What are your expectations? Seriously, take a minute and think about that. What do you EXPECT to happen. Not just on a grand scale of years and decades and for your life, but on a minute by minute basis.
We have hopes, dreams, vision, goals, and purpose. Each of those is different that expectations. When we start to expect things we begin to fall into a trap of our own making. How do you react when your expectations aren’t met? You get frustrated, right? What we expect to happen is more a reflection of who we are than the world around us. All of our filters and self-protecting behaviors are wrapped up in that expectancy. Frequently the world doesn’t meet our expectations, which leads to suffering. We believe things should go our way (A LOT). The more the things don’t go our way, the more frustrated we get. We suffer greatly this trap. What if you shifted from expectation to hope? How would your world be different if you were more hopeful and less expectant?
So what are the things you expect from the world? Big things and little things. We expect the world to not rain on parades and picnic, right? We expect a raise. We expect our children to listen and behave. We expect our relationships to stay the same once they reach a certain place. We expect someone to respond to a text or email in a certain amount of time. It goes on and on. We expect the world to not change!
What small changes do you need to make in order to reduce your expectations? It is a difficult thing to do as we often don’t see we are doing it. Take some time and observe how you react when things don’t go your way. Even reducing our expectations just a little bit will reduce the frustration we feel with ourselves and the world around us. – www.rhoadscoaching.com
finding purpose and meaning in daily life