Member-only story
The Weight Of Expectations
There are many weights in life, and the weights of expectations are the heaviest of them all. From your conception, the expectations begin; the shape of your head, the color of your eyes, the preferred gender as a boy or a girl, the type of things you’d like or be interested in, and a whole lot more. As soon as you are born, these expectations are projected on you directly, and they influence your choice and decisions as you begin to think, grow and choose your life.
Expectations can come from the outside or from within you. Most external expectations present themselves like a vote of confidence from those we hold in high esteem, but they are often painfully misguided, and their imprints on our lives increase the internal pressure we feel to either perform or overachieve. As you begin to take on interests, your choices will mirror the expectations of those whose influence on your life weighs the heaviest, mostly your parents, extended family members, and of course, the environment in which you were born.
On a deeper level, expectations come out of a need or hole in our core self that we are trying to fill. Often, in the deepest, darkest recesses of that hole sits fear. Fear of not being enough as we are, or fear that we amount to nothing if our life is not attached to anything the world views as success. On the other note, a lot of us do not know what we want. We battle with various ideas or information in our heads, which is evident when trying to make solid life decisions. You can’t, and you end up trying to seek other people’s permission through the advice they give you, so at least if/when it fails, you will have someone to blame. Sounds familiar? Yes, that’s fear.
I was wondering the correlation between our personal identity, achievement, expectations, ambitions and validation. This is what I can summarise for you in an elevator pitch style. A lot of our identities are rooted in the achievements associated with our lives. Our achievements spring up or are pursued from the mental expectations we place or are placed on our lives and because a lot of us suffer from identity crisis, we pile up unrealistic expectations on ourselves, one we call ambitions, one that results in pressure because in some sort of way, the society has projected them as a validation of our existence, and without the fulfillment of these expectations…
