The great ah-ha
It doesn’t take a lot of deep self-reflection to notice how suffering is related to unmet expectations. The great ah-ha comes when it dawns on us that we can’t choose how life will respond to our expectations. We can only choose which expectations we will use to guide how we use our time and talents.
The practice around this principle is making a list of expectations that life is most capable of fulfilling for us. Possibly things like:
I expect that good things to come and go, change and return in different forms
I expect that everyone has a different capacity for understanding and appreciating me
I expect that on some days I will receive more joy from good acts than good outcomes
I expect that the creative among us will continue to surprise us
I expect that the only time we will every have is the flowing present that never stands still.
