where it settles
My expectations continue to let me down. I am learning that the difference between what I expect and what really occurs often equates to the level of my frustration or, as I learn to manage it, simple disappointment.
You know that game where you’re asked to close your eyes and just fall forward because SOMEONE is going to catch you? I’ve never played that game. I’ve watched people do it. It scares me. I don’t think I could go through with it so I’ve always stayed as far away as possible. I don’t expect to be caught, and, therefore, falling forward means falling on my face. Who wants to do that?
I used to assign blame for failed expectations to someone else: usually whomever was the subject of my expectation. To be truthful, I still do about half the time at first. But I see fairly quickly, that it isn’t what these people do that upsets me, but rather my expectations not being met that is so difficult. To put it another way, if a random passerby stopped me on the street and said “I’m going to mail you a million dollars, WATCH FOR IT!”, I wouldn’t be all that disappointed when it didn’t show up. Despite the fact that, just like him, others have failed to lived up to their promises, I didn’t actually expect this random stranger to fulfill his.
But under the cloak of varying degrees of compassion, mutual respect, friendship, or loyalty somehow, a few expectations manage to scurry in as the door shuts. Those are the worst. They sit there, undetected, waiting. When the time comes, they make their presence known just enough to be accepted — to seem normal and natural. It isn’t until it’s too late that you hear their cackled laughs as they run out the door.
Initially, my situation is identical to what it would have been had the expectation never been present. It’s when I begin planning around the expectation, that the situation holds potential for harm. To use the same example as I did above, things don’t get bad until I start spending the money before the million dollars arrives in my mailbox. So then, when it doesn’t show, not only do I not have it, but I’m in a bad situation.
Despite having fought through this so many times, I know, without a doubt, that there are other honest, trustworthy people capable of fulfilling expectations. I have to remind myself of this in the darkest times. But now, in the light of day, I see it clearly. So, disregarding expectation entirely seems silly, too guarded, cynical, and sad. And that’s not a world I want to live in.
I continue to adjust the set of rules I have for myself in this regard. Rules that will, hopefully, offer me protection without cutting me off from the good, honest, wonderful parts of this world.
And, in all of this, it makes it very clear to me that I need an even stronger, closer family of friends. People near by that my daughter is very comfortable with, that she sees regularly, not just in emergencies, that I feel will nurture her as I do in my absence. Then failed expectations are less likely to hit as hard, because there will always be a back up. Therefore, I’m able to take greater risk, without risking that which is important.