Rule 14 of 17 · Chapter IV — After the Date
Actually do the things you said you would do
Why this rule exists
I present a tactic of such staggering reliability that it will mark you as practically otherworldly: follow through. If you said you would call, call. If you said Thursday, mean Thursday. If you promised to send them that book, that recipe, that song, send it. The bar has sunk so low that simply doing what you said you would do now reads as an almost suspicious degree of trustworthiness. Every kept small promise is a tiny deposit in the account of being someone who can be relied upon, and reliability is not the boring cousin of romance, it is the soil the whole thing grows in. Flakiness, however charming the flake, quietly teaches the other person that your words do not mean much, and that lesson is very hard to unlearn.
In practice
Only promise what you actually intend to do, then treat those small commitments as real ones rather than pleasantries. Put the plan in your calendar so 'we should do Thursday' becomes an actual Thursday. If something genuinely comes up, say so promptly and honestly and offer an alternative, because a rearranged plan communicated with care is fine, while a vanished one is corrosive. Let your follow-through be consistent enough that the person never has to wonder whether you will show up, literally or otherwise. Being dependable in the little things is how you earn the trust that lets a relationship hold weight in the big ones.
When it doesn't apply
Life genuinely interrupts, and cancelling for a real reason is not flaking, provided you communicate and rebook rather than evaporate. The rule targets casual unreliability, not honest human scheduling collisions handled with courtesy.