Disappointment

If there's one thing to make you reflect on how you treat others, it has got to be when someone treats you poorly. Well, if you're self-aware and open-minded, that is.

We can blame the person that fought with us, spoke bad behind our back, betrayed our trust, wasn't there for us, or disappointed us in any other way. But does it really make us feel any better? Is it that somehow shifting the blame onto another frees us of being "the bad person"? Is it like having some epiphany to realize and dwell on someone else's flaws that comforts us in times of wrong-doing? Like since they're the wrong doers, and not ourselves, that a subliminal form of confidence in ourselves is formed from hurt? 

Yes and No. Yes that this is probably an unconscious coping mechanism. But no to truly making us feel better or helping us learn and grow from those types of situations. Blame isn't healing. There's a reason it hurts when someone does us wrong, especially when we dwell on it. We can't change others, and we can't control their thoughts or actions. But we can control our actions. No one is responsible for our happiness except ourselves. We choose our happiness. Initial emotions may be reactive and unconscious, but continued emotions are a choice that we make. I'm not getting into the neurological deficits in mental disorders, though. I'm just talking about disappointment in individual interactions. 

This is really just "outloud" self talk for myself. I often have to remind myself that I am in control of my own feelings when I think someone else hurts them. I have to stop and ask myself why. Not why they hurt me, but why I felt hurt. Was it because I expected something from someone (regardless of their offer or word)? Whether it's someone telling me they will do something (and don't) or me thinking a person is honest when all that they tell me are lies. Regardless, it all goes back to expectations. I think someone is honest, therefore I expect them to be. Someone tells me they are going to do something, therefore I expect them to.

Expectations are so incredibly poisonous. It takes some superior discipline to null expectations. It's a daily practice, and never seems to be 100% effective. 

This has been happening around me a lot over the past year. Friends, family, colleagues, even complete strangers seem to be instilling massive amounts of disappointment, anger, hurt, and disdain in me lately. However, it isn't them. It's me and my expectations that I place on them. I really just needed a reminder to myself to look within, expel grudges, and just be plain happy without expectations attached to that. 

Peace, love, and happiness, my friends. 

✌💖☺️