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Managing Expectations And The Circle Of Control

This post is courtesy our guest writer, Avni Bhalgat!


It is often said that you are the reason for your sorrow. But how true really is this statement? To understand that we must first understand expectations, how we consciously and unconsciously build them, and how those expectations influence our reactions and feelings.

Expectations

An expectation is the strong belief that something will happen, or that you expect something to happen. It could be something as simple as “I think it will rain today” to something as emotionally up-heaving as “I think my significant other will propose to me soon”.


As children we believe in what psychologists call “magical thinking”, or the thought that your thoughts can manifest into real life. For example, thinking that you want something sweet will result in you getting dessert after dinner. Many psychologists believe that you outgrow this line of thinking by the time you become an adult. But what if that isn’t the case.

The Law of Attraction

For those that are unfamiliar with this law, the Law of Attraction, simply states that you attract events in your life based on your thoughts. More simply put, your expectations will manifest.

This is the adult version of the magical thinking we go through as children. While it may not be as whimsical as magical thinking wherein we believe that we willed something into existence as with the desert example, it still connects emotions to events around us. This can be harmless enough when it comes to expecting your timer driven coffee machine will have a hot cup of coffee ready for you in the morning but can be the reason behind an emotional spiral when those expectations go beyond activities that you control yourself.

Building Expectations

Any time you want something to happen or you hope for something, you are building an expectation. Usually those expectations are built on some experience. Something that has happened in the past that leads you to believe that you know how something is going to turn out. For example, if you have eaten sushi then you have a flavor palette that is built up for some form of Japanese food. When your friend now asks if you would like to try ramen you have an expectation of whether you will like it or not based off of the fact that you like or dislike sushi, which is also Japanese. This, of course, is an oversimplification but still gets at the underlying psychology of expectation building.


There are two categories into which we can sort built expectations; conscious and unconscious. Unconscious expectations are only felt or realized when the outcome of the expectation is reached, either by a feeling of relief, happiness, joy or a feeling of disappointment, hurt and pain. These are activities that we do not even know we have expectations from but our emotional attachment to the outcome shows that we do. For example, when you dig into your favorite plate of food you have an unconscious expectation of taste and that is demonstrated by joy, if it is exactly how you remember, or displeasure/mild irritation, if it isn’t up to your self-defined standards. The emotion at the end of the action demonstrates the type of expectation you had; either positive or negative.

Conscious expectations on the other hand are those that you build with the knowledge that you want a particular outcome, pretty much the opposite of unconscious expectations. These outcomes usually have stronger emotional sway over us since we set these expectations for ourselves. For example, when you set up an expectation of doing an x number of hours of work a week and do not achieve it, it causes disheartening and disappointment whereas if you did hit the target, it causes a lot of joy.


I want to take a slight detour to explain a concept that was brought up to me by a close friend that really helps define the things you actually control in your life versus the ones that you perceive that you have control over. This will also help understand how to manage your expectations.

What this concept states is that there are different levels of control that we have over things in our life.

The outermost circle of concern is based on things that we worry about but know that we do not have power over. This could be things like the past or international crises. It is the biggest circle because most things that worry us are out of our control.



Within this circle we can draw a circle of influence. This circle consists of things that we have indirect control over, or things we can only influence. This usually involves other people in our life and their behaviors. The most effective thing we can do to influence things in this circle is to change our attitude towards them or work on removing them from this circle. I like to think that this circle goes both ways, in that not only is it your circle of influence but it also has an influence on you so make sure you are okay with everything in this circle.

The last nested circle is the circle of control, is arguably the most important circle because you have control over the activities in this circle. This circle usually includes things that you have direct influence over; your behaviors and actions.


Overall this concept helps you categorize things that cause you stress and anxiety in a way that makes sense and helps you determine what things you can actually control or influence. Hopefully that may help you determine what is worth spending your time on and alleviate some of the stress that comes from relinquished control.

Managing Expectations

With the knowledge we have gained so far it is easy to see that there are many barriers to managing expectations including building unconscious expectations, building unrealistic expectations and building expectations that are reliant on things outside of your circle of control, to name a few.

That said, here are some of my tips to managing expectations:

Don’t Assume

Not everyone has the same understanding of a situation or is going through the same things. It is very easy to assume things about people but harder to truly understand their underlying motivations/actions. It’s important in these situations to…

Communicate

Have open conversations with people that you know you may have pinned expectations on. Take the time to get to know their perspectives and check in on them to know their thoughts. This will help you be more informed, helping you shape your expectations in a way that will lead to a greater chance of a positive outcome.


Yes, this is more work on your part but at the end of the day, this will only help you. (And also the other person if they felt that you had an unrealistic expectation tied to them.) Introspect and Use Mindfulness

Revert back to the circles of control to try and de-tangle yourself from expectations that set you up for failure because they are things that are not directly under your control. Mindfulness, is the act of being conscious of your thoughts and being intentional with your actions. Employ that concept to building expectations by being mindful of expectations that are being built to prevent surprises and also make more realistic expectations. This should help manage the outcomes of those expectations in a much healthier way.

It isn’t easy managing your expectations. Anyone that says that it is, is lying. It is however a skill that you can gain overtime, with practice. And, who knows, it can hold the key to unlocking a life filled with more happiness and less disappointments.



How do you deal with the weight of expectations in your life?


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