A Mason's Work

[00:00] So all week we've been working on commitments and contracts and things like that.
[00:06] And we've been talking about understanding our own interiors as well as commitments with
[00:12] the other party.
[00:13] But we make commitments all the time that don't seem to have those same dynamics.
[00:18] They don't seem to track to the anatomy of a standard commitment.
[00:23] There's no deliverable per se.
[00:25] There's no external party to hold you to them.
[00:28] And that's oaths and identity commitments.
[00:30] These commitments feel like they're one-sided where I take an oath to be a better person
[00:36] or, you know, like you may have taken an oath to do certain things in your lodge.
[00:41] Those commitments are just as important as any other contract.
[00:48] But they're the easiest to kind of forget about because when you break them, nobody sends you
[00:55] an invoice, right?
[00:56] The cost is internal and it's cumulative and it's invisible until it creates that internal
[01:05] disingenuous behavior that we essentially spent last week trying to resolve.
[01:10] The better we understand ourselves, the more we can make these commitments that make sense.
[01:16] And we, you know, the more we break these internal commitments to ourselves, the more of this kind
[01:22] of baggage we have to overcome when we try and get to that honest self-assessment.
[01:28] So the structural problem with that identity commitment is it seems kind of crazy to have
[01:35] a commitment that's one-sided.
[01:36] But the hook here is that's kind of a joke because these commitments aren't one-sided.
[01:45] They're commitments you're making with your future self.
[01:50] That requester, that person who's asking for behavior change, who asking for an outcome is the
[01:57] person you want to be in the future.
[01:59] And by taking the commitment today, you are, or whenever you took your most recent commitment or
[02:05] oath or any of these kinds of identity statements, you essentially set a requester, which is the
[02:12] future version of yourself, who's going to be the beneficiary of these commitments that we make.
[02:15] So that person needs, needs to behave in a certain, needs you in the present moment to behave in a
[02:24] certain way.
[02:25] He needs to be able to trust, or she needs to be able to trust, you know, the person that's making
[02:30] that commitment or that oath.
[02:31] So how do you deal with that?
[02:34] The reality is the same rules apply.
[02:36] What you do is you talk essentially in dialogue with a future version of yourself in your head
[02:42] or out on paper, and you use the thing that you want to become that as the outcome that
[02:51] you're going to drive towards.
[02:52] You use the, that identity.
[02:55] I'm going to be a, um, a community influencer, or I'm going to be a conscientious individual,
[03:01] or I'm going to be a person of integrity.
[03:03] And you use that as the position, uh, that the requester has.
[03:08] And from that position, you then architect the actual behavioral language and filters you're
[03:14] going to need to put in place in order to move that conversation forward.
[03:18] In this process, uh, everything you're making, all of these commitments then become essentially,
[03:24] they move out of this ethereal, like one day I'm going to be the kind of person who X or Y or Z.
[03:31] And you actually begin to contract.
[03:34] You begin to take this commitment seriously by giving yourself discrete behaviors and actions
[03:40] you're going to take to drive to that future version of yourself.
[03:44] In those conversations, again, the ARAA cycle works really well here.
[03:50] What is it that I'm aware of?
[03:51] What is the gap that I'm trying to close in reflection?
[03:55] What are the mechanics of that gap?
[03:57] And what are the sort of spaces in between?
[03:59] And then through that analysis and then action phase, build that real consent.
[04:05] Uh, you can then, if you're making this commitment to yourself, you can enroll help aid and assistance
[04:10] from the people around you to help you close those goals.
[04:14] This whole process works for the oath you took at the altar.
[04:21] This whole process works in contracting with the people that you're building relationships with.
[04:27] And that one of those primary people you should be building a relationship with is yourself.
[04:33] Thank you.
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[04:35] Any questions?
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[05:00] Thank you very much for today.
[05:01] Thanks.
[05:01] And you.