Most of us are pretty good at keeping promises that we make to other people. If a friend asks you for a favor or your boss asks you to do a project and you agree, you will find a way to get it done. If you have a meeting with a coworker or a lunch date with a friend, you will typically show up when expected. But what about the promises we make to ourselves? How good are we at keeping those promises? Have you ever decided you were going to wake up early to work out, but morning comes and it’s cold outside and your bed feels so warm and cozy. The thought of getting up to get your work out clothes on and put in the energy required feels so unpleasant compared to the extra sleep you could get. You decide then and there that you would rather just stay where you are. Or let’s say you decide that you will avoid sugar and skip dessert. But then you’re at work and it’s 3 pm and you walk into the break room to grab some coffee, but you’re confronted with the most moist, homemade brownies your assistant brought in that you couldn’t possibly resist. In that moment, all thinking is gone and you listen instead to your primitive brain that just wants the pleasurable treat on the table and you reach for the sweets. I can’t tell you how many times these scenarios have played out in my life. Each time, I have come to realize, I broke a promise to myself.
That little promise may not seem like much. Repeated over time, however, breaking promises degrades trust. Trust strengthens relationships, while mistrust destroys them. Maybe you were late to meet that friend of yours for coffee. Maybe you completely forgot to show up. You would probably be forgiven, unless it became a pattern. What if you no-showed 2 or even 3 times? What kind of trust would you generate in others if you consistently broke your promises? Do you think your relationship would suffer? Would it even survive?
Now think about the relationship you have with yourself. We break promises to ourselves all the time without even questioning it. We make a to-do list, but get distracted by social media or Netflix. We make big goals, but get sidetracked with more immediate pleasures. The list goes on and on. We lose trust in ourselves. We don’t truly believe that we can count on ourselves, so we just stop trying. Is it any surprise that several studies site January 17 as the day most people give up on their New Year’s resolutions and fall back into old habits!?
What if this didn’t have to be true? What if we kept promises to ourselves the way we do to others? What if we treated ourselves with as much respect as we treat those around us? Can you even imagine how our lives might be different? If we trusted ourselves, we would know that if we decided on something, it was as good as done. If we could count on ourselves, we would have a closer relationship with ourselves and be more compassionate and understanding and less judgmental. If we messed up sometimes, we would be kinder and know that we still had our own back. We would be more willing to try new things, to take chances and have less fear of failure. We might even reach for higher goals. Maybe we could dream bigger than we ever imagined and just maybe we would even believe that those dreams could someday be real.
What promises have you broken to yourself? What kind of relationship do you want with yourself? Do you trust yourself?
