Eventualities, promises, the future, chances, choices, living in the moment, insecurity, expectations and disappointment.
That's quite a load to try and tackle at once, isn't it?
Yet we are all guilty, at some point or another of dealing with all of the above for someone else, or expecting others to handle all of our own.
Generally, it's not a good idea to trust anyone, even your best friend/significant other with any of the above. They all sound so intricate as to warrant a lengthy explanation for each, yet they are all tied to the same thing. In general though, I class myself as quite cautious and careful not to mishandle any of these when faced with receiving them as a reluctant gift. I have been known to stumble and smash them all over the ground. You cannot turn any direction without someone placing their expectations of an unwritten future onto your lap.
It can be argued that fate and destiny tie you to the results of fumbling with expectations, but only in a relative sense as I have said before. A clever person may decide whether to try live up to the expectations of another when given the choice, but even the clever person is fallible when faced with the demands of the quiet hopeful expectant. We are all subject to great fantasies when promised that someone will meet the demands of your dreams, even facing an unsure means of achieving a result. I could promise to meet you for dinner, hail, rain or shine, but that truck driver may be trying to meet a deadline of his own and therefore flatten me dead while overtired. Dinner ain't happening, my fair lady.
I may also decide now that one day I'd like to move into the same accommodation as you, somewhere down the road, just so long as I accept that all the things you do between now and then are OK with me. Seeing as I am not the master fortune teller, I may not agree... I prefer to say I'll watch the ongoing results of our friendship before I commit to buy or make a decision.
And so it is also fair to say that I don't often handle the fragile package that is holding all of your dreams that are not apparent to me right now. I would not like to open that package to be hit by a punch-glove in jest, or to trip up and fumble the package only to find out that it was in fact holding a crystal sculpture of a scene of the future that you carved with your bare hands. You may say I'm afraid of the responsibility of handling the delivery of that package... I would say I just don't want it. I would rather be the hands that pass it on, thank you very much.
I don't gel well with the expectant kind. I don't like sitting on the fence due to immature forc asts I have made about my own character. The only forecasts that I can predict well are the tears that follow from failing the expectations of others. I seem to know them well, even if I do not know what they are. I just know that they are there and that failure to meet them always ends up rupturing the waterworks. I am no better a plumber than I am a courier in this case. In the world of creating and manufacturing expectations, delivery and receipt of them, I am unemployed. I have to say, that is only because I willingly quit the business long ago.
I wouldn't even say this was a pessimistic outlook of the business rather a realistic one. I am not the father of an ex's kids, I am not married to or separated from any past girlfriends, I did not wait four hours for an unreliable friend that never turned up and I have not been decieved by the same person twice... at least outside my own family anyway. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me.
Choices are easy to make, based on the ongoing results you see in any given situation. Some people really do believe that they don't have a choice. As the Rush song "Free Will" states: "If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice". Many will leave their "fate" (for want of a better word) in the hands of another, even when they see things are not going their way. They will say that destiny dictated that they were not meant to be happy, or that Karma dealt them a blow because of a past life. Imagine the Allies believed in Karma? We'd all be speaking German now. At least, what was left of us anyway. That is not to say German people are bad. In fact they are wonderful. Based on the decisions of a few English, American and Russian people. Of course it's ALL relative now. The important thing now is that They are. We are. And You are.
When expectations are not going your way, it is your fault, not the fault of the person whose hands you placed them in. When things are not going your way it is your choice and actions that decide what way they will go, to a large degree. You cannot stop the reels to land on lucky 7's, but you can stop your hand from putting money in. in the first place. If your house mate is pissing you off, say so. Or else move. If it's raining on your wedding day, tough it out and enjoy yourself in spite of the weather. But please shut up moaning about something you CAN'T change. If you are overweight and don't like it, LOSE weight. Don't blame the food, blame your lack of motivation and self-control. If you are happy the way you are in this life, don't let anyone else tell you otherwise. They probably just want to drag you down.
If things are not going your way make it so, or try a different approach. If he is not marrying you then find someone who will. If you are not getting laid go out and TRY. Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing, it was here first*
And don't blame anyone for failing your expectations. The only one in charge of them is you.
*Mark Twain
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