I have heard this so many times that now I feel like there is something wrong with me and me alone. “You should live your life without expectations.”

Your life would be bliss and you will have the mental peace that you are looking for if you just stop having expectations from others in your life. I am a living breathing human being and how on earth am I supposed to live without expectations? I go to sleep also with the expectation of waking up tomorrow, the sun rising in the morning and being able to do things during the day. So how can I live my life without expectations?

Aren’t the people who are saying this living with the expectation that if not 100’s at least a few will listen to them and do it?

Why are we trying to remove the most natural or basic emotions and emotional reactions from our mind? The fact of life is that by the time we as human beings understand mental stress and emotions in all their varied effects, we have already reached a level of maturity. To me it feels as if scientists are saying that the air is polluted so stop breathing and see how wonderful your health will be.

We all know not breathing is only possible if we are robots and the same applies to our emotions as well. You can’t grow a full tree from a seed in 1 day or 1 hr. It’s a process which requires steps and time. So, give yourself the time you need, not what is the norm or the standard or what someone else has achieved.

You are a human being and it’s built in your system to have expectations from everything and everyone. What you need to slowly build is acceptance. Acceptance that someone people will meet your expectations, and some won’t. Accept that the person you have expectations from is also a human being and he/she might not be able to reciprocate on the same level as you.

The first thing to accept is that you will have expectations and it’s absolutely normal to have them. What is not normal is believing, that they will be met each and every time. If you are a human being and live in an environment with other people, you will go through incidents, emotions, and reactions and accept that so does the other person. There is no world in which you won’t have expectations. When you smile at a stranger you expect it to be reciprocated, when you message a friend, you expect a reply. It’s not the expectation which is a problem it is the denial of that expectation which leads to you feeling hurt having anxiety or fear of rejection.

The denial of these expectations brings the devil on your shoulder alive. Telling you nonstop all the negative things, creating that fear in your mind and taking the peace away. Remember the devil never likes things to be quiet, that is an angel’s state.

So don’t try to block or deny the expectation. Learn to accept it, because not accepting it is the problem. Once you accept the fact that you have expectations then you will be able to better equipe yourself to handle it. Think about all the times when you accepted that you have expectations and recall how well you were able to handle those situations in life, be it career or relationships.

Let’s assume you met someone, and you exchanged numbers. You might expect the other person to be the first to message. You waited for it to happen, and it did not happen. What did you do next? You allowed your sense of entitlement to come to the front, and this opens the whole box of negative emotions.

In the second scenario……  You thought about it and decided, what if the other person is also assuming I will message first? What happens then? You choose to be the first person to message because you want the conversation to begin.

What is happening here? You are accepting that you have expectations of the communication to start and then acting on it.

In both cases there are expectations. It is only in the second scenario that there is an acceptance with the expectation. In the first scenario, the devil is out in a party mood now. He starts whispering in your ears.. What if the other person decided I am not worth their time? What if they were actually taking the number for someone else? What if I said or did something that made them change their mind after taking the number?

Now you are anxious, fearful and non stop playing the whole thing in a loop in your head. What is the effect of all this on your mental health?

Accepting or ignoring the existence of your emotions, which is more peaceful?