Human connection is complex. It has layer upon layer of opportunities for growth and expansion. And yet, those opportunities are often mired in a web of expectations, obligations and responsibilities. A quote that particularly resonated with me is “how can you love that which you feel obligated to” from Mooji. It’s a reminder that these self-made agreements are powerful indicators of our relationship with ourselves and how we see ourselves in relation to others. I have been in deep contemplation of the agreements I have with myself and others to ensure that they are conscious agreements. Too many times, I’ve uncovered an agreement that actually originated from someone else’s expectation of me, rather than my own. Those are the agreements that I find feel constricting and difficult to maintain. 

Making healthy agreements with ourselves

This web of agreements that we weave for ourselves can either be empowering or disempowering. Some of the questions I’ve asked myself along the way to uncover my underlying agreements include how do I expect myself to behave around my Mother, my children, my partner and my team? When do I feel contracted and want to disconnect from others? When do I experience social anxiety and shut down? With whom? Who do I feel most comfortable around? Why do I feel comfortable? What do I expect of myself around them? What roles do I play for them? I look for times I feel a contraction and immediately start poking at myself in the mirror to figure out the source of it. I’ve found that this discovery must become a practice and something that you do regularly. There are thousands of layers to uncover over our lifetime and I like to be proactive about my own self-development. I relish the opportunity to dive in and unravel something juicy and my self agreements have not failed to deliver. 

One thing that helped me to uncover my agreements was to look for the masks I wear around others. These masks are little personas that I put on in order to “be” the person I want to be in their reflection. I might want to be a “good boss” or a “great Mother”, as an example. That creates a story in my head of what good and great means and therein lies the agreement. I’m agreeing to play this “role” or accept this “expectation” and respond in a specific way to it. Once I understand what I’m holding myself accountable to and how I behave in relation to that agreement I can then decide if it’s healthy for me. Sometimes I’ve found that I’m holding myself to an impossible standard of perfection and as such have created a negative relationship with who I am and who I want to be. I feel dissonance between where I am now and where I want to be in the future and it creates a state of restlessness that leads to an anxious state. 

This must be resolved and reformed into a healthier agreement. So I upgraded my agreement to be that I will show up as the best version of myself to the best of my ability, every day. This agreement with myself isn’t conditional and doesn’t involve anyone else. Sometimes my best self is tired and cranky. And sometimes my best self is happy and excited. My agreement is to accept and acknowledge that I’m always doing my best. I certainly don’t intend to hurt others or to hurt myself, but sometimes I do and that’s a reality I have to face. In those times, I have an agreement with myself to offer the same compassion and forgiveness I would offer my children. I intentionally speak to my inner child who can feel scared and hurt when I’m feeling disconnected from my true self. I’ll ask myself when’s the first time I felt this? How old was I? Who was I around? What happened? What is the context of the emotion? What’s my story of this feeling? Is it positive or negative? Is that true? Many times I find there is a wound that I have an opportunity to heal if I can turn my attention to it and set the intention to release it. While it can be scary to look at a wound especially if it’s raw it is also incredibly cathartic and once removed it feels like a giant weight has been lifted off of me. So while it’s scary and it often hurts it’s also worth it. 

Making healthy agreements with family and friends

Once you’ve reconstructed your unhealthy agreements with yourself, it’s time to start looking at the agreements you have created with friends and family. These agreements are far less subtle and easier to uncover as they are often patternistic. To start uncovering these I take a look at each of my relationships and ask myself, what does this person expect from me? What do I expect from them? How do we behave in light of those expectations? How can I remove expectations and allow this person to be who they are? When does this person trigger an automatic response from me? Is that response what I would like to continue or do I want to change it?  What really works about this relationship? What would make it even better? How can I show up more fully as my best self with this person? When don’t I? Why? 

I’ve found that by focusing on these unwritten rules of engagement with others I find that they are also wearing masks and act in accordance with the real or perceived expectations they have in relation to me. That includes the way they believe that I perceive them. The agreements with others are multi-faceted and require a more in-depth examination. Many times it’s something that will unravel over time. In the last exercise, you looked at these agreements in relation to yourself, now you’ll turn that mirror outward and see how others reflect in response to you.

Some of the questions I ask myself include when do I trigger them? How do they respond? Is that response healthy or unhealthy? How do I behave in response to their reaction? Do I want that to continue? Or would I like to upgrade it? What would an upgrade to this behavior look like? How can I participate in creating that change? When do we really gel? What’s different? Then I separately review the agreements we’ve made related to trust, communication and expectations. I ask do I trust this person? Why or why not? How do we communicate best? Worst? What is my role in that? What expectations do I have of this person? What expectations do they have of me? Are these healthy or unhealthy expectations? Who do they serve? Who do they not serve? 

A major part of the human experience is to connect with others. That connection creates a playground for self-exploration and expression. When it’s handled with intention it can greatly accelerate personal growth and alignment with an even truer version of self emerging a little bit more every day. Ultimately, what I’ve found is that I have unwritten rules of engagement that can be completely unconscious and sometimes unhealthy. I’ve spent a large portion of my life being a chameleon who transforms herself into the mold of another’s expectations. I no longer want to live that way, instead I strive to show up as me and only me. This desire to keep the peace and be pleasant to others can also push me out of alignment with myself if I’m not careful. I’ve learned that I have to have a deep relationship with my own integrity and hold myself accountable to it even when it may create conflict that requires resolution. 

Resolution of misalignment creates a space for growth and allows for an even better version of self to emerge. And that aligns perfectly with my agreement to show up as my best self to the best of my ability. My ability to show up will evolve as will my best self. However, at my core there is also a piece of me that doesn’t change. A piece that’s been with me since the day I was born and has lived through every life experience. That’s the piece of me I’m uncovering. The me that’s always been there. It’s required years of unraveling pieces of myself that don’t fit that I’ve picked up and created along the way. And it’s required finding pieces of myself that have gotten lost in the shuffle of life. In both cases, it’s a journey that continues and will always continue as we are all dynamic human beings who have the capacity to create incredible things. Especially if we do the internal work to discover and uncover our full potential.