Permissions and Expectations
Guilt and shame suck. I feel guilt and shame when I perceive I’m letting people down. Sometimes, I do let people down. There are other times that people have felt entitled to a relationship/communication dynamic I didn’t mean to agree to.
I have a phone number that accepts calls and texts. I also have a voicemail, email, website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, and dozens of other vehicles for communication people can use to send me a message. A few years ago (give or take a decade), I realized that merely having these accounts seemed to create an expectation that I would respond quickly or at all. Sometimes, people have been upset by my slow or lacking responses. Sometimes, I have felt bad.
In order to not disappoint others, I’ve decided to proactively communicate that I’ll do my reasonable best to respond to texts, calls, and voicemails. Sometimes, I’ll forget to respond to those. Sometimes, my response will be delayed.
Always, I care to connect with people.
Over the last decade, I’ve gone through bouts of non-engagement with almost every form of communication. I’ve entertained deleting my email, Facebook, email, Instagram, email, phone number, email, etc.
After some more processing, I don’t think the answer is to actively or fully disengage with anything. I also don’t believe the answer is to respond to every unsolicited message. I don’t feel entitled to other people’s time—I’m thankful when they’re able to take the time out of their busy day to respond to me.
People want a way to get in touch with me. I want a way to get in touch with them.
If someone emails me and I see it, I let them know I’m best at texts and calls. I do the same thing for Facebook messenger, Instagram, or any other platform I engage with.
NOTE: if someone asks for my email address, I let them know that I’ll check it for the email they will send, but I communicate my likely slow or lacking response to future communications if they don’t text or call first.
If others don’t want to text or call, my responses may be slow or limited (although never intentionally slow or absent).
This approach to communication has helped give me the mental space and freedom to be at peace with not checking every inbox every day. I’ll respond to texts, calls, and voicemails when I can: other communications happen whenever and if they happen.
Needless to say, this is one of the reasons this website doesn’t have a contact form or a comment section (at least not currently). If people want to share the blog content, they can. If they want to contact me, they will.
Most importantly, I give myself grace for not being communicative on every platform I have an account. The guilt and shame I used to carry for lower-than-expected response habits I hadn’t agreed to is mostly gone.