Expectations and Chapter 3

Expectations, they are a funny thing. I have lived my whole life on expectations and have constantly lived in disappointment. I always expect something or expect for things to be a certain way in my life and in the situations in my life, and when things don't go that way I am always upset, mad, and disappointed. I believe a lot of people do this and it is a driving force in a lot of people having problems. I am really bad with this I always expect something and when it doesn't happen I always get mad and show out. That is just how I have been, things don't go my way and I get mad. If someone does not give me the answer that I want I am pissed, when someone does not do something that I want or expected them to do I am upset. Working on controlling my anger and emotions I have come to realize this part of myself and how I always let my expectations run my emotions is unhealthy. Someone once told me that you can expect anything from anyone but yourself. I am slowly getting that through my head as the days go by. The past couple of days have been what they have been because of my expectations that I placed on the situations I was in. On Thursday I went to a Christmas Ball hosted by a sorority at my school, it was really nice and me and "friend"/boyfriend/ex (whatever) looked really nice and ended up having a really nice time. I was a little upset at the beginning of the night cause he left me to go and greet people and I didn't expect for him to just leave me like that. It kind of put me in a rut an a bad mood but I got out of it and had fun. Then as we were leaving I made a smart somewhat mean comment to him, like we have always done with each other, totally disregarding that the night before I had told him that I wanted him to stop being mean to me and we agreed to watch what we say to one another. So he was pissed at me and called me a hypocrite, which in a way I was, and I had become upset cause I didn't expect for us to end the night like that. Because my expectations were deterred I grew even more upset with the situation that was taking place at the present time. Learning how to not expect things and not place expectations on things in my life is where I am right now. When you set yourself up for expectations you set yourself up for non-realistic thoughts and rather disappointing outcomes.
I believe that I have made some good progress in understanding me and the way that I am currently and how to change the way that I am. In the book that I am reading it tells you to take a look at yourself and the roles you play in life and a couple of goals of those roles and decide whether you are happy with what you come up with. The chapter I just completed is called begin with the end in mind. The chapter starts out first by discussing visualizing your funeral and what people would have to say about you. From the visualization you are then suppose to determine if you are happy with what people would say about you and what you would want people to say about you. I am not to fond of the idea of death and so therefore I was not to excited with exercise itself, but I still did it. I would want people to say that I was a good person who really cared about people and worked everyday to make someone else's life better. I would want them to say that I was a good motivator, great mother, good friend, good listener, and someone to look up to. Right now in my life I have to figure out how to get there. The whole principle of "beginning with the end in mind" is based on personal leadership. The book discusses how we need to use our imagination and conscience to work on our personal leadership. This chapter discussed a lot about visualizing situations and seeing how we would react to the situations. It stated that if we can work on how we handle different situations in our life before they occur we can be highly effective in making changes in our lives along with being a more successful person. It talked about using visualization and affirmation as an exercise of making changes in our lives. Also it talked about writing a personal mission statement including our life roles and goals and what we want to accomplish like what our values are. All of that kind of goes back to the beginning exercise with the funeral with establishing what your values are and what you want to accomplish with your life, you can only do that once you know what your values are.
My Affirmation: It is fulfilling and pleasing that I respond with love and self control when I am upset with people.
My Life Roles and Their Goals: Christian, as a Christian I will continue to grow closer to God by being a service to God and his Kingdom and the people around me, nourishing them with the love of God. Student, as a student I will graduated with a 3.0 accumulative GPA by being on time and working as hard as I can (never giving up or just being mediocre), and controlling my actions in the classroom. I will also learn all that I can learn and take advantage of all learning experiences and opportunities. Friend, as a friend I want to be a supportive, good listener who loves them throughout all of the drama.
One day things will be good and I will be a more effective person in society and my relationships with people. I am growing happy with the more that I discover about myself and the things in my life that I now know that I can change and knowing how to change them. I received some heartbreaking news on Friday, and yes I cried in fact I boohooed, I cried so hard, but I stopped and I took in to account that I need to look at my other options and seek out some other opportunities. Yeah having the support of my friend and having him to talk me through it was helpful but I really could not stop crying until I realized that I did have other options. I guess I am making progress, I was able to get up and not be depressed about the news I realized that all I can do is to wait til Monday. I am learning to be more positive and to look at things more positively, I know that I sometimes I fall back on to old habits but I really do see a change in the new ones that I have been making in my life. I love it!!!!!