Is This ONE Expectation Making You Unhappy?
Hello, hello!
It’s a nice and early 5:45 am here, so good morning to you.
I’ll be honest: I’m not a HUGE fan of waking up in the 5:00 hour (or earlier, that’s a given), but I do really enjoy the few hours of alone time I’m able to get before my son wakes up.
And it allows me space that I wouldn’t otherwise have to write these blogs, and for that I am grateful!
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As I woke up this morning and started writing in my morning pages (you can read all about my morning routine in my book), I noticed that I was feeling a lot of anxiety. One of the BEST ways for me to figure out what’s going on in my head and in my heart, is to get all my thoughts out of my head and onto paper.
I started to notice that a lot of what was causing this discomfort and uneasiness was one single expectation:
I was expecting that life should be easier than it is.
Yesterday evening was pretty stressful and chaotic, and I found myself slipping into the victim mindset last night and this morning.
WHY IS THIS HAPPENING? Can’t we just have a relaxing evening? Ugh, so many little things are just adding up — I feel like I’m going to go crazy. And my personal favorite victim mentality that I slip into (lol): IT’S ALWAYYYS SOMETHING.
Upon reflecting in my morning pages, it was easy to see how much resistance I was creating to what was actually going on. And how my own thoughts were causing ADDITIONAL suffering beyond what was actually going on.
That got me to thinking: why am I just expecting that life should always be easy and smooth and without struggle?
I’ve always been into spirituality and manifestation, and one of the phrases I see thrown around a lot (that I even say myself) is “I allow this to be easy.” There’s also a question from Tim Ferris that I love: “What would this look like if it were easy?”
We all want things to be easy, right? WHO DOESN’T??
We live in a culture of instant gratification — if we want something, we can order it online and get it at our doorstep within a few days, or even hours. We can order food and have it delivered. Some of us are privileged enough to not only have our basic needs met, but also have access to incredible technology that makes our lives 100x easier (and sometimes harder, but that’s a blog post for another day).
But I think we’re missing the mark when we just expect things to be EASY all the time. Because what happens when:
you receive an unexpected bill in the mail
something breaks at home and you have to replace it
your car breaks down or you have to take it in to get something repaired, which costs money AND time
you get into a disagreement with someone you care about
you or someone you love gets sick
someone passes away
… I could go on and on, but the point is: these things are all just part of life. LIFE HAPPENS.
It’s our resistance to life happening that creates so much suffering for us.
I used to spend so much time in resistance to these little/big stressors that used to come up:
Am I not manifesting correctly? Why are my affirmations about life flowing perfectly and with ease not working? Why isn’t this EASY? Why is life so freaking hard sometimes? Do I just have bad luck? Am I the only one? WHY IS LIFE SUCKING RIGHT NOW?
Here’s the thing: I think life CAN be easier than we make it. Like I mentioned, we create resistance to WHAT IS when we think life should just flow effortlessly without pain or struggle — but truthfully, that is just part of the human experience.
Things happen, but we do NOT need to add to our own suffering.
I think we’re all guilty of adding to our own suffering by:
resisting what IS going on (no! this can’t be happening! why is this happening? what did I do to deserve this?!)
worrying/ruminating/obsessive thinking
going down Google rabbit holes (never a good idea LOL)
allowing yourself to envision the worst case scenario when the best case scenario (or a scenario in between) may be just as likely
thinking that we have control over every detail of our lives and everyone around us (why isn’t life going according to MY plan?!!!)
So, what can we do?
We don’t want to get sucked into the pits of pessimism and always expecting the worst (that only adds to our own suffering). And adopting a Pollyanna view that EvErYtHiNg iS aLwAyS PeRfeCt & ThE SuN iS AlWaYs sHiNinG can also set us up for huge disappointment when life inevitably ebbs and flows.
Here’s the stance I’m trying to adopt: somewhere in the middle. I am neutral — meaning I am starting to accept that shit happening is just naturally part of life. It’s going to happen. AND I can still maintain some optimism to give myself hope that things usually turn out better than I expect them to, and that most of the things I worry about don’t even come true.
That hint of optimism also comes in handy when things DO come up in life, because you don’t take it as a personal failure: UGH I didn’t manifest hard enough! I am a failure! Why is this happening to me?
Instead, we can be more kind and gentle to ourselves. We can see things with more of a level head and make rational, logical decisions based on the evidence we have of what’s going on. We can learn to let go of control and understand the ONLY thing we have control over in our lives is how we respond to what happens.
The older I get, the more life experience I have, and the more I realize that while I can hope, dream, manifest, and envision exactly how I want life to go, sometimes things will happen that I don’t expect.
Instead of resisting what is — instead of making myself miserable with worry, doubt, frustration, or questioning why all these things have to happen — I am trying to create more space, more ease and more grace with myself while I figure it all out.
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I’d love to hear from you! Is this something that you struggle with, too? Leave a comment below and let me know. And if you’d like to share some words of wisdom based on YOUR life experience, we’d love to hear it!
xo
