I Choose, I Commit, I Act

I Choose, I Commit, I Act

Quick! What’s something you are committed to? A happy home? Stellar job performance? Running a marathon? Ten million dollars in assets?

Or are you committed to a stressful home, poor job performance, not moving your body unless you must, and thousands of dollars in debt?

What? Why would anyone commit to that crappy stuff?

Well, let me lay some information on you.

One. We live the life we are committed to. I know, I look at some of the stuff in my life and wonder how anyone would be committed to that, but if it’s there, I am. Committed, I mean.

Two. Commitment is a kind of habit, and that means it is behavior, and that means we can change it. The thought has gone deeply unconscious for our bad commitments, and so we need to change the thought.

Three. If we don’t decide what we want, and commit to it, our unconscious mind will. I don’t know about you, but my unconscious mind is not altogether reliable in the “good decisions” department.

So I need to spend some time thinking about what I do want, and then try on committing to it. Sometimes I have ancient, moldering junk that gets in the way of my committing to what I want, so as I practice with “Why do I commit to X?” I may feel angry or scared.

Sometimes we bought scripts from our grownups when we were tiny, and now we regurgitate them and have a vague, but wrong, notion that they are our own. Relationships and money are two topics where this happens a lot.

Sometimes one of our grownups said something crushing, and often unintentional, to our baby-self, and we internalize it as truth. Art, music, dance, athletics, math, the Doing Stuff, often gets trashed in this way, and we totally commit to the idea that we can’t draw, sing, waltz, run, calculate, and so on.

Lies! Horrible, horrible lies! Creative Questions to the rescue!

We start with “Why do I commit to X?” If you have resistance, try “Why could/ would I commit to X?” And then support it with “Why else do I commit to X?” If you find an old, negative experience, integrate it, and continue.

Commitment is a super power. The question is simply, will we use our super powers for good or ill..

I choose, I commit, I act. This is how I create the life I want.  

How have I changed from letting my unconscious mind run the show to living a conscious life?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2013 all rights reserved 05072013