“What are your expectations?” I try to ask myself this question whenever I am encountering something new or different. I don’t always remember though. My 40 something years have shown me that we often set our sites higher than what is reasonable achievable and we think, maybe, just maybe we will reach them this time.
This is not a blog telling people not to dream, hope, wish or desire. Rather it is a blog about doing those things and assessing and finding out what we can control, what we can’t and, therefore, finding peace in the outcomes. Am I getting ahead of myself? Maybe a little bit…but, I can be an optimistic person. The irony of this blog is that I had a lot of expectations about how I could set up this site. How I would name it, load it, design it, write it and get it launched. I found myself clenching my stomach at times and finding myself in the kitchen for comfort (not a good habit). Just another cup of coffee, snack or fizzy water to help sort out my mind.
I have a version of this and my mind gallops to the place where I get to tag in favorite blogs, articles, 
videos and music with the snap of my fingers and share this with you and soothe my mind. I will get there. I realized that my expectations of being a start-up blogger were higher than my skill level. This is not shocking information in reality but, my own hopes hijacked my to-do list. I’ve had to revise my expectations several times all weekend while piecing this together.
The way I roll this concept around in my mind and when I share with my clients is here in three categories. What are the minimum expectations? What are reasonable and achievable expectations? What are the dream scenarios (also called gravy, lottery, bonus).
The three questions bring up the head tilt thought of, “Huh, what did I want and what control did I have in making it happen?” Or, in reality, “What the #*&%$ happened!”. It moves us away from blaming and to problem solving.
Most of us are big dreamers and shoot for the stars. Nothing wrong with wanting the best but, what hurts is when we expect others to do, think, want, desire, plan, achieve as we do and in our way. Then we hit the ground hard and we are stunned that things didn’t turn out the way we so thought they would. It moves us away from blaming and to problem solving and dream revising.
But, I digress…My reasonable expectations are to publish some thoughts about expectations and my journey in identifying those in my life, parenting, travel, friendships, work and marriage. I’ve got some threads I want to pull and see where they unravel. Thank you for reading and please join me on this journey.
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