Show Notes

Episode 80: Expectations of Others


It’s hard enough when we expect perfection from ourselves, but when we expect others to be perfect, we’re introducing stress into our (and their) lives. This week, Shannon and Janine talk about making life easier by modifying your expectations of perfection in others. (Spoiler alert: It involves assuming good intentions and cutting people some slack.)

Discussion topics include:

  • Janine’s unrealistic expectations for how much crafting she’d get done on her crafting weekend
  • How having high expectations for a technology updates is bound to disappoint you
  • How managing clients’ expectations is so important for professional organizers, life coaches and other service providers
  • How shifting your expectations of others can remove stress
  • Adding kindness in your expectations of service people
  • Shannon’s practice: Assume good intentions of others
  • Living more peacefully by letting go of expectations of perfection
  • Easing up on our expectations of our pets’ behavior
  • Holding people to a high standard without stressing yourself out if they’re not perfect
  • Thinking about the stress-inducing thought patterns that you’re putting on other people
  • The power of our new refrain: Being aware of certain thoughts and behaviors

 

1 thought on “Episode 80: Expectations of Others”

  1. I try not to let others’ expectations of me drive my thoughts or behavior. And I definitely agree with the practice of assuming good intentions. We were just talking about this very thing last night. We were on the highway coming home from a play and someone just whizzed past doing about 20-30 miles over the speed limit. I said, “Someone thinks they are very important.” My friend agreed. Then I started to reminisce: “The only time I have really sped is the day my mom had her heart attack. I was doing about 100 on the freeway to get to her, darting in and out of traffic. I was very lucky that I didn’t cause an accident because I couldn’t have forgiven myself for that.” My friend said, “You never really know what is going on in someone’s life to make them drive like that. It could be a situation like yours.” And we talked about how we need to assume good intentions on the part of others (although we didn’t use quite those words).

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