Sorry, I can’t make it. There’s too much rain. It’s too windy. I’m exhausted. I can’t commute anymore today. #SELFCARE! I need to reschedule! These are texts I sent endless times over the past five years as I’ve flaked out on friends, therapy appointments, and extracurricular activities.
“I’m an extremely low-maintenance friend,” I tell any new acquaintance. By low maintenance I mean: You only have to see me twice a year and you never have to return my texts, but please don’t expect any more than that from my end. Schedules change, people are busy! Grow up!
The pandemic only fortified my impulse to cancel. Before I might have feigned an effort to reschedule, but post pandemic, I had no qualms about canceling at the last minute. The amount of money I’ve paid, happily, over the years for last minute therapy cancellations is enough to have taken my family on a European vacation.
Lately, however, I’ve been wondering for the first time if flaking is as beneficial to my overall mental health. I was tucked into bed watching reruns of Nashville and scrolling through my phone when I saw a picture of friends with silly smiles surrounded by drinks. I had flaked on this meetup, citing “lack of motivation,” but what had I done instead? It dawned on me that these languishing feelings are most prominent when I cancel. “Taking care” of myself by staying home mostly leaves me feeling the same, if not slightly worse.
Then it hit me, like Cher Horowitz realizing she was in love with her stepbrother, what if self-care isn’t doing exactly what I feel like in the moment? What might happen if I spent an entire month not canceling any plans? This included friend activities, medical appointments, and previously purchased tickets. (To give you an idea of my baseline: Earlier in the summer I attempted, on two different occasions, to visit It’s Pablo Matic at the Brooklyn Museum, and despite buying tickets ahead of time and the museum being a 30-minute walk from my home, I didn’t go either time.) Not canceling on my therapist would be tougher, as I’d spun the narrative that she likely loved getting paid to not have to work and that this was my contribution to women helping women. Finally, as part of the experiment, I forced myself to pay attention to how I felt after following through on each activity when my impulse was to cancel.
I am disturbed and disheartened to report that my mood improved and I felt more connected and more present every time I followed through. It took about a week before I hit my first hurdle, an overcast and rainy September afternoon. I was supposed to be meeting a friend for lunch in midtown, but it was dreary, wet, and I was in Brooklyn with a fully remote work day. Previously, any one of the above conditions would have been a valid excuse for me to flake, but I mustered on, strapping on a bra, swiping on mascara, and bravely leaving the apartment.
When I arrived, my friend explained she was having an overwhelming week and felt gloomy. She apologized for not being her usual upbeat self; I offered hot gossip and Real Housewife recaps in response, and left feeling energized by the encounter. Later in the week I had the urge to cancel on my therapist to make room for a nap, but I made it and for the first time opened up about my impulse to be a no-show. Halfway through the month, I began thinking of myself as Shonda Rhimes in her book, Year of Yes, where she spends the year forcing herself to go from introvert to socialite. If I could manage both biweekly therapy appointments then I couldn’t imagine what could stop me.
Around week four I planned to attend a nonfiction reading series. At the last minute, I realized that I’d be sitting in the audience alone. The event didn’t start until 7:30, which meant I would have to change from my house sweatpants into stiff jeans at the very end of the day. That night the sun set at 7:11, which only furthered my inclination to hole up. No one at the event was expecting me. It would have been the easiest flake of the month. But instead, I slipped on my Doc Martens and made it out into a cool October night just as the sun was setting into a stunning blazing orange. The backroom of the bar was hot and I instantly regretted wearing such a thick sweater. I didn’t know anyone, so I was left awkwardly smiling at people with their friends. I accidentally drank three beers and left the event tipsier than I intended, but I ended up meeting an author I admire. On my walk back to the subway, I even tried an “experimental” hot dog from a very Brooklyn establishment, something that had been on my to-try list for years. The bun was soggy, the sauerkraut mild, the dog itself mediocre—but now I know! As I reached the subway, somewhat drunk but satisfied, I recalled the Virginia Woolf quote: “I will take my mind out of its iron cage and let it swim—this fine October.”
Psychologist Caitlin MacCrate agrees that when trying to build new habits, setting yourself up to experiment with the new behavior within a specificf time frame can be a good idea as it gives you a set opportunity to collect data. “Now you know how good it feels to not flake,” she notes, “and it becomes much easier by way of that experience. You have substantive reason to not flake now, not just because of a moral imperative or abstract rationale.” This is not to say that within this time period sticking to the newly desired behavior will be easy. Part of this, MacCrate explains that, “at a very basic level, we have competing desires. Sometimes those desires are difficult to weigh, clarify, and act on. Honest and meaningful self-inquiry to clarify what you want (and impediments to these aims) can help to outline the steps toward doing things that are good for you.”
Psychotherapist Danny Gellersen suggests thinking about what you want to accomplish as a whole, and allowing for some contradiction. “There probably were feelings of “I don’t want to, I’m tired, etc.” Making room for those feelings to coexist with your engaging the activity is in my opinion probably a part of what left you feeling so good on the other side of this experiment.” To avoid acting on impulse he suggested taking things slower. “We don’t always have access to motivation, and on those days it’s more about sustaining the system/habit building than demanding something of yourself you don’t feel.”
As I neared the end of my non-cancellation month, feeling like my most superior self, I ditched a yoga class. “At least I made a donation to a community organization,”I reasoned internally. Later, however, the low of not following through hit me, and I wondered why I had bailed. Gellersen reminds us that creating new ways of being takes time. “Becoming a more reliable person can feel like a threat to our freedom—and in a way it is a threat to a degree of freedom. Don’t panic if after this month you have slumps and want to return to flakiness! that would be understandable.” I rescheduled for Friday knowing I could try again.