The Burden of Expectation

It’s been close to a year since I graduated (my gosh time flies) and whenever I see people who I haven’t spoken to for a while, our conversation follows a predictable pattern. They ask how I am, I respond that I am well and enquire as to how they are.

Sidebar: We all know people rarely answer the question ‘How are you?” with an honest answer…so why do we still bother asking it and pretend that we believe their reponse?

Suddenly their eyes gleam with a blend of excitement and expectation, and they ask…

‘"So where do you work?"

As their minds struggle to absorb the fact that I haven't sold my soul to a FTSE 100 company for a comfortable salary and the respect such jobs automatically command, I attempt to change the subject. However as most conversations about life involve people trying to impose their life view on others, they begin their personal campaign to change my life view in 10 minutes.

They then begin to probe as to why I haven’t taken a traditional route and demand to know when I will get my ‘act together’ .You know, begin the banal routine that most of our generation will be engaged in until we retire.

Sleep,Eat,Commute,Work. Sleep, Eat, Commute, Work.

A routine built to sap the life out of people so their senses become so dulled they forget that life isn’t a rehearsal. And before we know it we’ve spent the bulk of our time on earth, dedicating our life to something we don't quite believe in, working for someone we don't like, living in a house that we may never really own.

So when having the ‘when will you get an impressive corporate job?’ conversation, I rarely argue my case.

Sidebar: Expressing your dreams out loud to people that don’t get it is the quickest way to assure them of your arrogance or insanity. I stay silent; they're kinder when they believe you’re stupid or misguided : )

I just pretend I agree and end the conversation with

‘Thank you (insert name), I’m really determined to get a job that matches my intellect now’

or

‘You’re right’.

And they smile, satisfied that they’ve done their job.

The conversations used to annoy me. Then I realized just like Jehovah Witnesses’ that have a knack for knocking on your door at the worst possible moment, their intention isn’t to annoy. Their concern is my security and since our society has associated security with a ‘9-5’ job, they want me to take the path that guarantees I'm able to accumulate all the things that will apparently demonstrate to the world that I’m a success. The mortgage, kids in private education, fancy cars, designer clothes. And it’s not that I don't want these things for myself, but the idea that they can only be attained via one path...well that sounds slightly ludicrous.

After having to constantly have variants of the same conversation, I now really understand how cumbersome it is to carry the burden of other people’s expectations. There’s actually nothing wrong in people having expectations of us, in fact they can be good for us. If set at the right level, they’re something to strive towards and even if set ‘too high’ they can empower us to perform beyond our capacity.

Contrarily, when we begin to shape our lives solely based on the expectations of others, (without defining and knowing what’s best for us) those expectations become burdens.

Sadly I’ve come to conclude that too many of us are living the version of our life that makes everyone happy but us. We observe religious rites we don’t believe in, stay in relationships with people we don’t like and do occupations we weren’t built for, all because it’s what’s ‘expected’ of us.

I guess this should be the point where I write ‘follow your heart and blaze your own trail, live your dream and no one else’s’. It would be the ‘right’ thing to write and I really do believe in it. Sadly it’s easy advice to give and much harder advice to live.Our decisions are not made in a vacuum, they impact everyone around us and without the support of friends and loved ones, the ‘unsafe option' is an even harder path to take.

Nevertheless, as idealistic as it may sound, I think being courageous and honest with oneself will always pay off. Sticking to your vision and gut instinct will always outweigh the benefits of conforming. Heck,it’s hard enough making your own dreams come true; let alone living someone else’s!

So to whoever’s reading that is going through a similar experience, I hope you keep striving, keep believing and keep making your dreams a reality. Eventually, it’ll all come together and suddenly everyone else will ‘get it’.

Christiana

xxx