13: Why Keeping Promises to Yourself WORKS!

Do you struggle to keep promises to yourself? This episode of the Build Strong Women podcast explores the transformative power of self-commitment. We delve into why keeping promises to yourself is crucial for building self-trust, boosting confidence, and ultimately, achieving your goals.

We'll discuss how intentionality in making promises shifts your mindset and helps you stay focused, and how self-accountability strengthens your motivation to follow through. Learn how consistently keeping promises fosters habit formation and strengthens self-discipline. Discover how honoring your commitments demonstrates self-respect and contributes to positive self-esteem and a sense of accomplishment.

We'll also explore the importance of self-compassion, understanding that circumstances change, and that sometimes, breaking a promise is a learning opportunity. It's about progress, not perfection, and cultivating a mindset that allows for growth and resilience.

Tune in for actionable tips and empowering insights to help you build a stronger relationship with yourself and create a life you can be proud of.

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Transcript

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Hi, I'm Laura Orlando and welcome to the Build Strong Women podcast. I believe as women that we are the role models for the next generation of girls. So how do we become the best role models for these young girls? We work hard to become the best version of ourselves, whatever that means to you. It's not easy. It takes work. It takes learning, trying new things, falling down and getting back up again. But that's what we do on the show. We dive deep into how we can grow on the inside. We will learn from women that are on the same journey as us. Just trying to become the best version of themselves. Let's learn together, build our confidence, learn to love who we are so that we can teach the next generation of girls to grow up to be strong and confident women. Hi guys, and welcome back to another episode of the Build Strong Women podcast. Thank you so much for being here and tuning into this week's episode. This episode this week is something that is really close to my heart. It's all about keeping promises. But before we dive in, I want to remind you to head over to the show notes and make sure that you are on my email list so that you never miss anything going on over at Gracious Adventures. And I share tips and ideas for helping you grow on the inside, and I don't want you to miss anything over there. That's is the best way to stay connected with me. So I hope that you will head over to the show notes and do that. So today, like I said, we are talking about something that has been really close to my heart. And that's all about keeping promises to yourself. So a while back, I did an episode about how I decided that I was going to stop setting these big audacious goals for myself and just start keeping promises to myself. And keeping promises to myself really actually worked for me. It wasn't like this big audacious goal that I had to keep in the back of my mind. They were these little like micro goals or mini promises I was making to myself that really held me accountable. And I really wanted to talk about how keeping promises to yourself actually can work for you because it really worked for me. And I'm just coming from experience. I'm not saying that this is going to work for everyone, but I really, really wanted to share how keeping promises to yourself can actually help you achieve the things that you want to do or it can help you feel better inside yourself. It can help you become the best version of yourself. So the first part of keeping a promise to yourself is you get really clear on your intention. It shifts your mindset from I should do this to I will do this because you're making a promise to yourself. And this intentionality helps you to stay focused on your goals and it really helps you resist those distractions because you are committing to yourself. When you commit to yourself and you are just building that self-trust inside yourself and no one else can You can build your self-trust. You have to do this on your own. So when you make a promise to yourself, you're making a commitment to you and you are trusting yourself that you are going to follow through on these the best that you can so that you can do the things that you want to do. When you make these promises to yourself, it not only helps you build that self-trust, but it also helps you build confidence within yourself. Knowing that you can count on yourself boosts your confidence. When you make a commitment to yourself and you know that you are going to follow through with that because you made that promise to yourself, it really helps boost that confidence you have inside yourself. Confidence is all about believing in yourself and your abilities. And when you do something that you didn't think that you could do, it changes how you view yourself. And this confidence translates into greater willingness to take on challenges and to pursue goals and bigger goals that you have for your life. When I talk about keeping promises to yourself, I'm talking about like these little things that you do for yourself. A lot of the promises that I made to myself are just those little ways that I know that it's going to help me feel better inside. I really wanted to start working out more I wanted to start eating better not eating sweets so often and it was just those little things that I was going to do for myself that helped me to feel good inside myself because I know if I feel healthier that I am going to be happier I'm going to be have more energy I'm going to just feel better in every area of my life and this also helped with my confidence so knowing that I can count on myself really helps me boost my confidence because I'm doing something for me The next thing that I really wanted to talk about with keeping promises and how it really helps you just feel good inside yourself and really helps you achieve those things that you want in your life is that you have this form of self-accountability. You're holding responsibility for your actions. You're telling yourself, you know what, I'm going to hold myself accountable for the things that I want in my life. This sense of responsibility increases your motivation to really follow through on those promises, even when things get really hard and get really difficult. One of my promises that I have for myself is I I want to have a more positive mindset. I want to just be more positive in my life. I can tend to be very negative, have some negative self-talk, which I'm sure everyone does, but I really, really wanted to focus on just being a more positive person and like assuming positive intent with other people. So I love that I made these lists of promises to myself because I can really look back at them and say, okay, these are the things that I want to follow through on. These are the things that I want to take responsibilities for and I'm holding myself accountable. So when you hold yourself accountable, you really are more intentional about how you follow through on the things that you want to do in your life and the promises that you want to keep to yourself. Another thing that I feel that promises can really do for you, it really helps you Thank you so much for joining us. No, this is how I want to live my everyday life. and you do the things that you want to do because you know it's going to help you feel better, you really have this sense of accomplishment. And every time someone has a sense of accomplishment, I really feel like we are improving our self-esteem. You really start believing in who you are. And I really believe that when we start believing in ourselves and our abilities and that we can follow through on something, we start to just grow inside. We start to grow our self-esteem. We start to grow our confidence. And we start to respect who we are. When we honor our commitments to ourself, we're demonstrating self-respect. We are loving ourselves. And that's what I want for you. I want you to make these small little promises to yourself and just be consistent with them. Show up for them. Read them every single day. And tell yourself that you are going to follow through on them. Because when you do this, you are going to have an amazing relationship with yourself. You're going to have this positive relationship with yourself. You're really going to start loving who you are. And you're really going to start thinking that you are... an amazing person because you are showing up for you. So what I want you to do is just think about one small promise that you can make to yourself, that you can show up for yourself every single day and follow through on that promise. Don't make it this big, giant thing where I'm going to eat... 100 grams of protein in the morning and walk for three hours every single day, you have to pick things that can be attainable because you will not show up for them. You will not be able to follow through on them and then you are going to feel like you failed or you didn't show up for yourself and that's going to happen. So I really want to talk about how when we make these promises to ourselves, and sometimes, guess what's gonna happen? You're not gonna follow through on your promise. It's important to remember that we are all human. And sometimes, even with the best intentions, we don't always meet our own expectations. And I want to talk about ways to approach those moments and really focusing on having some self-compassion with ourselves because, trust me, I have had so many moments where I did not make or keep the promises that I made to myself. And I just started feeling so guilty about it because, you know, this is a lot more personal than just having a goal on your vision board. This is something that you are committing to yourself. You're making these really strong promises for you because you want to show up as the best version of yourself. And when you don't follow through on those promises, you can be so hard on yourself. And there are so many reasons why you might not follow through on a promise that you made to yourself. Life is completely unpredictable. There are events and emergencies and things that can happen that you're not going to be able to follow through on your promise. And we have to give ourselves grace for those unexpected things that are going to come up in our life. You know, we are our own worst critic and we are are so quick to jump on ourselves when we're messing up or doing something wrong or not following through on a promise. And we really have to take a step back and look at the situation. Maybe there are things that were out of our control. You have to be okay with that. And maybe there were things that you could have been in control of, but you just couldn't help yourself. And that's okay too. We are all human. I want you to understand that life is so unpredictable. You have to just have some compassion for yourself and give yourself grace Because guess what? If you make a mistake, if you don't follow through on a promise, you can go to bed, wake up the next day, and start again. That's all I want you to do. You always have that chance to start again. You can start again in the next five minutes. It doesn't even have to be the next day. Really start working on not being so hard on yourself. If you feel like you can't keep the promise that you made to yourself, maybe you need to look at that promise and set a more manageable goal. And then just recommit to yourself. These things are not set in stone. It's okay to renegotiate and to make different promises for yourself and to focus on something else if you can't commit to something maybe you need to adjust it a little bit it's okay to adjust and recommit back to yourself and what you can do is you can really learn from the past and from your past mistakes and the promises that you broke to yourself you can learn from them and you can focus on making a better goal for yourself and putting more energy into that one and putting more energy into being consistent and following through with that new promise it's okay to adjust it's okay to recommit and start over again it doesn't mean that you failed it just means you learned from it and you have to move on this isn't about perfection this is all about making little progress towards a better life making progress towards a life that you love living in the person that you want to be and how you can just do these little small things for yourself and watch yourself start to grow inside watch yourself just to start feeling so much better inside yourself And when you really start to trust yourself in this process, you're really going to learn how amazing you are. You're really going to start loving yourself and growing your self-esteem and your confidence because you are committing to yourself. You're holding yourself accountable. You are being intentional about how you want to show up and how you want to live. And everything's going to change for you because you're doing this for yourself. It isn't for anyone else. It isn't to show someone, oh, look what I can do. It's all about commitment. And when you show yourself what you're capable of and you show up for yourself every single day by following through on those little promises you make to yourself, your whole life is just going to feel better. You're going to feel so much more confident. You're going to have so much more faith in who you are. And that's the beauty about making promises to yourself. So I really wanted to share one of the ways that has really helped me keep promises to myself. to myself that I really want to keep. And that is not focusing on being perfect all the time. It's about focusing on being consistent. When I keep showing up regularly, doing the things that I want to do, following through on the promises that I made to myself and trying not to be so perfect all the time, just being consistent and doing those small little actions and doing them over and over and over again each and every day, knowing that I'm moving forward because I'm being consistent. And sometimes, yeah, of course, I'm going to mess up. I'm not going to do the things that I want to do. I'm not going to follow through. But it doesn't matter because I know last week I did that every single day. I was just sick with the flu last week and I didn't work out for eight days in a row. And it really got to me. I was like, oh my gosh, I'm not consistent. I'm not following through on my promise that I made to myself to work out so many days a week. And I wasn't hard on myself. I obviously knew I had the flu. I couldn't even go to the gym I couldn't do any type of workout but I was just kind of like feeling bad about it like oh my gosh I was so consistent for so long but guess what I had to work out this week and we had like these challenges where we have to kind of beat the time that we made before so there was a rower and we had to beat our time on the rower and I have been so consistent for the past three months going five days a week I went on the rower and I actually beat my benchmark time it's because I was Yes, I missed eight days before I went back on that rower and did that type of workout, but I was so consistent before that I didn't need to worry. I had all this momentum behind me. I had all this consistency behind me. So when I showed up to do it, even though I took over a week off, I was still okay. And those are the things that you have to think about. If you keep showing up and being consistent, it just compounds over time and it leads to this growth that you didn't even know that you could have. have inside. So if you focus on those daily promises and habits every single day and being consistent with yourself and just really trusting yourself, you're going to build that momentum. And that is huge when you're doing these things for yourself. And I don't want you to worry about being so perfect all the time because we can be so hard on ourselves. And I don't want you to get in that trap of perfectionism because it will bring you down because you're allowed to be imperfect. You're allowed to make mistakes. You're allowed to mess up. You're It's okay. I want you to really focus on being proud of who you are and how you want to make change in your life and how you want to feel better inside yourself and be proud of that. And be proud of that little consistency that you've had. If you've done something for three days in a row that you promised yourself you would do, be proud of that. Celebrate those small wins. And the coolest part about making promises to yourself and following through and being really consistent with them is that When you do this, it is going to show up in other areas of your life, which is so cool. So when I do things for myself and it helps me feel good inside, I'm a better parent. I'm a better wife. I'm a better friend. Because I know that I'm showing up for myself. I'm giving myself that self-care and love that I deserve. And it really helps me in all areas of my life. I have more confidence in myself. And it helps me in every area of my life, in my relationship in my career, in everything that I do. So that is what I really wanted to share is that it doesn't matter about the little promises or what they actually are. It's just about showing up for yourself, loving yourself enough to follow through and do these things for yourself. And really knowing that when you feel good inside yourself and you show up for yourself, It will affect every area of your life. You will be happier in every area of your life. Things will change, and that ripple effect will go to all areas of your life, and that's the coolest part. So I really want you to focus on just trying to find one thing that you can follow through on and be consistent with, a little promise to yourself, just one. Just try just one, even if it's for, okay, I'm going to do this for two days, and the next time I want you to do it for five days, and then just keep moving on from there, and just try to be consistent and really just trying to show up for yourself. Show yourself that you can do these hard things. Show yourself that you can be consistent and that you can trust yourself because I'm telling you it's going to expand and affect every area of your life. And I'm here to help you with that. And I actually created a promise planner for myself. I did it on a program that I use on my computer and I had it printed and bound and everything because I really wanted to show up every day and in the morning and say, okay, these are my intentions for today. These are the promises I'm making for myself. These are the happy habits I'm going to do today. These are the goals that I am working on. These are the things that I want to show up for myself. And when I set up my morning like that and I tell myself, okay, these are the things that I'm going to focus on, I am setting myself up for success. I find that when I don't have the time to do that in the morning and I'm not really focused in on the promises that I want to keep for myself and the happy habits I want to include in my everyday life that brings me joy I just kind of feel a little off I just love being able to you know do my prayers and do my promise planner do my gratitude because it sets me up for success for the day I'm grounded I can see what I want to work on I can see the person that I want to be and it really really helps me and it's just something that I'm really trying out is this promise planner and seeing if this is something that helps me because I want to provide something for you that will help you with your promises as well so if you're listening to this and you think hey this promise planner sounds really cool message me on instagram or let me know because i think this would be something that would be really really cool and i have been using it for over a month now and i absolutely love it because it really just helps me set the tone for the day okay these are the things that i really want to stay consistent with today and i'm going to do that for myself because when we show up for ourself we feel better inside we have more confidence And like I said, it's just this ripple effect that affects every area of our life. And it's not about being perfect. Absolutely not. In my house, perfect is not even a word. And I really want you to focus on that too. So I hope this episode was helpful. I really love talking about ways that I can help you improve your life help you feel better inside yourself help you feel more confident within yourself and if it's just making one promise to yourself and being consistent with it and following through hey then that is an absolute win and I'm so excited for you to try this and I hope that you will really take making a promise to yourself seriously because it has so many benefits and I really think it will help you feel better inside yourself so like I do Every episode, I want to end it with a powerful affirmation that can help you get you through your day, help you feel happier and more positive and really inspire you. So that affirmation is, I honor the promises I make to myself, knowing that each commitment I keep strengthens my trust in who I am. I hope that you have a wonderful day and that you loved this episode. And if it was helpful, I would be so grateful if you could share it with a friend. I would appreciate it so, so much. And I hope that you have a wonderful day and I will see you on next week's episode.