The most difficult part of our life is not to expect. Its such a natural thing. We expect from our parents, from our friends, from our partner, from our children, from our bosses, from our colleagues and so on. This is the thing which hurts us the most. You expected something but it did not turn out that way or the person you expected from couldn’t do it for you. You think and think and overthink and end in doing what? Do you realize how much harm it is causing to your health?
The most common situation occurs in couples. There are different different expectations which one has from the other. One expects care from the another and the other expects space from the former one. One expects love and the other expects peace. Can you do it all? Is it possible? If you are not able to outright expectations of your partner or he/she is not able to sheer your expectations, its all right.
You are not born perfect and neither is your partner.
You had to finish a deadline in your project but it exceeded. Don’t get sad as you tried your best. If you did not put your best efforts, you would not be sad either. You know yourself very well and you know it what target you are capable to achieve. Try harder, push harder but don’t let it go beyond your head.
You were expecting a good amount of appraisal but your boss did not give you even the half. Will it hurt? Of course, what a question to ask? Can you do anything about it? No? Yes? You choose what you want to do next but don’t let your expectations put you down.
Its your birthday. You get up in the morning. He/She might have left a note/message here and there. Instead you see he/she gets up and leaves for work. You leave for your work but the expectations are running in your mind. He/She will call me. He/She might have planned a surprise for me. It was a wonderful day at office. You come back to see the home locked. There must be some surprise. You check your phone. One message from your partner. You open it and it says ‘I will be late, meetings extended.’ You still think its a prank and the surprise is on the way. Your partner is back, tired and goes off to sleep. Are you hurt? Why not? From the morning you had been waiting and here he/she doesn’t remembers your special day. What made you hurt? Its your expectations which made you feel worse.
Its not bad to keep expectations from your loved ones but don’t force them on your partner. There are lot of things which are going in each one of our mind. Yes, its natural to expect from your loved ones but don’t take it as a crime if it doesn’t gets completed. Talk about it. Express your feelings calmly. Your loved ones will be so happy that you understood them. But what about your feelings? Read the next situation.
You woke up in the morning. You could not hear the alarm. You jump out of the bed. The breakfast got burnt in hurry. You missed your timely bus to your work. You reached late in the office. The boss got angry on your submitted work. You return back to home. Your partner is not happy. You forgot their special day. You both fight. You are tired and in you go to sleep in wait of another better day. Was the day bad or you made it? The expectations made it bad.
What if you got up late? Its okay, just relax. You are not a machine. You are a human. You can make a mistake. There is everything you can do if your mind is at peace. You just need to tell yourself, I need to adjust today and start your work. When we ourselves cannot complete the expectations we have from self, why we need to do the same from others?
You promised yourself to start working out. But, you have put it on a later on mode. Days, months, years pass by but you could not manage to find time for yourself. Do you get angry with yourself? Yes? No? Not really? Yes, I feel bad on myself when I am not able to complete my work. That’s because the work is your priority and not working out. Your expectations arise according to your priorities. What you give importance the most, the intensity of expectations automatically increase with that.
When you expect something, if its get completed, well and good but when it doesn’t, a bad feeling starts to occur in the mind, you keep thinking about it. With time the feeling turns to feeling of dislike, you start to get angry and what are you doing to yourself? You are hurting yourself. Your body is coming under stress. You start to feel sad. You are leading yourself to depression. Sad but true.
How to cope up with expectations and what to do?
- Stop expecting. How simple it sounds yet the most difficult thing to do. But, its the best thing to do.
- Stop complaining. This is in fact the first step towards stoppage of expectations. When you stop complaining, automatically your expectations tend to decrease. Start with a 7 day trial to stop complaining and see the effects. Why not start from today..from now?
- Everyone is different. Yes, please understand this. No one in this world has the same thinking as others. Some points may match but you can never exactly think or act like someone. You and your partner have come from different backgrounds. What he/she thinks of you or you think of him can rarely match and if it does, you have found your soul partner.
- No one is perfect. Ask yourself. Are you perfect? Can you complete all the expectations you have from yourself? If no, you need to understand, other people are also not perfect. They also have flaws.
- Don’t try to mold anyone. Just because you want certain things to happen in a certain way, don’t put pressure on your loved ones to follow that way. Everyone has his/her own way. It would be very difficult if someone would want to do the same to you.
- Try to work and focus on yourself. This is the most important point. Instead of wasting your precious time on someone else or on blabbering how he/she did not come up to your expectations, put that on to yourself. You can only change and adjust yourself. That is in your control. Be independent and try that you do your work on your own. Try to avoid things that can imbalance your peace of mind. After all, you are all what you have who is completely yours.
So, its time to put a stop to expectations, to stop complaining and start acting. You will be more happier, more productive, more balanced and most important, you will be with a more peaceful mind.