The other day, I was thinking of this thing called expectation. Sure, my sister’s boyfriend has chimed about this all the time: when it comes to relationship, best to keep expectations low and do something great after – you know, to double the happiness.
On another random day, I was having dinner with my friends after class. And it seemed that among the three of us, only one person has high expectation in terms of his grades and studies. ‘High expectation, eh? The higher you will fall,’ I jokingly said.
My other friend agreed. She, too, thought that the lowering expectation helps to shield us from most of the pain – we will be easier to please and overall happier too.
I know, I haven’t been great at curbing my expectation. I always expect my boyfriend to ‘do everything’ (in his words, anyway) and understand me and love me and pamper me and plan our dates. I thought, ‘That’s what guys do – they plan the dates!’ But perhaps I was wrong. I mean, it’s hard to plan dates and expect them to be awesome every single time, right?
And yes, the same thing happens at uni. I’ve been struggling, once again, with the concept of grades. I know it doesn’t rule my life, but knowing the statement and believing it wholeheartedly are two different things. I’ve been trying to practice what I preach, and I still find it difficult, like I did back when I was still a 17-year-old freshman.
It was cloudy when I wrote this. I was on the train to my boyfriend’s place and even though I couldn’t see the sun, my mind wandered at the story of Icarus – how he flew too close to the sun after making his hard-earned freedom and fell.
Is expectation like that?
Are we naively trying to chase the sun, putting our expectation higher and higher, yet burned instead?
I know, expectation is a tricky thing. It’s wrong to set it close to the sun, and it’s wrong to set it near the ground.
But perhaps the solution is not to lower our expectation. Perhaps the solution is to be a tougher person, and keep getting back up when we are doomed to fall anyway.
Photo by realize_photo
