Expectations lead us astray . . . and away from God.
Expectations are seductive. They can feel exciting. Consuming. Addictive. And like every other addiction known to humankind, the outcome can be disappointing, oftentimes to the point of personal destruction. Our expectations ensnare us because of our insecurities, I think. We want a certain person or situation or experience to satisfy us in a specific way, and that’s destined to be a set-up for disappointment which is then commonly followed by resentment. i speak from a place of authority because of multiple past experiences with both expectations and resentments. They do go hand in hand.
One of the bigger issues when talking about expectations though is that they keep us side-tracked from God. If we are fretting over the outcome we think we must have, we have launched our expectations unreasonably high, thus denying the role God has in our experiences and every outcome for every one of the experiences. It’s a simple equation, actually. What we should experience, we will. It’s our job to show up, embrace the experience, allow God to show us what the lesson is, and then incorporate it into the tapestry we are weaving under his direction.
Expectations, in and of themselves, can forecast our direction and that’s not necessarily bad. It puts me in mind of the “vision boards” many of us created in our youth or even in early recovery, perhaps. That’s when I made mine. If we don’t have an idea of what we want, or where we want to go, we may not recognize it when it comes. But God may have another idea. And that’s where the inner turmoil arises. Our “vision” may not be consistent with the lesson God wants us to experience. We can fight His lesson, but ultimately it’s the one that will transform our lives and put us on the path to wholeness, the place where we need to be, the place we were born to inhabit.
It’s really rather exciting to think of our lives unfolding in this way. Don’t you think? There is a “drama” in play. We may be in act two or three, by now, depending on our age. Assuredly, many of the scenes in any one of the acts might have been difficult to experience. What we can know for sure, however, is that God was the “director” and the play is unfolding as it must. It will continue to unfold as it must. And that’s the reassuring message we have been prepared for. Letting God direct while we play the “lead,on occasion and a minor role in the drama of others too.
Being in God’s “drama” rather than our own makes so much more sense. It’s so much more peaceful too. And we didn’t even have to try out for “the lead.” It was ours to play all along.
