He's Scared, She's Scared: Understanding the Hidden Fears That Sabotage Your Relationships (28 page)

How about you? Are you elusive? Do you resent expectations from lovers, friends, and family because they make you feel locked in? How about your partner? Does he or she change plans, break plans, show up late? This sends out a message to anyone who is paying attention:
NO EXPECTATIONS
.

Do You Thrive on Anonymity?

Men and women with serious commitment issues hate the idea of looking as though they are committed to anything. Maintaining anonymity is another way of maintaining freedom. Does this need affect you? For example:

Does the thought of joining an organization where you are seen as a committed member fill you with dread?

Is it difficult for you to commit your thoughts to paper, where someone else can read what you feel or think?

Would you prefer to leave letters unsigned?

Do you avoid putting your name on the mailbox?

Do tape recorders make you nervous?

Do you hate having your picture taken because something is never right about the way you look?

When people ask you specific questions about what you do or what you feel, do you purposely keep your answers vague and uncommitted?

Have you ever been in a close relationship that you downplayed in front of friends because it wasn’t perfect enough to admit to or to risk being judged by the world?

Can You Make an Appointment Three Weeks from Tomorrow? How About Three Months?

Those with serious commitment issues embrace the concept of spontaneity as if it were a religion. They find it hard to imagine how people can make plans weeks, or even months, in advance. They hate having their life be that predictable. It’s all last-minute. Sure, they may miss out on some opportunities, but it feels like a small price to pay for freedom.

Does this behavior seem familiar? Is it painful to make plans weeks or months ahead? Do you make it very clear that all of your arrangements are always “tentative”? Does your appointment book look like a scratch sheet at Santa Anita? Do you try to keep yourself open in case something better comes along—something more important or more exciting? These are all classic symptoms of commitmentphobic behavior.

What Do You Do for a Living?

Do any of these sound like you?

• You’re never happy with the job you have, and you’re always thinking about making a change.
  

• You’ve never held a job for an extended period of time.
  

• Your work moves you from office to office, city to city, or country to country.
  

• You’ve never been able hold a job unless there was great freedom and diversity.
  

• Your business is so volatile, you never know from week to week whether or not you’ll have a job.
  

• You think of yourself as a free-lancer, even when your work is permanent.
  

• You’re self-employed and wouldn’t have it any other way.
  

• You always feel somewhat detached from your jobs, no matter how long you hold them.
  

After romance, nothing is more revealing than your pattern in work. If you have commitment conflicts, it’s highly unlikely that you will be comfortable holding a stable nine-to-five job in a stable industry. In fact you may always be searching for the perfect profession or the perfect job, much as you search for the perfect mate.

Where Do You Live?

Do you think of your living quarters as temporary, no matter how long you’ve been there? Instead of accepting your current space as “home,” are you always dreaming of where you’ll live next? Do you pride yourself on your ability to move at the drop of a hat? Have you ever spent an extended period of time bouncing back and forth from place to place—six months here, a year there, house-sitting here, subletting there, staying with friends here, staying with family there? In your head do you fancy yourself a “citizen of the world,” footloose and fancy-free, and think it mundane to be tied to any one place?

What about
buying
a house? For some people, owning their own home is a dream come true. Is it your nightmare? In light of the ups and downs of the real estate market, you have many good reasons to be scared. Renter’s pride may be very fashionable right now, but the real question is this: Is it the real estate market that terrifies you, or is it the loss of freedom … the responsibility … the commitment?

You probably have all kinds of great reasons to justify how you
choose to live: It’s cheaper, or easier. It’s less work, or less worry. It’s exciting. It’s glamorous. It’s more fun. All of these explanations are valid, but in our experience they are often a cover-up for something much larger: the incredible sense of dread you experience at the thought of settling down.

What’s Hanging on Your Walls?

Men and women with serious commitment problems sometimes announce their unavailability by the way they choose to live. People who prefer beds that cannot be shared are good examples. Here are just a few of the “beds” described to us: a single cot, a sleeping bag permanently installed on the floor, a single futon rolled up in a corner, and a lumpy couch. These bedding choices clearly announce one’s preference for sleeping alone.

Other decorating giveaways:

• Does your living space look unfinished at best?
  

• Do you have furniture covered in plastic waiting to be returned to the store because you’ve changed your mind about whether you want to commit to it—yet again?
  

• Are your walls as bare as your cupboards, which are
  very
  bare?
  

• Do you have more furniture in storage than you do in your living room?
  

• Are your books packed in cartons … somewhere?
  

• Have you never gotten around to buying anything that matches?
  

• Are you unable to reach a decision about where to build bookcases, where to put the couch, or where to hang the pictures?
  

If any of this sounds like your home, then it is clear that you haven’t made a commitment to living where you are supposed to be living.

To help justify the appearance of your surroundings, you probably have a fantasy of some future space where you’ll live very differently. This is the place where you’ll buy beautiful furniture and great art. It’s the place where you’ll design perfect built-ins
just for you and your needs. This dream about tomorrow keeps you from committing to the present.

Joe and His Phone—Does This Sound Familiar?

Joe is a worst-case commitmentphobic. The way he uses his phone speaks volumes. Callers never know if he’s in or if he’s out because at home he hides behind his answering machine, and at work he hides behind the receptionist. His family can never reach him, and his friends realize that the only way to be sure of reaching him is to show up at his door. One day, on his answering machine, he had twelve separate messages from twelve different people, all saying the exact same thing: “Where are you?”

He calls his girlfriend and leaves messages saying, “Call me back.” But when she does, he’s never where he says he’ll be when he says he’ll be there. He gets angry because he has so many messages on his machine, but he never returns calls, so people keep trying. When he breaks up with one woman, he gets the next one to record the message on his machine. This is his way of turning away any ex-girlfriends who might continue to call. For Joe the phone is his way of announcing his inaccessibility, and the way he uses it verges on performance art.

Do you know anyone like Joe?

Younger Than Springtime—Does This Describe Someone You Know?

We know a man whose entire life is a statement against growing up. Where he lives, how he lives, whom he associates with, the kinds of relationships he establishes, his attitude toward work, his attitude toward his hobbies—all reflect his insistence on avoiding adulthood. His apartment is the apartment of a young man; his clothes are the clothes of a much younger man. He has two types of friends: one as childlike as he is (either chronologically or emotionally) and the other, parental, who treat him as an adorable child. In his head he still has the potential of a twenty-one-year-old, and that’s how he behaves.

Are Pets an Overwhelming Responsibility?

Is the thought of having an animal dependent on you for survival enough to make your heart race? You say that with your lifestyle it wouldn’t be fair to have a pet, but maybe you want it that way because you simply don’t want the commitment.

When most people consider getting a pet, they think about how much pleasure it would bring into their lives. But if you’ve got a commitment problem, those warm thoughts can be quickly displaced by thoughts of all the problems a pet can bring into your life. What if you can’t get home to feed it? What if you want to go away for a while? What if you want to move to a place that doesn’t allow pets? What if it gets sick? What happens when it gets old? There are so many possible complications.

Truth is, there aren’t many pets that don’t require at least some commitment from their owners. That loss of freedom is enough to stop some serious commitmentphobics from having any form of life in their apartment except carpenter ants.

How Hard Is It to Make Major Purchases?

Does the thought of buying a new car make you toss and turn all night? Are you living without a VCR because you can’t decide what features you really need? Do you stay home every year because you haven’t decided where to take that big vacation? These are all classic signs of the struggle with commitment conflict.

True commitmentphobes may agonize over major purchases—sometimes putting them off indefinitely. But sometimes a major purchase can’t be avoided. And that’s when the terror kicks in. What if you make the wrong choice? What if another store has a better price? What if a better model comes out next year? What if your needs change? What if, what if, what if …

What About Small Decisions?

Is a ten-page restaurant menu enough to make you wish for a tranquilizer? Do the words
final sale
make you tremble? If a sweater comes in four different colors, do you wind up buying none, or all? Do you change your outfit a dozen times before you
leave the house? Decisions, decisions, decisions … when will it ever stop?

If you’ve got a commitment problem, life’s “simple” choices aren’t simple at all, they’re maddening. Getting dressed in the morning can be an arduous task. Going grocery shopping can be overwhelming. Buying presents can be painful. Any choice that’s final is a source of torment. You drive waiters crazy, you drive salespeople crazy, you drive friends crazy, but most of all you drive yourself crazy.

Do You Want to Return Everything You Buy?

Thinking of selling the house you just bought?

Trying to find a new home for the dog you just adopted?

Wish you could return the car you just drove out of the showroom?

Exactly how long do you hold on to your receipts, “just in case”? For those with unresolved commitment conflicts, buyers remorse is a lifetime guarantee.

Do You Have Difficulty Getting Rid of Things?

Are your closets full of old clothes? Are your filing cabinets overflowing with papers? Do you have cartons of memorabilia that you just can’t toss, even though you know most of it is junk? The inability to part with such things goes beyond being sentimental—it’s a commitment issue.

Once you get rid of something, it’s gone forever, and commitmentphobes can’t face forever. Saying good-bye to anything—even an old shirt—generates tremendous anxiety. What if I need it a month from now? … a year from now? … five years from now? What if I make a mistake? Such questions torment you, rendering you incapable of cleaning house.

What About Kids?

Almost everyone fantasizes about having children, but if you’ve got big-time commitment issues, you may wish that it never gets past the fantasy stage. If the thought of buying a goldfish is
enough to keep you awake all night, you may figure that parenthood is not such a good idea.

The prospect of children can sometimes produce a commitment crisis within a relationship or marriage. The idea seems too confining and too limiting. However, those with conflicts can take heart in knowing that we’ve seen from our interviews that men and women with extraordinary commitment issues are often able to become overwhelmingly committed to parenting.

It would appear that commitment issues can get very muddled when they come up against the biological imperative. While some commitmentphobes see children as the ultimate ball and chain, many others aren’t nearly as frightened. They can’t imagine missing out on being a parent. They see children as a temporary commitment, not a permanent one. And that’s a lot easier to handle.

Are you certain you want children, but not sure you want to stay with the other parent? If you have children, are you a committed parent, or do you resent the responsibility? Do your children live with you? Are you the primary caregiver? Do you look forward to the ongoing experiences you share together, or are you counting the days till they go to college? Perhaps both. After all, commitment issues are about conflict.

What’s Going on Inside Your Head?

This is tricky stuff. To the outside world you may look solid, sound, and committed. But inside your brain your conflicts are raging, and you always have a contingency plan. The only thing that enables you to make “commitments” are the elaborate escapes you are always plotting. The bottom line here is that just because you don’t look commitmentphobic doesn’t mean you don’t feel commitmentphobic. The only proof may lie safely inside your brain. You may be masterful at hiding your fear, but you know it’s there—and that’s what counts.