Does commitment limit your freedom?

A young woman recently shared with me that she is really struggling with commitment. She has expressed fears that saying “yes” to anything—projects, relationships, responsibilities—limits her. When I asked her what she is afraid of, why she chooses to decide about things at the last moment, her instinctive response was that she appreciates her freedom. Immediately, my inner voice whispered to me, that’s not freedom, that’s isolation.

We live in a culture filled with endless options. Often, we think that keeping all of our options open allows us to choose what feels best in the moment, and that this is freedom. Sometimes, it is necessary to choose in the moment. We need to maintain flexibility to respond to immediate needs.

At the same time, when you only make choices in the moment, it is difficult, if not impossible to cultivate meaningful collaborations. Relationship requires commitment. That is easy to understand when we think about marriage or long term friendship, for example, and it also applies to projects, communities and practices.

As she and I talked, we realized how our sense of belonging and personal safety is intricately tied to our relationships. Feeling a community holding you contributes significantly to your sense of safety. Building community and relationships requires that you show up, that you commit to being present both technically, as in setting time to meet with someone, as well as energetically by showing up with the intention to connect, well rested without distractions.

In the same way, your relationship to yourself requires commitment. Many mornings, I do not feel like doing my practice and would rather just stay in bed. My commitment to my health, to my well being is the force that moves me to get my yoga mat, to move my body, to practice. If I did only what I felt like in the moment, I would probably rarely, if ever, do my practice in the morning.

As we talked, the young woman who was afraid of commitment realized that freedom doesn’t have to mean isolation. Choosing to commit creates a different freedom, the freedom to choose to belong and to deepen your connections. By practicing commitment intentionally, she is learning to honor her need to listen closely to herself and also show up in her relationships, with others and with herself. Commitment is actually a key to breaking through patterns of loneliness.