Expectations
“I am not in this world to live up to other people’s expectations, nor do I feel that the world must live up to mine.”
Have you ever looked forward to anything pleasant and found you were more or less disappointed? The upside to this is that bad things don’t always come up to our expectations either, they nearly always turn out much better than we anticipated. Life is largely a matter of expectations and it is a much better place when all you have is hope, without any expectations.
A life that is burdened with what you expect is a heavy life and it’s fruit is sorrow and disappointment so it isn’t fair to blame others for letting you down, blame yourself for expecting too much from them. Besides, expectations are meaningless to those who have already mislead you and expecting any different is nothing more than premeditated resentment.
Granted, there are legitimate expectancies we should have from others. When love is involved, there are also moral obligations to fulfill the mutual commitment of trust and respect to name a few. Sometimes we expect more from others because we would be willing to do that much for them but unmet expectations can drain the life from a relationship where neither are capable of fulfilling their needs. Expectations will feed frustration, it is an unhealthy attachment to people, things and outcomes that we wish we could control; but can’t.
One of the biggest killers to our success, whether in work or in relationships, is expecting a favorable outcome rather than working towards it. I've learned, after countless years, that the key to happiness is having low expectations and that there is no shame in keeping my anticipations high on achievement but low on people. Peace begins when expectations end. When you raise expectancies of yourself, you lower the disappointments from others and having hopeful intentions of others means you’re trying to fix their lives. Don’t do that, fix your own and remember the actions of others are always on their terms. Rewire your thinking to expect more from yourself than others, though expectations from others hurt a lot, expectations from yourself inspire a lot.
As I look back over my life, I can relive the missed opportunities of times I could have stopped expecting others to be perfect so I can like them for who they really are. Now I see that when I held others to my own sense of decency, I subconsciously limited their actions to my own flawed image of “honorable behavior”. The wisdom in the old saying “Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he will never be disappointed” has never been clearer.
Aligning expectations with our own reality is the first step towards aligning a “plumb line”, a foundation on which to build. The world which you live and work is a mirror of your attitude and expectations and when we have high expectations of ourselves, it tends to bleed over to those around us and this is the weakness of an overused strength.
Expectations of myself will always exceed those that are put on me and in all honesty, the pressures of meeting others’ expectations also pushes me in a positive direction. If I can’t hold myself to the same requirements I want from others, then I only demean the virtue I am trying to invoke in others.
Be aware that expectations are a double edged sword. You have to constantly work towards what’s expected of you, as well as working against who you never want to be. Ultimately, there is a sense of victory when you let go of your expectations, especially when others still hold you to theirs.
I have found in my long life, there are two ways to be happy; improve my reality or lower my expectations and let every situation be what it is instead of what I think it should be. Simplicity in life is not the goal, it is only the by-product of integrity, good planning, and modest expectations. Without those critical fundamentals, expectations in and of themselves are nothing more than disappointment and heartache in the making.