DH and I were recently discussing promises. He stands firmly behind the premise that promises are made to be broken. Not that it's a relative juxtaposition or anything, just that there's an implication of potential breakage when any promise is made; the swearee knows the swearor will, in fact, not follow through if given enough time. Just as staunchly, I believe that you don't make a promise unless you intend to defend it, to do whatever it takes to make the promise of the promise come to fruition—fully recognizing that shit happens and sometimes you just can't help it when things go awry.
I try really hard not to offer things I can't deliver, whether an actual thing or an act or a non-act, as in, "I promise not to do such-and-such." It's kind of surprising, really, because I'm a very selfish, very determined girl, who will generally do whatever it takes to get what she wants. I can be dogged when it comes to fulfilling my own heart's desire. Sometimes it borders on being a bit obsessive. (Bite it, Absolem.) But I just can't get behind making an empty promise only to make someone else happy.
There's something about intentionally promising to do something that I know damn well I have no intention of ever doing... it's innately deceptive. Believe me, I've been known to lie, cheat, and steal to get the things I want, but there's always some weird sense of moral truth to those desires, like I deserve to have those things, like they're destined, so it's okay to do whatever it takes to get them. Promising something to someone else, for no other reason than to make them momentarily appeased, seems wrong to me. It's a blatant lie with no greater purpose, and I have a hard time wrapping my heart around that.
So if DH is right and there's an underlying fracture in a promise, is there a reason to keep it? Is there something sacred in the vow, even if it's inherently imperfect?
Yeah, I think there is. A real promise, as a compact between two people, is made in confidence, both in the sense of trust and in the sense of secrecy. Only the hearts of the avowed know the depth of the oath. The circumstances of that connection are worth defending, are worth trying to protect, even in the face of extreme internal and external adversities. The selfless intimacy that gave birth to such a promise is what makes it sacrosanct and that's what gives the promise its own inherent value.
And what if a promise is broken? What happens when one party digs their fingers into the minutest cracks of the covenant and rips open the facade?
It doesn't make the occasion of the promising any less inviolable. If the hearts and souls of the swearee and the swearor were truly as one when the pact was made, the circumstance of the emotional communion is in-and-of itself a thing of undeniable beauty, worthy of exaltation even if the fruits of that labor have spoiled.
Maybe I agree with DH more than I realize. Maybe, deep down, I assume all promises will indeed be broken, ushering in an inexorable amount of drama and possible trauma. I certainly have historical reason to assume I will be disappointed. Perhaps, as I'm prone to do, I weigh the potential consequence of my actions, of breaking a promise (intentionally or not), and choose to avoid the difficult burden of yet again examining my own motives and culpability when I fail.
Often my refusal to make promises I think I can't keep is perhaps for selfish reasons, a way to protect myself from my own disappointment. I'd like to think my lofty (if seemingly random) ideals push me toward making the honorable choice, but I think it's really more a matter of lowered expectations: if I don't climb very high, the fall will hurt a hell of a lot less.
But I'm still enamored of the experience, of the extant intimacy that led to the communion. I'm enthralled by those dark, quiet moments that happen between two people, two of billions, and the intensity of the emotion surrounding that connection. That is the kind of stepping stone I'm looking for, laying my path and edging ever closer to the ultimate destination of Me.
Even if the promise will eventually be broken—even if there will inevitably be shards of trust lying about, ready to slice my fallen knees—there's still something virtuous about the bare hearts bursting with their own affiance. It's tender and fragile and budding, and that is worthwhile, simply because it ever existed at all.
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