Expectations

When we get married, we enter into the marriage with a certain form of luggage. This luggage is the most harmful to a relationship and its name is expectation. We all have them...and we all make assumptions based off of them.

It was 10 years into my marriage that I received this tool. My marriage was in a season of atrophy and pain and was in great danger of being dissolved. My husband and I were both scrambling to hold ourselves together during this trying time, and God introduced us to a couple that had walked a similar path that we were now experiencing. We did not know this couple at all. On top of that, they lived 2500 miles away. My husband had spent the weekend prior and now, it was my turn to open my life to someone I had never met and seek what wisdom God had for me.

It was about 36 hours into my time with Eldon and Judy and we had already covered some serious ground. This powerful tool came to me as we were in the car, discussing some painful events, when suddenly Judy leaned back and said "Expectations murder people." I felt like I had been punched in the gut! After a moment of awkward silence, I asked "Isn't that a little harsh?" She looked at me and said "No." You see, when we have expectations, spoken or not spoken, when a person does not live up to those expectations, we get angry, frustrated, discontent, hurt and so on. Aside from what goes on inside of us, we begin to express these feelings, intentionally or not, to the person that did not live up to them. This can be manifested in a number of ways, but more often than not, our relationship begins to suffer because they feel like they are not good enough for us. This begins a vicious cycle of them trying to live up to our expectations and us either growing more frustrated when they can't meet our expectations, or us realizing that our expectations weren't what we really needed to "fix" us! We begin to place new expectations on that person and the cycle begins all over again!

And you know what? I take that statement one step further and say: Expectations murder others, and they murder me too. You see, placing an expectation on someone is an attempt to get my own percieved needs met. Expectations are self-seeking, never for the benefit of both parties. I murder myself when I place expectations on others because others can't fulfill or fix me. To put it more simply, when I place expectations on others, I wind up spinning my tires and grow more and more frustrated and discontent with those in my life. Someone once  told me that when I realize that I cannot control what others do or how they will respond, I empower myself to make choices that lead to joy and contentment, peace and satisfaction. It is crucial to every marriage that we remember that the only way to have a positive outcome of every circumstance is taking responsibility for our own attitudes and choices, and realizing that the only power we really have is over our choices. Remember that we can always check our choices against the love chapter to be sure that we are empowering ourselves and ensuring a positive outcome for ourselves those we care most about.