If there's one thing that ive learnt, getting disappointed is a self induced result. Why? We get disappointed when our expectations surpass reality and unfortunately thats the case many a times. If only we can curb our expectations, for ourselves, our friends and the ones others have for us.
We think that we're unique, we're different and better than others because who wants to admit that they are mediocre? So many people in the world and if we are the same as everyone else then whats the value in living? We are the main characters in our own stories and due to the over-glorification of Hollywood we expect the main protagonist to succeed and gain victory against all odds. But life aint a movie, its the real deal. There are so many things in this life that are beyond our control and having expectations is the prelude of our negativity.
People say that expectations are the drivers of our motivation. And i agree but only to a small extent, more often than not, these expectations are way beyond our abilities and try we might, we never ever reach the goal in mind. We are left hopeless, depressed and tired. We are led into thinking we are failures because we couldnt reach our targets. Those high achievers who actually work their asses off to attain their goals get swallowed by ambition and lose their humanity while they try to maintain their hugh standards at all costs. Hence, i feel that expectations lead to our downfall.
Im not saying we shouldnt have ANY expectations in life. Im saying we need to have realistic expectations, the ones that occurs quite frequently. For example, if youve been getting 45marks for math you cant expect yourself to suddenly hit 80 by the next exam. A more realistic expectation would be around 50 and maximum maybe 55.
But thats the thing, people are greedy. We dont know how to manage our expectations, we yearn for more constantly and this makes majority of our expectations unrealistic and unattainable. Its really frustrating because its hard to change a mindset that's so inbuild into our nature. Knowing that we need to manage our expectations and actually successfully doing it thats the difference. I myself am having trouble having the mindset of setting realistic goals even though i know that expectations that are too far-fetched aint good for myself. Thats the crux of the problem.
Those thoughts you have in your head? The scenarios that you pictured in your minds? How many of those actually became reality? Must be less than a handful isnt it? Its tough because we cant control our thoughts, our mind wanders and this is also where our creativity comes in. We build our own perfect scenarios, our perfect world in our heads even though they are impossible to have, so we are left disappointed.
On the other hand, if we live in this world without any expectations, there would be nothing to look forward to. We soon get bored of our lives, we lose the excitement we feel when we pray for something we hope to achieve to actually become true. Thus, we shouldnt live life without expections too. We need to find the right balance, the correct amout of expectation to drive us forward and yet not make us lose hope when we fail to reach our desired outcome. We need to forgive ourselves when we are unsuccessful, understand that the world doesnt revolve around us and move on with life, hope again and try again.
Life isnt a wish granting factory. The more we expect, the more we are going to end up feeling the crushing sense of defeat. What ive been doing is to adjust my expectations, reflect upon myself and those around me. I ask myself: based on my usual performance in a specific task what is my standard and from there set my expectation and accepting that there will definitely be chance of failure. I gauge my expectations of others too: based on my past experience with these people are they likely to meet my expectations of them? If not, ill need to reset my expectation and see if they meet those instead. I guess this is why the people we treasure the most can hurt us the most deeply, because we expect the most from them.
Maybe living life "Que Sera Sera" aint a bad thing. However i believe that life is not fixed and we have the power to create our own destinies
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