Is It Wrong To Break Our Promises?
Sometimes...sometimes not
Dear readers
It's Thursday morning as I write to you. I'm sitting propped up in bed, scribbling away under my trusty electric blanket. A white cloak is cast over the woods, fields and allotments. All is cold and still and silent.
But I can't tell you what the view from my window will be today - Sunday - I can only hope, as I'll no longer be in the UK.
Many years ago, when my life was radically different, I made a particular promise to myself. It was a new thing for me to do - make a grand, confident statement about doing something for myself that didn’t involve work or mothering. I was optimistic, perhaps even naive. I believed I would fulfil this promise soon and that my life would change somehow.
Yet it's taken me seven years to fulfil, and it's only today that I honour it.
If I scan back along the timeline and take inventory of how my life's changed since then - my daughter no longer living with me, hypothyroidism diagnosis, CFS/ME diagnosis, my beloved Gran dying, the pandemic, the death of a dear friend and confidente - I consider that I'm a different person to who I was.
But the desire to fulfil the promise remains.
Of course, the losses stand out and come to mind first; there have also been plenty of gains. A year abroad in Asia, a feisty new niece, a gorgeous god-daughter, new friendships, a ton of therapy and healing, a better understanding of myself, a newfound respect for my ageing body, letting go of trying to be someone I'm not, my life-affirming neurodivergent diagnosis, and simply allowing myself to rest more.
And the desire to fulfil the promise remains.
In the past, I've broken promises. I made a 'sacred' promise when I walked down the aisle with a man I loved. But I quickly turned my back on it and him when it no longer suited me.
When I reflect on breaking that supposedly sacred promise I made when I got married, I’m glad. It was the right thing to do. A different promise, not quite conscious, was rooted in my decision: you deserve more, and I will give it to you.
I've kept promises, too. I made a promise to my daughter after that failed marriage: no more men in our life, just me and you. I stuck to that one with no trouble. I'd made an earlier promise when she was a baby, and I was a single mother on benefits: you will not grow up in poverty. I managed that one, too.
It's always been easier to make promises to her than myself, or at least it used to be. I supposed I loved her more than me.
I'd break the smaller promises I made to myself consistently and continuously: not drinking, not sleeping with men who didn't deserve my care and attention, exercising more.
But times change… I changed.