Words can lie. Patterns are bad at it.

A sentence can be arranged to say anything, and intentions are cheap to describe. Behaviour repeated over months is much harder to fake, because it costs something every single time. That is why what somebody does on average tells you more than what they announce. Watching for the pattern is not cynical, it is just using the more reliable signal.

When words and record disagree this week, go with the record. Give it a count: has this happened once, or four times. Then look at your own patterns, because that is the version of you other people are reading, whatever you have been saying.