everal years ago while I was on my way to San Francisco for a short vacation by myself I decided to pull some paper from my bag and start writing my thoughts down. A plane ride from Indiana to San Francisco can be quite long. As I sat dazing out the window of the plane thinking about what it was I needed to let out I began hearing the words "no expectations". I began jotting down what I thought those words meant to me. No expectations can mean several things. To not expect the expected and to never think you know what is coming because that's when your hopes get shattered. Someplace in my mind I had expected my grandmother would recover from her cancer and live life as she always did. Was it my expectations that put so much pain in my heart?
When we set our expectations to a situation without thought of what might else happen we can count on being hurt. That's where hopes come into play as well. Do we not ever hope for anything again? For the fear that it could hurt our expectations for the future? I don't believe we should ever give up on hope. Hope is a service of love always keeping in mind of good things to come for better outcomes for self. Keeping the hope alive within our selves shows we believe and love for that which is to come. It is when we decide a certain expectation to happen that we shatter our hopes and dreams. It can be considered tunnel vision for our life. We are set at one path and that is the only outcome we can vision.
When we open to a larger setting of how we would like to see our hopes come alive we then begin to recognize that
hurt has no place for our future. For example, if we are set on one certain type of job and we have our hopes set on working it we can definitely count on being disappointed by the outcome. We have set our expectations in one area with no room for more options. In the case of my grandmothers passing I set in my mind that she would live and not leave me. But if I had decided to believe there was a possibility that she might pass on and different levels of growth may come my way I might not of been shattered to the point I stuck myself in a denial stage of grief. This is not to say that we should not grieve when someone we love passes because it is a very normal emotion and lesson of love we must go through. But to deny your self of the possibilities of newness walking into our lives from this tragedy is what closes us down and causes pain.
I decided at a point in my life to not put expectations of how I hoped my daughter Samantha would turn out when she grows up. The hope I have for her is so much bigger than just wishing what I want her to be. I now hope that she will be what she wants to be. That her dreams and hopes will be as big as what, I or anyone can imagine. I tell her so often "you can be whatever you want to be and more". Be that doctor and artist all at once. Don't put yourself at one area with no room to expand. Don't limit your hopes and dreams, keep striving for the love within you that will keep you at peace.
This may seem like a tangled web of words but when we sit down and think about the difference between our
hopes and expectations we soon realize what it is we really want.
Kelli Faulkner |
