I feel you. On the one hand, people in your life probably remark on how creative you are. On the other hand, you wonder – and behind your back, maybe, others wonder – why you haven’t accomplished, published, produced more?
You have tons of potential – which is a dual-edge sword. Potential is great and all, but it can be very hard to harvest. And potential creates expectation. You have expectations for yourself, and others have expectations for you, too.
Breaking expectations is an underlying factor in most of our moods, fears, and disappointments.
Think about an expectation in your life. For example, your sister is always late. When she keeps you waiting an hour, how do you react? Anger, resentment? Maybe, you’re done with this behavior and you leave after 15 minutes. Now switch up the expectation. She is NEVER late, but she’s an hour late. What is your reaction within the broken expectation? Now, you’re likely worried. You can’t leave before she gets there, because “what if?” Nothing is factually different about the sister being late, just your expectation and therefore your reaction to the fact. Expectation sets us up to respond – often without consciousness of our reactions.
Expectations control many of our moods – anger, surprise, delight, fear and more. “Hope” and “potential” are both subsets of expectation. They create an acceptable and unacceptable outcome in your mind, and therefore can hold you stymied for a dreadfully long time. You fear you cannot create the acceptable outcome. But you hope you can. And ‘hope for good’ feels so much better than certainty of mediocrity. And so you stay in stasis.
You don’t want to push that hope into reality and risk despair. Because, again, hope creates an expectation. You hold onto what I sometimes call the “hope balloon.” It’s pretty, and yours, and you don’t want to let it pop. As a hope balloon, it is perfect. Unmarred by reality. Hope feels good.
But balloons don’t last very long, do they? They begin to wither, and sink. Their surfaces pucker. And so it is with your hope, if you can’t access it, and let it fuel your creativity toward the outcome you hope for.
So, my dear frustrated writer (with tons of potential), what is keeping you in stasis? Is it hope? Fear? Expectation of others or of yourself? There is only one way forward. Pop the hope balloon, and begin to try.
As you try, consciously change your hopes and expectations. Make sure you concern yourself with things that are within your control. (Leave out, for now, things like, I expect to be a bestseller, be famous, get the attention of my personal hero.) You can set realistic expectations like:
- I’ll work every day
- I’ll work every other day
- I’ll work 2 x this week
- I’ll begin work next week
These are all reasonable and realistic expectations, that are within your control. Before you accept an expectation, make sure you can keep it. Don’t accept a “gird your loins” expectation, like “I’ll work every day,” if it is not true or reasonable. Be kind to yourself, and set an expectation you can keep. Work toward your expectation and shift it as necessary. Just as broken expectations create anxiety and guilt, keeping expectations of ourselves help us feel good. Meeting reasonable, if lowered, expectations can have a cumulatively positive impact.
You cannot control how well you’ll write, how it will be received, or in many cases, how long this process is going to take. You can only control you and your output. And as you do so, your spirits will lift, your engagement will deepen and you will do your best writing.
Do your best. We’ve all heard this all our lives. But, you cannot do your “best” when you’re bogged down in expectations that are beyond your control. Doesn’t that seem true to you? Let your wild expectations and shiny hopes go, and let yourself do and be at your best. Leave your expectations at the door, when you begin to write. And you’ll definitely do your best work.
Let’s tap that potential without expectation. You never know what you can do when you let yourself try without judgment.
In the meantime, come join us in the FB Group – Write Without the Fight, where we talk about the mental obstacles that can keep us from writing. I mean, what did you expect? Getting to the bottom of that question can free up your potential, and ease your frustration.