The Debts That Are Not Money

An unkept promise works like interest: you pay it in attention, avoiding someone's eyes and postponing a reply to a message that is long since shorter than the fear of it.

Take a sheet and list everything you owe people that is not money: someone's book and drill on your shelf, the help with the move you promised, the unanswered message, the reference you said you would write, the call you have been postponing for three months. Write the name and exactly what you owe, with no explanation of why it has not happened — explanations do not work here. Next to each, put the approximate date you promised it. Find the oldest one and do it today, in full: take the thing back, write the message, make the call. If it cannot be done in a day, write to the person honestly: I remember, I owe you this, it will be done by this date — and put the date in your calendar.

The list is usually shorter than the feeling — three or four items instead of a vague «I owe everybody», and that alone makes it easier to breathe. After the first debt is returned what comes is not pride but embarrassment that it took twenty minutes after a year of postponing; note that and do not turn it into self-flagellation. If the person reacted coldly or had stopped expecting it, do not explain for longer than one sentence: you were closing a debt, not buying forgiveness. Do not clear the remaining items all at once today — one a day, or the list will be back at its old length within a month.