In today’s video I would like to talk about our response to “Expectations”, specially expectations that we have from people.
Many a times we expect people to behave in a certain fashion or take a particular action in a way we approve of.
And many a times they don’t, because they are totally different people, out of our control and we cannot really monitor them or get them to do what we want every time.
What we need to learn from this aspect is, that we are again falling into a trap of deriving our happiness out of the outcome of a certain situation.
We are trying to extract some kind of happiness from an environment that suits us, and when that situation doesn’t work out the way we want it to we create unhappiness / we create negative emotions within ourselves.
So every time you are expecting an e-mail reply to the e-mail that you had sent, and it isn’t coming, start being conscious of yourself at that point of time.
Because that would be the stimulus to create unhappiness within you. If you are waiting for a reply from an sms, or message that you have shot out to your friends, again be aware of yourself.
Bring some consciousness so that the absence of the response is not a stimulus to make you unhappy.
There are so many times we employ people to work in the garden or to do some work at home, and we have a certain expectation that they need to fulfill for us to be happy. If they do not do it we think that we have wasted our money and time and are unhappy.
So this goes on and on everyday, every single day of our life. We are living with this false or wrong way of living. we have a mis understanding about expectations.
Every time we base our happiness on the outcome of any situation, we are trapping ourselves for unhappiness. If people do not return a favor in return for a favor you had done for them.. That will make you unhappy.
People cannot be controlled, they have a total different belief system and a total different way of living.
Example: when friends come over to your house, you love to serve them a lot of food and give them a good time at your home. You all chill out watch a movie and have a good time.
You enjoy doing it, you enjoy treating your friends like that when they come over to your home. Now when you go over to their home, they may not treat you in the same fashion.
Yes you guys will talk, but the other aspects of stimulus which provide entertainment and provide engagement may be missing. And then you end up thinking I do so much for them when they come over, but when I go over they do not really care.
So expectations are a source of unhappiness for us on a daily basis. And by being unconscious of the fact that people live life differently, they think differently, they prioritize differently.
By making this clear to ourselves, we will not be dependent on their actions to give us happiness.
This can be achieved only by creating a certain space between what you do and the happiness that you derive out of it.
Yes, you like to entertain your friends at your place, but if that doing is the only source of your happiness, then you are going to have a problem down the line.
You need to derive your happiness from self fulfillment. By taking care of where you are focusing your attention on.
You can achieve this by being more self aware of yourself. By practicing self awareness.
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So the next time you are caught in this trap of an expectation not getting fulfilled, use it as an opportunity to be aware of yourself. Be aware that this false dimension of deriving happiness still exists in your life.
And you just need to bring it to your notice that this unhappiness has been cause due to an expectation that I had which is a misunderstanding.
You do not need to derive happiness from the outcome of a situation. You need to derive happiness from self fulfillment by being aware of your true self.
Engage in life by being happy first. Never base your happiness on the outcome of a situation as that is the trap for unhappiness.
Image by : Ravindra