Death to expectations

As humans that exist through this journey called life, we are met with numerous expectations that society expects us to fulfil. I see life as a path that we take but no matter how much we plan ahead we do not know everything that will lie ahead. We just have to face whatever obstacles we meet and try to figure out how to overcome them. We may not always make the right decisions, we may not have a clue how to proceed, we may fail at times but all of this is a learning journey. 

Society puts pressure on us from a young age to have everything figured out, to have a solid plan for our lives, and to know where we are going at each point of our lives. It's like taking a map out and figuring out which path to take from point A to B. No matter how much you plan this path, the map won't show you when it will rain heavily, or if there are wild dangerous animals you will encounter which can affect your journey. This shows that regardless of how much you plan, something can always happen which can completely change your plans. We don't plan for sickness, we don't plan for betrayal, we don't plan for loss, we don't plan for bereavement, we don't always plan for failure. These things can happen at any time.

We all go through hardships but we live in a society where it has been normalised to hide these and only show our successes, which promotes a false narrative to others that you can be successful without going through any difficulties. When people do fail they struggle with how to deal with this and feel that they are a failure in life, not knowing that failure is part of the learning journey and that life is a series of failures. Every successful person I have ever researched has stated in their life story that they have failed so many times, but the difference is that they never gave up despite these failures. They will simply try again and again and again. 

Sometimes we want to be able to control every aspect of our lives. Yes, there is a lot we can control, we can choose our friends, who we listen to, which path we want to take, and the places we visit. We can even mitigate risk in our lives, that's why insurance exists, in the event something bad happens insurance will pay out. But we have to let go of the idea that we can control every single thing because we can't as there are circumstances that will come up that we can not control.

This links with society's expectations. You may be expected to earn a certain salary by a particular age, but this may not take into account the socio-economic background you come from. You may be expected to be married by a certain age but this doesn't factor in the environment in which you live in which can greatly impact this. You may be expected to have children by a certain age, but this doesn't factor the health of your reproductive organs which can affect this.  You may be expected to "look" a certain way, but this may not take into account your genetics. Many of us are currently in life situations that we may not have expected to be in, we thought we would be further in life than we are, but circumstances beyond our control have affected this.

I wish society normalised failures so that people will know that it is a part of life so that they can feel encouraged to find ways to navigate this without feeling like a failure themselves. I wish society didn't put unrealistic expectations on people who end up thinking that due to them not being able to meet these expectations placed on them they are failures. I wish society didn't put pressure on people to have everything figured out because we can't. I wish society gave people more grace when they fail. We are humans, we do not know everything, and we never will. We will grow, we will make mistakes and we learn. Sometimes we may not know what decision to make and may feel lost in our journey. This is totally normal. So whatever point in your journey you are at currently at, know that your jouney is unique to you and step out in faith to carry on into the unknown.