Expectations are often at the root of disappointment, because what you expected doesn't come true and that evokes a certain feeling. Usually this is disappointment and it can even spill over into irritation, hatred and resentment in some people. You may also feel hurt.
You expect the train to arrive on time, and it doesn't arrive on time... Disappointed!
You don't expect a traffic jam and then there is a traffic jam... You expect someone on time and they are not on time, and yes... Disappointed!
But you do it yourself. Because if you had no expectations, you wouldn't have felt that disappointment either. It's as simple as that.
Then you could say you're just not going to expect anything more, but that's very difficult, because you always have some level of expectations.
Subconsciously, you expect a lot of things. When I walk downstairs, I expect everything to be there and then when it's gone, I do get disappointed.
So subconsciously, I expect that furniture to stay there.
Maybe there are those who can release expectations, like a monk or something, but I don't really know any.
Some time ago, I was watching a soccer game. Like most soccer fans, I had certain expectations of my team, and when a goal was scored, my expectations only increased.
All kinds of things were happening and after the break, things were going very fast. Suddenly things were different and the underdog just won. The team that was normally the favorite lost. So they had different expectations and you could see this in the team and the supporters. There was total disappointment and with the underdog, of course, there was total joy.
It was magical.
Control freaks who freak out
Most people are often disappointed anyway . These are often people who want to completely control life. These are often control freaks.
They want life to be as their expectations are. Their beliefs about how the world works must be right. Nature must do as they say.
Trees should grow a certain way and especially not over the neighbor's fence. Plenty of these types of "control freaks" come up at the Driving Judge.
A leaf falls from your tree, my goodness. Like you own that tree. Yes, because it's in your yard. Someone also figured that out that you buy something and sign a piece of paper and suddenly it's your land. That's the expectation, I pay for it so it's mine. Something like that.
These people have it tough, because everything has to go their way, and that often doesn't go well.
That's really tough, man... It has to be exactly this and that. They expect life to go the way they want it to. 'It has to go the way I want it to.' They expect all of life to conform to them. Every frustration must be taken away by others. No, because it is obviously not up to them.
Suddenly there's a traffic jam, then they have to shout irritably because that's supposed to solve the traffic jam. Or they curse at the train station when the train is not on time.
There are even people who start stalking their ex when he breaks up with them, as if they have no other life. There are plenty of other women out there.
All hassle because they expect everything. They expect their ex to do what they want anyway. They expect all of life to adjust to them. Any frustration must be taken away by others, not by themselves.
Rigid people who break.
Go with the flow
This is also in martial arts. The fight in things. Karate, kickboxers and all compete against each other until someone else breaks.
And you also have sports, such as Aikido, in which people bend along. For example, with the resistance you face in life. Like in a storm, you bend with it like reeds.
It is not bad to struggle for things and when things are not going well to want to improve them. It is also evolution, you want to grow and develop. Sometimes you also have to accept things. Sometimes you also have to move along, which is much more powerful.
It's also tougher not to expect anything.
But there are so many people who are disappointed in life, in their parents, in their children, in their school, in their teacher or in their master. Actually, they are only disappointed because they expect.
If they did not expect something from the above list, they would not be disappointed with it either and could create more space for themselves or those around them.
I don't know if it is possible to live completely without expectation. I can't. Of course I also disappoint myself and other people, that's how it goes. That people get angry with you, or happy with you. You can also have this with yourself.
This is because I expect something different from myself, from other people or other people from me.
You can't please everyone and you can't disappoint everyone. You just do what you think is right and it falls out a certain way and that's it. Then you go on with your life again.
Focus on expectations you can live up to yourself
I like a quote from Toon Gerbrands: "You have controllable things and uncontrollable things." If you start worrying about uncontrollable things such as politics, terrorism, education systems, healthcare systems, terrorism, other people, things you have absolutely no control over.
But you have a lot of influence over yourself and the things you can influence. For example, by making appointments with people, making phone calls, your own work, and if you do what you can control well then you can expect more from yourself.
By sticking to what you can control. By doing those things well, you can be more influential and then expect more from yourself than from someone else.
For example, I expect myself to write a blog regularly. I can manage that myself. That is something that is manageable. Usually it goes well and sometimes it doesn't.
I can fix things, but of course I can't fix a traffic jam. If you start worrying about that, you're not being helpful. I see many people doing the opposite. They waste their energy on unmanageable things, then you sleep badly and can have panic attacks.
So what's the best way to be disappointed? Having expectations that don't come true. And consequently having expectations about unmanageable things and being disappointed about that. That doesn't make any sense. You can sit with that for a minute, but after that it has to be done.
There is a gradation in this, of course. For example, I expect the people I love to live a long time and my children to outlive me. If that doesn't happen, of course I am upset for more than an hour.
And that's not easy then, but that's the only thing you can control. The rest is not.
Awareness and focus
I think if you can always realize that and focus on that, you can still be disappointed, angry, frustrated, but it will lessen. Because, can you control it? No. Then there's no point in worrying about it.
What you can control you can do. It has to do with what you produce, not what happens to you.
These were my reflections on disappointments. For me it's a work in progress, maybe for you too. ;-)
https://www.buzzsprout.com/195236/1106177-hoe-kan-je-nu-teleurgesteld-raken
What can you actually do on your own?
Now you may be thinking, "Yeah that's all nice and all, but I can't do anything at all." Of course that's not the case either, that's a belief you can have. Changing your expectations is something you can do with hypnosis and with mindfulness[1].
For example, research shows that certain suggestions can cause you to start your day with a different intention. For example, you may have the intention to arrive at appointments "on time." By doing so, you also express a kind of expectation that you can arrive on time.
By changing the suggestion to "do your best to be on time," you become much less stressed when the train is once late. You then assume more of what you yourself can do, rather than what the world should do for you. At least you can say you got to the train on time or got in the car half an hour early to avoid trouble.
While being in hypnosis and the trance of mindfulness are two different things, they can both help you adjust your expectations.
Expectations even affect the DNA in your body and how you deal with pain. You can have expectations about things you have influence over and have expectations about things you have no influence over. Especially if you have a lot of expectations about uncertain things you would like to have influence over, this can cause problems, such as the development of anxiety[2].
Changing your focus from things you have no control over - the uncontrollable, to the manageable, to where you do have control - can then help you reduce or eliminate those fears.
Hypnosis also helps in these kinds of ways against fears and also shows you what you can all influence.
With hypnosis, for example, you can figure out why you value control over the uncontrollable. Why you get disappointed when someone arrives five minutes late.
This can be done, for example, with regression. With regression, while you are under hypnosis, you go back to the first moment when your expectations did not come true and you became disappointed because of this. You go back to the moment when you did everything possible, such as getting angry, to make the situation work for you.
You then start looking at that moment in a different way to see how you could have handled that moment as well. The hypnotherapist helps you with this. This alone can help you adjust your expectations so that you have and experience a finer life.
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Sources:
[1] https://jmss.org/index.php/mbr/article/view/16006
[2] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1364661303000615
