collective defence of all Allies, against all threats, from all directions. [...] NATO strives to secure a lasting peace in Europe and North America, based on its member countries’ common values of individual liberty, democracy, human rights and the rule of law.”
https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_68144.htm
Furthermore, I would suggest that the history of actual NATO action, particularly since “Russia” came back into existence as a sovereign entity not under the umbrella of the USSR, is more consistent with the offically-stated purpose than “to unite a front against Russia.”
It's true that in the last decade or so Russia has become, as the USSR had been for most of NATO’s existence, the primary threat to NATO’s purpose.