Expectations vs Reality

Expectations. I have a love hate relationship, perhaps conflict is a better description of the relationship. My motto is expect the worst and hope for the best. My brother Brandon says expect nothing so that everything is a beautiful surprise.

Neither seem to bring much joy and yet both breed some sort of truth. I want good things to happen. I want to will them into being, but when they don't happen I'm disappointed. If I expect nothing I feel like I'm selling myself short and only getting the leftover scraps of what joy is left in the world. So which one is correct?

Today we rolled out a very special, and generous promo at work. Spend $50 at The Peak and get a $20 gift card to the local struggling theater for FREE. I have been so excited about it. I have been looking forward to it. I was fully expecting people to line up and the phones ringing off the hook trying to grab this promo, but I think we handed out 5 of them..... 5 of the 300 available. 

This truly is a generous and not at all required thing to do. We paid the local theater $6K for these from a grant and we want to bonus our families as well as the theater so why is no one lining up for this but a $50 sweatshirt will sell out to an online store?

It's not that today was bad. I truly wasn't. Provably the best Monday in a long time even though I am down 3 coaches due to covid, but everything worked out and people were generally decent, but still I am bummed. Such a silly thing to be sad about, but I feel it's a failure on my part. I didn't market it good enough. I haven't mended the Peak reputation as much as I thought I had. I chose wrong. People don't want to commit to us. They think we are greedy. I have lost touch with the customer...... on and on and on. As if I had any control over people, their finances, or their choices so why do I tie my disappointment to something I have no control over.

I think a lot of it is because I don't feel like I am being successful in any particular area. So much is falling behind or I'm falling short on, but no extra time to do more or better, but somehow my best doesn't feel successful unless it leads to the results I am seeking. 

So how do I fix this need for external success or validation. Not sure. Maybe I need work success because I feel unsuccessful at home? More likely I'm looking to rise to the expectations others had of me that I somehow feel I have let down by living a smaller life than I even imagined for myself.

Don't get me wrong. It's a great life. I truly enjoy my small life, but there are parts of me that miss the grandness I imagined for myself making big differences in big ways. This is something I have to reconcile. The high school overlooked me, with the college celebrated me, with the mom making good people me. Who am I and how can I let go of who I once was?