We are all consumers of expectations. They are easy to come by—from parents, family, friends, the media—and many are self-created. Maybe it’s to be successful, get married, have children, look good, make a difference, please others…
The list is endless, especially in today’s world, where there are constant opportunities to compare ourselves to others and look for ways to be more, better, or different.
Some people say that if you have no expectations, then you will have no disappointment. “No expectations, no disappointment.”
Is this true?
Never before have expectations been so high in terms of what humans are capable of, and this creates a paradox of opportunity and pressure when we begin to realize that expectations lead to disappointments.
Expectations are pervasive in our lives, and most of us are conditioned to be driven by them and to attempt to realize them. But we didn’t start out that way. We are all born in a state of pure Love where there are absolutely no expectations and no disappointments.
Think of it as our “original innocence.” When you were born, you knew these Truths: You are whole and complete. There is absolutely nothing wrong with you. You are worthy and deserving. You can trust the Universe. You have a deep inner knowing. You are connected. All there is and all that matters is Love.
And then you got older. And things happened that moved you out of love and into fear.
Someone criticized you; you only got praised for your accomplishments; someone left or wasn’t there for you.
You saw people fighting or got yelled at your heart got broken you were told your dreams were impossible.
You felt incredible pressure to succeed; you got rejected.
You made a mistake and judged yourself a failure; you compared yourself to others and believed they were better in some way.
Or perhaps you had a blissful childhood and grew up expecting the adult world to be the same way. The moment you got your first reality check in the form of a disappointment was the moment you moved into fear.
Expectations lead to disappointment, and you were just getting your first taste.
When in the grip of fear, we experience disconnection and a sense of emptiness.
The voice of your ego and the voices of others become much louder than our inner voice , and you feel alone and separate.
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Thank you …To manage the disconnection, we start to be driven by what we expect will make us feel loved again. To fill the emptiness, we create expectations of what we believe will fulfill us.
As we fail to live with no expectations, they then become our compass, which often navigate us right into an Expectation Hangover.
Have you planned something and it didn’t turn out the way you wanted it to?
Are you disappointed with people because they don’t do what they say?
Do you expect other people to react or reply to you on social media when you post something?
Some people say that if you have no expectations, then you will have no disappointment. “No expectations, no disappointment.”
Is this true?
Expectations are what we think will happen, while reality is what actually transpires. While we hope these two will match up, they often don’t.
Do you want to add a word or two?….
This disparity of expectations vs. reality can often lead to feelings of discontentment and unhappiness.
Everybody has expectations. When a student comes to me, they have certain expectations for me to fix their problem.
When I give them tasks and exercises to complete, I have expectations for them.
Do these expectations help?
They don’t.
The student might feel disappointed when I’m not meeting their expectations and I might feel frustrated when they’re not meeting mine.
Your comments ….
Even if you’re not a psychologist, this pattern probably rings a bell.
Some people might tell you to lower your expectations, but that may not be enough.
To be happy, you should strive for as few expectations as possible.
It’s impossible for the human mind to operate without expectations. Subconsciously, you assume things in the future will behave like they did in the past.
Slowing down to notice, be mindful of, the expectations you carry with you gives you the opportunity to change them to something more supportive.
For example, you wish your partner would act a certain way. Trying to control or manipulate people to your wishes is a sure-fire way of making the relationship worse.
Instead of expecting them to be different and getting angry when they aren’t, you could expect them to be exactly like they always have been and be okay with that.
They would feel more accepted by you and want to do things that might make you happy. Then they might start acting more the way you want.
Funny how that works – and it really does work. The more you accept the other person the way they are, the more likely it is that they’ll change into more of what you’re looking for.
It doesn’t work all the time, but it works more often than you would think.
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