On Breaking Promises to Myself

“My ex is Italian so my boys spend the summers with him in Italy. It’s tough for me. The first day they’re gone I feel lost and depressed… 😞

The second day I miss them so much I go into their closet and smell their clothes. 🥲

Then on the third day I’m FINE!  😁

Noooo, I’m not really fine. 🙁

I’m FANTASTIC!” 😃

This joke has been told by yours truly on comedy stages a few times, but the truth is I’m not totally fine on day three or fantastic on day four. I miss those messy, loud, fun, exasperating, long-legged teenagers at home all summer long. As a single parent for 300 days of the year I feel completely upside down the two months they’re gone. It’s like a hurricane passed through my house and for two months I’m left standing with all of the pieces of my upturned couch pillows scattered around until it magically gets cleaned up on their return.

This summer I’ve distracted myself with trips away from home for two of the eight weeks.

But this week I’ve been home. You’d think the kids had taken my legs with them on the Swiss Air flight, leaving me here ambling on two stumps. I’ve got so much more time for myself and feel completely lost and unable to sort out what to do with that time. I closed down Santa Monica public library on a Tuesday night checking out a dozen books I’ll likely never read and even cleaned every nook of my car on in the darkness of an evening on my own.

It’s not just the laughter we share at dinner, missing of the Pantene conditioner smell of their hair when I hug them, or longing to hear their upbeat voices in the next room, while I miss all those things a lot. I’m also missing the commitment to something outside of myself. I miss showing up for someone and something that needs (constant) attention. I’ve still got my work, relationships, workouts, and feeding myself (a part time job). But there are significant gaps in time when I’d typically be caring for those two beings when I don’t have any commitment to anyone or anything at all.

Insert feelings of despair, emptiness, and loss. Bird launching is tough, even two months at a time. And holding down the nest once my eaglets are in flight is not easy for this mama eagle.

Summer time is an opportunity for me to turn my attention to my internal commitments. Ut oh. This is where it gets messy. The empty house gets pretty darn haunted when the silence is a reflection of all the promises I made to myself for this summer. The things I wanted to do for myself. The blogs and newsletters I wanted to write, the open mics I wanted to do to reconnect with my love for stand-up, the YouTube videos I longed to create, the Insight Timer meditations and courses I wanted to record. Oh, and that messy hall closet I wanted to clean out. I don’t have any excuse for not following through on those internal promises.

Some internal promises are easier to keep. I keep up my workout routine and journaling. But the deeper, more vulnerable fires seem harder to fan the flames of. No one is there to say, “HEY, THAT BLOG ISN’T GONNA WRITE ITSELF! LET’S GET GOING!” or “GREAT JOB ON MAKING PROGRESS ON SCRIPTING THAT MEDITATION NO ONE ASKED YOU TO MAKE! KEEP GOING!”

Apparently this parent needs to reparent herself. Showing up for others and checking boxes on external promises — especially to my kiddos — seem a lot easier than showing up for myself and the promises I’ve made to me.

I’m embarrassed to admit this, but I posted a video on YouTube in April about my goal of creating 50 videos on YouTube in the next 4-6 months. Then I didn’t do post anything. NADA! I got distracted, made excuses, left town, checked out a lot of library books, and placed my attention on other things. I’ve been thinking about taking that video down in shame, but then a wise friend offered, “Why don’t you make your next video about ‘Why I didn’t follow through on making 50 videos?”

There’s still time to meet my goal (or take that thing down!). But the lesson asks what will it take for me to keep the promises I’ve made to myself?

Can you relate? Is it easier to show up for others even when you’re sick, tired, and depleted, but an Everest climb to follow through on your deeper yearnings and internal promises?

I forgive myself for not following through. There’s no use in curling up in a ball of embarrassment, apologizing for the blogs and newsletters I haven’t written, or deleting the YouTube video or my entire account.

What is helpful for me is to recommit to the promises I’ve made to myself and move forward. I’ve got five weeks left of summertime. There’s plenty o’ time to follow through on the dreams of my heart. I know my desires — even simple things like organizing the hall closet — are bread crumbs to lead me on my path.

What also helps me is to fast forward my brain to LAX airport when I embrace my eaglets on their return mid-August. I’m playing out two scenarios in my mind. One is the scenario when I coast through this summer missing them, doing all the basics to keep my life afloat, but not keeping my promises to myself. I’ve got a pit in my stomach just thinking about how disappointed I’ll feel in myself. I don’t love leaning into this scene of future regret and disappointment but this future possibility is like jet fuel to my self-promising engine.

The second scenario is me making this semi-public declaration and fully committing to my goals for myself, as if I’m overboard mid-Atlantic and the goals are my inflatable pants. Keeping my internal promises feels more brave, vulnerable, and a lot more fulfilling. This approach won’t only keep me afloat, it must just save my life.

I’m reigniting the flames of my internal promises. This blog is one promise, and I’m following through on that right now. I recorded and uploaded a new Insight Timer meditation yesterday. And I’m signed up for my first open mic in a year on Tuesday (wish me luck).

Mindset also helps. The truth is i don’t have to do any of these tasks. I GET to do all of these amazing things with the spaciousness and time I’ve got on my hands this summer.

I’ve also engaged two friends in checking on me and my promises. A little support can go a long way in keeping me accountable.

Do you have a promise you’ve made to yourself you’re struggling to keep? No matter how small the goal is, and how little external validation you might get by following through on it, and all of the valid distractions that keep you from your internal promises, KEEP GOING!

Life seems long, but just like the eight weeks of summer it sure does go by quickly. You’ve got this my friend, and I think I do, too.