How To Stop Breaking Promises That You Make To Yourself

How many times have you promised yourself you were going to save money, lose weight, or clean out the junk drawer in the kitchen? If you’re like me then you will have been breaking promises everyday…

You’ve likely made thousands of promises to yourself and broken the majority of them.

It can be as simple as saying, “I’m going to get started on my exercise tomorrow,” yet it comes and goes, and you don’t start…….

This has consequences. 

How does it make you feel when you don’t complete something that you started or said you were going to do? It doesn’t make me feel good in myself. Basically by breaking promises to yourself you’re teaching yourself that you don’t have to take yourself seriously. You’re implicitly teaching yourself that it’s okay to let yourself down.

Trusting and believing in yourself is important.

After all, if you can’t trust yourself, whom can you trust? Keeping promises to yourself is generally more important than keeping promises to others, yet we tend to approach life from the opposite perspective.

Breaking promises can damage your relationship with yourself affects every part of your life.

What would you think of someone that made promises to you and broke them regularly? Would you date that person or call them your friend for long? The answer is probably No, so in essence you think less of yourself when you break a promise to yourself.

Treat yourself as you would another person: treat yourself like you matter and respect the promises you make to yourself. The integrity you build with yourself will make you better at keeping all of the promises you make. It will expand into everything you do.

Here are a few techniques to keep your promises to yourself and add integrity to every part of your life:

1. Use your past as a reference. Don’t set high goals – decide on something more achievable so you can feel good when you accomplish it. In other words make reasonable promises to yourself.
2. Put your promises on paper. Thoughts are a funny thing. They sort of feel real, but they sort of don’t. Writing them down is more concrete. Keep your written promises where you can see them regularly. Review them a couple of times each day.
3. Ask yourself if you mean it and listen to the answer. Down deep, you know if you’re serious about your promises. After you make a promise to yourself, ask yourself if you really mean it. Listen to the answer you receive and respect it. If you’re not going to honour the promise you made to yourself, make a different one.
4. Change your beliefs about promises to yourself. Most of us are much better at keeping promises we make to others than we are at keeping promises we make to ourselves. That means that some part of you believes that it’s okay to let yourself down. Believe that you matter as much as everyone else, so you know its not acceptable to not keep promises to yourself.
5. Avoiding discomfort is a habit. Why don’t you keep a promise? – Because doing so is more uncomfortable than not doing it. So, it stands to reason that if you were better at dealing with discomfort, you would keep more of your promises.

Build the habit that will serve you the best.

Dealing with discomfort is among the most

valuable skills you can build.

There is another word for ‘breaking promises to yourself’ – its called Procrastination – but I prefer to say ‘breaking promises to myself’ – because that makes it really personal to me and I know I should not treat myself with disregard but should treat myself with the highest regard and importance.

Do you treat yourself wth respect?  Sit down and think about how you treat yourself, are you really honest with yourself? Or do you promise yourself one thing whilst knowing deep down that you will not do it? Let me know in the comments below.

It might take practice to reach this level of self knowledge, but its worth the effort. When you’re really honest with yourself you develop an understanding of yourself that helps you to decide what you will do and what you might need to focus on a bit more. Being honest or authentic with yourself gives you the power to choose your course of actions.