I Oughta Be Committed

I Oughta Be Committed

What do you think about commitment? I always think it’s funny when I hear people say that they can’t commit. Commitment is part of living. The question is simply, “What am I committed to?”

All I have to do is look at my life to see my different commitments. For example, I am committed to surrounding myself with excellent people. I am committed to maintaining order at my job and in my car, but I seem to be committed to chaos in my home. I am committed to living a happy life. I am committed to sharing the lessons I have learned about how to do that.

Why am I committed? What makes me commit? How have I changed from thinking I can’t commit to choosing my commitments?

Oh. Right. Choice. When I have taken an inventory of my commitments based on my observations, I can compare them to what I want to be committed to. I get to choose my commitments. I get to commit to choosing my commitments! Ahahahahah!

I hear some of us wondering why we would care about our commitments. You could say it’s all about time and resource management. And about bringing our lives in line with what we want.

When I am obviously committed to something I don’t like, I spend a lot of T and R not liking it. If I whine about it without taking action, I compound the expenditure of resource because now I have involved you, squandering your T and R as well. Dang!

Sometimes we think of our “disliked” commitments more as weighty liabilities, as burdens, as constraints. We say that we want to feel free, but we keep finding ourselves in situations where we feel overwhelmed, or trapped, or suffocated. We feel doomed.

In the days of yore, I was committed to misery. Seriously. I was committed to feeling awful. My commitment was strong, I was also committed to overwhelm and feeling doomed. I would joke that I had three feelings; terrible, bad, and not bad. I hated it, but spent hours everyday talking about how much I hated it. I fed my commitment with attention, with focus, and with practice. I felt powerless to do anything about it.

Turned out I was wrong.

I love to admit I was wrong when it comes to this kind of stuff. It means my life is going to be so much better.

I had to make a commitment to change my bad commitment! I made a promise to myself that I would do whatever it took to become a happy person. I had no idea what that even meant back then, but I was determined. It took me some time. The current spate of information and support didn’t exist back then. One thing I remember doing was wearing a rubber band on my wrist and giving it a little snap every time I had an ugly thought. I didn’t know to change it to a good thought back then, but I did manage to slow down the bad ones.

There is so much help available now. On-line groups filled with like-minded people, wonderful websites, texting, new techniques to help us change. We can, you know, change what we are committed to. We just need to make that commitment.

How have I changed from being committed to icky stuff to loving my commitments to my wonderful life?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2016 all rights reserved 06232016