A Journey of Expectations

If I could give you one piece of advice today that could make all the difference in your Love to Live pursuit, it would be to forget about your expectations. Toss them out the window. Pack them up and ship them out. Expectations, like their sister issue comparison, steal so much joy and peace from your everyday. 

I have a friend, let’s call her Sarah. When Sarah was growing up she always told me about the impossible expectations her mom had. For her, for her husband, for the service provider at ANY restaurant they went to, her mom’s expectations were NEVER met. Almost every birthday, every mother’s day, the holidays always left her mom let down. And because of her inability to manage her expectations, her mom always seems disappointed. “Nothing was ever good enough,” Sarah would say. 

Thinking back on that now I still feel sad for her mom. I hate that she let unmet expectations steal so many times that could have been really good, whole, and joyful. Instead of savoring the moments as they came and even being able to laugh at things gone wrong or circumstances being comical, she resented them all together. And what this did is teach her kids that nothing would ever meet their expectations. But there was one silver lining, and that was that Sarah never wanted that for her family. She started working hard on managing expectations or chucking them totally and has managed to experience life so full, and so colorful. 

As women I think we are prone to wanting to control everything. And rightfully so! There are so many things that we are in charge of, that we must think about, or people won’t eat or get their homework done or be set up for success at the office. It feels like so many things fall on us. BUT we have to remember, at the end of the day what is done is done. What happens is going to happen. We can plan and meet and do whatever it is that keeps us on top of it but at the end of the day it won’t ALWAYS work out like we expect. And when we can start waking up with this notion and go through the day understanding this theme, our lives become less stressful. We will walk lighter and sigh a little less. We will be able to breathe deeper and even notice little things about our surroundings or our day that we never really noticed because we have been caught up in our own expectations. Soon, and I promise this happens after you start practicing this, you will start looking for the unexpected and celebrating it. You will start to see that the unexpected is where the magic lies. The unexpected is where God does his best work. He doesn’t want you to know how everything will work out…that’s boring and we don’t have a boring God living in us. 

I am going to give you a journal challenge. After I give you the challenge I need you to stop reading, grab your journal, and start writing. 

I want you to write about three times this week or last week depending on what day you’re reading this, that you had unmet expectations and it wreaked havoc on your life. Maybe it put a damper on a family gathering. Maybe it put a hard stop to a date night. Maybe it made you so furious that you yelled at your kids, when really, they were just being kids. Be as honest as possible. Then I want you to write about how it made you feel. How was your spirit? How was your stress level? Blood pressure up?

Now I would like you to write about how you think your unmet expectations made the other person or group of people feel. 

It is hard to move past how you were raised. Your mom did it this way, your dad raised you like that, this is how your grandparents told you it was. I get it! We’ve all been there. But it is YOUR responsibility to grow. It is your responsibility to stretch yourself and the next generations. Remember…people are doing the best they can with what they know. And now, you officially know better!

PLEASE keep me posted on all the things…I need to hear your thoughts and how it’s going for you.