Short Essay 2

Performative utterances can be commonly seen as promises. “ When you

make a promise, you send forth your honest intentions to manifest into reality”. 1 You
can make these promises for others or for yourself. From time to time, people have
to make promises to themselves to move forward. We are all imperfect beings after
all. Our problems occur commonly from human flaws that need to be reformed.
Usually, a person promises to himself/herself to let go of this flaw eventually, even
with the difficulty. These type of promises, which I will call promises of self-
development, are very important
This statement “I will not allow others to affect me” is an example of these
promises. This statement make you realize that your happiness are unaffected by
others and your sole responsibility 2. The feelings and actions of others will not be
the basis of your emotional moods.When you do get affected, you will take time to
re-evaluate your own feelings. You will simply will not let your will be harmed by their
feelings and you will eventually practice emotional detachment,so that you will
eventually become emotionally stronger.
This is a performative utterance because it does not take into account
whether you have already reached this level of emotional strength. A performative
utterance is not meant to describe your doing or stating what you are already doing.
You simply do it as you say it .
When someone say this, it is usually with serious intent. A person most likely
has been experiencing conflicts and misunderstandings with his/her personal
relationships that have become toxic to his/her well-being. This life circumstance can
make a person step up.He/she realizes things cannot go any longer like this. There
needs to be a change. When you utter this promise, you become committed to this
change. The spirit inside will change because of this outward change as well 3.
Relationships and people are one of the most important yet most difficult
mysteries in life. People are very complicated and social beings by nature. There are
moments when we cannot understand the reasoning behind a number of actions of
our loved ones, and we cannot help but be emotionally affected by them as well. We
simply cannot help but feel hurt when our loved ones do things or say things that we
find hurtful. It is very hard to detach yourself emotionally from the toxic situation,even
if it is healthier.
If you want to understand why they did what they did so your relationship can
improve, you need a lot of patience and strength to find the reason or answer with
the other person. Communication is super vital. This answer comes with the need to
find other answers or reasons. The emotional reactions of people tend to be patterns
or have patterns rooted in their own history. This is of course, very difficult. The only
way you can do this, as a victim, is to be to go beyond your own emotional pain or
detach from it, as said in the former paragraphs. It is a form of strength that is hard to
achieve. This is why the performative utterance can be very useful in gaining this
strength.
Saying “I will not allow others to affect me”, has the effect of showing the
person how strong he/she can be. I will not simply just let people define me, and I
will not let myself be passive whenever I feel bad. If the utterance never took place, I

1 Carmen Harra, “10 Promises to Make to Yourself Today”, HuffPost, Jan 25 2014, Accessed March
28 2018, n.p., https://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-carmen-harra/promises-to-yourself_b_4297869.html
2 Carmen Harra, 10 Promises to Make to Yourself Today,n.p.
3 J L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words,(Oxford University Press, 1976), 9
would never mature emotionally. I may just stay a victim in my relationships without
moving forward. I would never think that I am more than what people say about me
or what they do to me. I can love others while not being dependent on others.