Expectations = PreMeditated Resentments

 

• Ever order a steak in a restaurant as medium-rare and it gets served to you as well done?
• Ever ask your teen in the morning to do the dishes and come home from work and they’re not done?
• Ever go to drive somewhere and it takes you twice as long because of construction?
• Ever do tons of exercise and get on the scale 2 weeks later to find the numbers haven’t budged?
• Ever go to your doctor for a routine wax cleanout and leave with a surgery date in hand?

Ever feel mad about these things happening?

Check, check, and 4 more checks.  For me at least.  2 of the incidents just in the last week.  The mad part, for all of them.

Why did I get mad about all of these somewhat trivial snapshots in the bigger picture of life?  Because I was already good’n’ready to get good’n’angry.  I set myself up for success in being supremely ticked off and I accomplished it.  I put expectations on people, places, and things including myself rather than letting life live itself out on life’s terms.  I assumed all of the above would turn out the way I believed they would and they didn’t.  And we all know what assumptions make … big stinky farting butts out of ourselves and others.

Expectations are premeditated resentments.

That’s the twist I prefer on a similar quote attributed to author Anne Lamont who wrote “expectations are resentments under construction.”  The premeditated part hits home harder for me.  It’s the reminder that I and I alone put conscious and calculated thought and energy into being angry.  Before I even have any real reason to be pissed off.  And only I can change those thoughts and redirect my energy elsewhere.  It has nothing to do with the steak or who cooked it, my kid, traffic, my scale, or my doctor.  I am the only common denominator.

This reminds me of another common saying:  insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results.  Well, I’m gonna get a little twisted on you again.  If that’s the case, then why not turn it around and say …

Sanity is doing different things over and over again
with no expectation of results.

That sounds like premeditated happiness to me.  What a terrific anger management/prevention tool.  Might come in handy next time I order eggs over easy and they get served to me as fried instead.

 

 

Image source:  mine, taken of me some years ago by one of my kids on my phone.  You can see I’m mad and I was because I expected them to not take a picture of me.  I was disappointed in them for doing something I didn’t want them to do.  I sure ain’t pretty when I’m angry now am I?

 

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Listen to music.  It could save your soul.  Be kind.  It could save someone’s world.  Wear a hat.  It could save your life.