Expectations & Disappointment

You know how when you have a conversation with your friend and you're either really excited or really upset about what you're telling them...and then they respond...and you immediately have that sinking feeling in your stomach, your cheeks flush, and your heart begins to race.

Or when you try on an outfit but once it's on you feel like the wind has been knocked out of your sails.

Or how about when someone responds to an email with "Let's talk about this later" and you begin to spiral?

I bet you didn't even know you had an expectation about how your friend "should" respond until they responded. Or that you had an expectation about how that outfit was "supposed to fit" or "supposed to look" until it didn't. And I certainly bet you didn't think you had an expectation about how you wanted that person to respond to your email until they gave you an answer you weren't subconsciously expecting and now all hell's broke loose.

More often than we like to admit, we are experiencing unmet expectations which lead to disappointment.

We go into these situations with unspoken expectations and when they don't turn out as they "should," we are caught off guard - shocked, angry, frustrated, hurt, disappointed - and then we respond accordingly - crying, lashing out, becoming defensive, shrinking ourselves out of shame.

These unmet expectations also show up when it comes to social norms. For some people, smiling or acknowledging strangers as you pass by is the "right thing to do" and become so irate that the other person "didn't even look at me!" While driving, an unwritten rule is to let the oldest vehicle merge because they have less to lose than the newer one (I had never heard of this until a few weeks ago when a friend told me about it and they were clearly disappointed that other people don't abide by it). And what is your expectation about the responsiveness to a text message that has OBVIOUSLY been read because there are two blue checks next to it?

We have the potential to live our lives in perpetual disappointment and being let down by those around us and the kicker is (sometimes) we don't even know we are holding onto these expectations and neither do they!

So, the next time you find yourself disappointed by the reaction of a friend, the way someone is driving, or the length of time it takes someone to respond to a text, ask yourself - what's my expectation about how I wanted them to act or respond? Once you begin to notice a pattern, you can prepare yourself by anticipating how you want to respond to the met and unmet expectations.

This won't rid you of the immediate wave of disappointment, but it will provide you with an alternative reaction that might defuse possible breakdowns, conflict, or road rage.

PS - I experienced an unmet expectation that led to disappointment while posting this blog. I assumed and expected that I could copy and paste this from Word buuuuuuut that's not what happened. I had to write it out ALL over again. Can you sense the disappointment?