In a world that encourages us to try everything, have we forgotten what it means to commit to something?

The other day, I came across a Tinder advertisement.

I can’t remember the exact words, but the message was something along the lines of “Let’s be a maybe.”

A maybe.

I found it fascinating.

Not because I expect a dating app to promise everlasting love. That would be a rather ambitious marketing campaign.

But because I couldn’t stop thinking about how perfectly those three words describe the world we’re living in.

Maybe I’ll date you.

Maybe I’ll change jobs.

Maybe I’ll move somewhere else.

Maybe I’ll start exercising.

Maybe I’ll try meditation.

Maybe I’ll find something better.

And don’t get me wrong. Having choices is wonderful.

Being able to explore different paths, meet new people and discover new interests is a privilege that previous generations didn’t always have.

But somewhere along the way, I wonder if we’ve confused having options with making progress.

Because there’s something nobody seems particularly interested in advertising anymore.

Commitment.

Not necessarily to another person.

Commitment to a process. To a place. To a decision. To ourselves.

The kind of commitment that doesn’t give you immediate satisfaction but slowly changes who you are.

And I wonder how much we’re missing because we’re constantly looking for the next thing.

The Culture of Trying Everything

Living in Ireland, I’ve noticed how popular fitness class passes have become.

You purchase a package or subscription that allows you to visit different studios, try different classes and experience different types of workouts.

Monday, Pilates.

Tuesday, yoga somewhere else.

Thursday, a strength class at another gym.

Next week, perhaps something completely different.

And honestly, I understand the appeal.

It’s flexible. It’s convenient. It’s exciting to discover new places.

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with experimenting, especially when you’re trying to find something you genuinely enjoy.

But what happens when trying becomes the entire experience?

When do we stop exploring and start building?

Because attending a class isn’t necessarily the same as developing a practice.

You can spend an hour exercising, sweat, feel exhausted and leave thinking you’ve accomplished something.

And you probably have.

But real progress often requires something more than isolated effort.

It requires repetition.

It requires understanding what you’re doing, recognising what you need to improve and returning often enough to notice the difference.

And sometimes, it requires someone else noticing that difference too.

A teacher who remembers that you struggled with a particular movement three months ago.

Someone who corrects your posture because they’ve seen how you move.

A familiar face at reception.

The person you always chat with before class.

Suddenly, you’re not just attending a workout.

You’re becoming part of a place.

You have a routine, a sense of familiarity, perhaps even a little community.

And I think we underestimate how much that matters.

Because belonging isn’t something you can always purchase with a single class pass.

Sometimes, belonging is built simply by showing up again.

What Pilates Taught Me About Commitment

I started Pilates on February 1st.

And when I look back at the person I was physically at that moment, compared to who I am today, the difference is extraordinary to me.

I wasn’t particularly strong.

My endurance wasn’t great.

My stability needed work.

At first, I started with a few classes.

Four. Then six. Then eight.

Eventually, I was attending ten or twelve classes a month, sometimes even more.

And slowly, things started changing.

Not overnight.

Not after one particularly challenging class.

Slowly.

I started understanding the movements instead of simply copying them.

I became more aware of my posture, my breathing, my alignment.

I discovered that a squat isn’t necessarily just a squat.

There’s the position of your pelvis, the alignment of your knees, the activation of your abdominal muscles, the distribution of your weight.

There are muscles working that you might not even realise you’re supposed to engage.

And the more you understand your body, the more intentional every movement becomes.

Something that once felt difficult begins to feel natural.

Then you discover another layer of difficulty.

And another.

And suddenly, an exercise you’ve been doing for months becomes an entirely different experience because you’re finally doing it with greater awareness and control.

That’s something I would never have understood if I’d only tried Pilates a handful of times and moved on to something else.

By October, I could see and feel the difference.

I was stronger. My endurance had improved. I had better stability, greater body awareness and more confidence in my movements.

My body had changed, but so had my relationship with exercise.

And somewhere along the way, I went from being someone attending Pilates classes to studying to become a Pilates instructor.

That wasn’t something I had planned when I walked into my first class in February.

It developed because I stayed.

Because I became curious.

Because I wanted to understand more.

Because I kept showing up, including on the days when I didn’t feel particularly motivated.

And perhaps that’s the part I find most interesting.

Sometimes commitment doesn’t simply improve the thing you’re doing. It introduces you to a version of yourself you didn’t know existed.

We Want Results Without the Repetition

I think about this whenever I hear someone say:

“I tried meditation. It doesn’t work for me.”

And sometimes, when you ask a little more, you discover that they meditated three times.

Three times.

Now, of course, meditation isn’t for everybody. Not every practice will suit every person, and there’s no reason to force yourself into something that genuinely doesn’t work for you.

But can we really expect to understand a practice after trying it three times?

Imagine going to the gym three times and deciding strength training doesn’t work because your body hasn’t transformed.

Or taking three language lessons and concluding that you’re simply incapable of learning another language.

We would recognise how unreasonable those expectations are.

And yet, we often approach personal development exactly that way.

We start something, expect to feel different almost immediately, and when the results don’t arrive quickly enough, we begin questioning whether it’s worth continuing.

Perhaps another method would be better.

Another class.

Another routine.

Another productivity technique.

Another book promising to change our lives.

There’s always something new to try.

But novelty and progress are not the same thing.

Some of the most meaningful improvements happen during the least exciting parts of a process.

The repetitions.

The corrections.

The moments when nothing particularly remarkable seems to be happening.

The days when you do the work without receiving immediate proof that it’s working.

We live in a world that celebrates beginnings, but transformation usually happens somewhere in the middle.

And the middle isn’t particularly glamorous.

It doesn’t always photograph well.

There’s no exciting announcement every time you repeat something you’ve already done a hundred times.

But that doesn’t mean nothing is happening.

When Everything Becomes Replaceable

And I don’t think this mentality stops with our habits.

Look at the way we consume.

Clothes, furniture, electronics, beauty products, subscriptions.

We have access to an extraordinary number of alternatives.

We can find a cheaper version of almost anything.

Sometimes several versions.

And while affordability is important, especially when money is limited, I wonder whether the constant availability of alternatives has changed how we perceive quality.

Two products can look practically identical in a photograph.

But one might last for years, while the other barely survives a season.

And perhaps we’ve become so accustomed to replacing things that we don’t always stop to ask what makes something valuable in the first place.

Is it the price?

The appearance?

The convenience?

Or is it the craftsmanship, the durability, the attention behind it?

I don’t believe expensive automatically means better, just as I don’t believe affordable automatically means poor quality.

But I do think there’s a difference between knowing the value of something and simply knowing how much it costs.

And that difference becomes harder to recognise when everything is presented as interchangeable.

Maybe this is part of a larger cultural shift.

We’re becoming experts at comparing things. But are we becoming better at appreciating them?

The Problem With Always Looking for Something Better

The same pattern appears in our professional lives.

We look for jobs, compare salaries, consider different industries and imagine the possibilities available somewhere else.

And sometimes changing jobs is exactly the right decision.

A better opportunity, a healthier environment, greater financial stability or simply the realisation that you’ve outgrown a position can be perfectly good reasons to leave.

But there’s another side to this.

The expectation that every stage of our professional lives should feel rewarding, exciting and aligned with our ambitions.

Immediately.

We want responsibility before we’ve developed experience.

Recognition before we’ve had time to demonstrate our abilities.

Confidence before we’ve allowed ourselves to become beginners.

And when things become repetitive or uncomfortable, we sometimes interpret that discomfort as evidence that we’re in the wrong place.

But learning almost anything involves periods of frustration.

You don’t become good at something simply because you enjoy the idea of being good at it.

You become good at it by doing it.

Making mistakes.

Receiving feedback.

Trying again.

And eventually developing skills that once seemed completely beyond your reach.

Of course, there’s a difference between growing through a challenge and remaining somewhere that consistently undermines your well-being.

Commitment should never be confused with tolerating mistreatment.

But neither should every difficult moment be interpreted as a sign that we need to start over.

Sometimes we need a different environment.

Sometimes we need more time.

And learning to recognise the difference might be one of the most valuable skills we can develop.

And Then, There Are People

Which brings me back to that Tinder advertisement.

Let’s be a maybe.

I understand the idea.

Nobody owes certainty to a stranger.

Nobody should feel pressured into a relationship simply because they’ve agreed to a date.

And discovering whether you’re compatible with someone naturally takes time.

But I wonder whether we’ve become so comfortable with the possibility of someone better appearing that we sometimes forget to pay attention to the person standing in front of us.

Dating apps have made meeting people more accessible.

And in many ways, that’s wonderful.

But they’ve also introduced a peculiar dynamic.

People can begin to feel like profiles in an endless catalogue.

You have a conversation.

You meet.

You notice something that doesn’t quite match your expectations.

And somewhere in the back of your mind, you know that another possibility is only a swipe away.

Maybe someone funnier.

More attractive.

More successful.

More compatible.

Someone who somehow arrives without complications, without emotional baggage, without the uncomfortable reality of being human.

But people aren’t products.

And relationships aren’t subscriptions.

You can’t always know someone’s depth from a first impression, just as you can’t understand the value of a practice after attending one class.

Real connection takes curiosity.

It takes time to discover how someone thinks, what makes them laugh, how they respond to difficult moments, what they care about when nobody is watching.

And none of that means staying with someone who isn’t right for you.

It simply means recognising that getting to know someone and constantly evaluating whether they’re worth replacing are two very different experiences.

Perhaps the problem isn’t that we have too many options.

Perhaps it’s that we’ve started treating every option as temporary, even before we’ve given it the opportunity to become meaningful.

The Art of Staying

I don’t want to romanticise commitment.

Not everything deserves our time.

Some relationships need to end.

Some jobs need to be left behind.

Some routines simply aren’t right for us.

And there’s courage in recognising when it’s time to move on.

But I think there’s courage in staying, too.

In deciding that something matters enough to give it a genuine opportunity.

In accepting that progress isn’t always exciting.

In understanding that repetition isn’t necessarily stagnation.

And in recognising that the things that transform us often require more patience than we initially imagined.

When I think about my Pilates journey, I don’t remember one magical class that changed everything.

I remember the accumulation.

The early mornings.

The familiar studio.

The exercises I struggled with.

The corrections that finally made sense.

The teachers who helped me understand what my body was capable of.

The small improvements that eventually became impossible to ignore.

And I wonder how many other areas of life work exactly the same way.

How many things do we abandon just before they begin to make sense?

How many skills never develop because we lose interest during the uncomfortable beginning?

How many connections never deepen because we’re already looking at the next possibility?

And how often do we mistake the excitement of starting something new for the satisfaction of actually growing?

I don’t have a perfect answer.

I’m still learning where to invest my energy, when to keep going and when to let go.

But there’s something I’ve become increasingly convinced of.

Trying something allows us to discover it. Staying with something gives us the opportunity to discover ourselves.

Maybe we don’t need another option.

Another app.

Another routine.

Another promise of a better version of our lives waiting somewhere else.

Maybe, sometimes, what we need is to stop scrolling long enough to notice what’s already growing.

Because in a world that constantly encourages us to move on, there might be something quietly extraordinary about choosing to stay.

And showing up again tomorrow.

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What in your life might become something extraordinary if you gave it enough time to grow?