Expectations

In every relationships formal, informal or business, we have expectations,  which is quite different from obligations, we expects our friends to uphold good morals, we expects certain values from them , sometimes we expect them to be like us right? The truth of the matter is expectation is the burden of the bearer and the other party may not even be aware of it neither are they obliged to meet our expectations.

At least in business, there is a contractual obligation for each party to meet the terms of the agreement, and neither party can be held to anything outside of the agreement, but in an informal setting like friendship for instance, there are no terms of engagement, this is a relationship freely formed by two or more parties, each with his or her own unique characteristics and sometime agenda. Why then do we hurt so much in relationships particularly in friendship?

for some time, I have pondered upon this particular question,  but wherever I look, only one thing stares me in the face, one word, a word that means so much and has so many facets.

EXPECTATIONS! the dictionary describes expectation as an anticipation of something, a hope for something or even a TRUST, now, that is the catalyst, the word TRUST and this is where the problem starts. Could our trust be misplaced leaving us in expectation of something the other party cannot give?

We are an evolving creature, situations and circumstances around us causes us to change; sometimes these changes are subtle and sometimes it could be drastic, however these changes are personal to us, rarely do we stop to consider how others around us will handle this change or indeed how they are affected by the changes in us, yet, we have expectations of them which may or may not be in line with who they are or indeed who they have become, because just like us, they are changing too.

In order  for our expectations to be fair and appropriate, I believe we need a constant evaluation of who we are, what defines us , what we belief in, what we can realistically live with and  what values we cannot compromise on;  because all of these are ever changing and are influenced to a greater or lesser extent by our experience and our environment.

Then we need to look around us and understand that, though we may have all of these, we cannot realistically expect everyone around us to feel or act the same, because they have their values which may be worlds apart from ours, now, that should never disqualify them from being our friends, but it will guide us towards the level of relationship we can hold with them, there is absolutely no point looking for comfort from a person who is emotionally detached from reality, but they could be a great friend in another area.

Friendship means a lot of different things to different people, therefore, if we can take time to understand what we want out of our relationship with others, we should then be able to discern which of our friends can supply that need, we will then not have misplaced trust or over-optimistic expectation of them, therefore, we hurt less.

As human beings, we operate on attraction, we are attracted to people based on looks, their outward qualities  or the social class they belong to, whilst there is nothing wrong with that and it might be fair to say it is our genetic makeup, we  need time to know our friends  and I mean deep understanding of them as a person and through the passing of time, we grow to love them for who they are and not who we want them to be.

One of the pillars hindering our happiness is our expectations, it is therefore fair to say that if our expectations are measured we spare ourselves an unnecessary burden, we can therefore tick another box in our “I want to be happy” checkboxes.

I used to expend a lot of energy on people’s attitude and that was because I had the wrong expectations of them, I realized that I do not have a good understanding of who they are and what makes them who they are, in some cases, they just cannot be any better or worse that the evidence in front of me, but I was looking for something in them they do not possess, until one day my brother told me that my problem was that I had high expectations of people and that’s why I was always hurt.

That struck  a strong chord in my subconscious mind, for several months I thought about it, and did as much reading as I could on the subject matter and I realized he was right, I also realized I could not change anyone, I could only change me. and I started working on myself, I certainly want to be happy in all ramification, whilst that might not be possible in every way, I definitely do not want to be the driver of my own unhappiness.

You hold the key to your happiness, managing your expectation of people might just be the gateway you need.