Commitment is difficult, among other things, because you will be re-evaluating when you have to perform the pre-committed actions. This is especially true of commitments you make to yourself.

I’ve been thinking about this in the context of math. When I study math, I’m painfully aware of how big of a commitment it is in terms of time. And each session feels a little pointless sometimes. “Ah! Now I know how to solve this specific class of ordinary differential equation that is never going to come up IRL, and even if it did, I could always probably simulate it, or maybe use a symbolic calculator, or ask AI! Hurray!” But over the long term, I think these pointless little sessions do add up to make me more like the person I want to be. It’s just that, when it’s finally time to put in the effort, it somehow doesn’t feel so clear anymore.

The result is that when I’m in the library I’m doing two things: math problems (or maybe just actively reading theory) on the one hand, and re-evaluating whether it is worth it on the other. That is exhausting and it makes studying math way more costly than it already is.

So how do we get some quiet? Apparently, the Metacognitive Therapy / Acceptance and Commitment Therapy advice here is to acknowledge these thoughts, but defuse them. Meaning, you just say “Not now, stupid brain, the scheduled time to think about this is at the end of the week, so sure, we’ll think about it but not now”.

You might have thought of a couple of alternatives like: “Not now, stupid brain [period].” or “yes, stupid brain, this is absolutely essential; in fact, I have all these reasons written down that I’m going to read right now to remind you of them”. Neither of those (thought suppression or opening the case for debate, respectively) really works. Why?

Thought suppression fails because it makes you monitor whether the thought is gone, which keeps the thought active: “am I thinking about it?” is already thinking about it. “Don’t think about a polar bear”, that kind of thing. On the other hand, arguing with the thought also fails because it treats the interruption as a legitimate demand for your attention; each time you stop to debate it, you reinforce the idea that the thought was worth pursuing, that there is a real concern there that needs addressing. So it will query you about it again later.

The one that has a chance, as I say, is defusion. But it’s just a chance. I believe that, in order for it to work, the commitment plan has to be credible, including the re-evaluation dates. If you just said “Not now, stupid brain, we are going to evaluate this on January 1st, 2070”, do you think that would convince you? Remember that “stupid brain” is ultimately you as well.

So I believe that you need to think “for how long am I certain that I can fully commit to doing this unless something really surprising comes up?” Not just wishful thinking, but deep down, how much time do you think you can give this, how much energy do you really have and so on. Will other competing goals predictably/probably mess with your commitment? If so, maybe you should lower your commitment plan to something that will fit those other goals, or think deeply about whether you actually want to prioritize the thing that you want to commit to. If you can only commit to studying subject X for a month because after that you will be pressured to do some other thing, then your commitment should last for a month, and maybe a potential re-evaluation date might be after 2 weeks. That is a credible plan and it’s easy to remain convinced that your re-evaluation date is real. Just set up a reminder for the re-evaluation date and your voices should quiet down. Hopefully.

At the end of the day, much of whether you succeed in this type of commitment is forming a habit, but that’s difficult. The above is a tool to help you in establishing said habit, or so I wish.

To be honest, this is the first time I’ve thought about it this way, even though I’ve struggled with this problem for years. So I will be reporting back once I’ve actually tried this. Today’s plan is to make a credible commitment.

I have another project that is fun in and of itself, but also has a decent chance of helping me accomplish my goals. The post about it is going to be ridiculously long, however, and I haven’t finished writing it up. Perhaps by the end of this week I will have it published here.

I wish you all the best with your self-commitments, dear reader.