Keeping small promises is how people decide whether to believe your big ones.

Nobody can test a big promise in advance, so people use the small ones as samples. Did you text back, bring the thing, arrive when you said, remember what you agreed on Tuesday. Those answers pile up quietly into a verdict about whether your larger commitments are worth planning around. Most reputations get built out of material too small to notice yourself.

Work out which promises you are currently leaking: the replies, the returns, the five-minute favours. Write down the next three you make and tick them off. If you cannot keep up, start saying no to small things, which is better than agreeing and disappearing.