Non-commitment

On the discomfort with "maybe"

One of my biggest pet peeves is when people are non-committal.

Too bad for me 99% of people are generally non-committal and you can’t ever get a straight yes or no out of them. My husband tells me it’s because people have FOMO and so they want to keep their options open. This must be true for some people, but often I think there’s something deeper.

The example I am thinking of is when I asked if we were going to do something for a family member’s birthday this week. I suggested perhaps going to dinner and instead of a “yes lets go” or “no, forget about it”, I received a non-committal comment in response.

Several thoughts run through my head when this happens:

(1) why am I always working so much harder for people than they are for themselves?

(2) how fucking rude.

(3) am I expecting too much of people?

(4) could this be just me trying to control an uncontrollable future?

(5) why am I constantly trying to foist something on them or working to show that I care, if they themselves don’t give a shit?

So then I’ve thought myself into a circle and can’t find a way out. To me, clarity is kindness. The least you can do is to give yes or no response. To them? maybe I am being pushy or overbearing, trying to force a celebration on something they don’t want to celebrate.

I am having a hard time accepting that the answer is to just not care and to stop trying so hard. Perhaps I’m trying to pin down an answer to a future that is unknowable. And that’s the something deeper that I can’t get comfortable with.

Yes.. AND… it’s just rude. Right?