Last week, a friend of mine who often preaches on the ‘Serenity Prayer’ dropped another piece of wisdom that shapes his serenity:
Your serenity is inversely proportional to your expectations
Let’s unpack that …
transcription
Let’s talk about ‘Serenity’ – that inner sense of peace.
A friend of mine used to preach the serenity prayer which I’ve covered in the past. In fact, I used to carry a serenity prayer coin from him in my pocket. Last week, he dropped another piece of wisdom that shapes his serenity (this one is so strong):
Your serenity is inversely proportional to your expectations
Let’s unpack that:
- If you have really high expectations of yourself, you can fall into the trap of comparing yourself to others. Someone’s always better at something. You’re likely gonna be disappointed – you’re not gonna have serenity.
- If you have really high expectations of others, “They should do this – They should do that – They should be better” … you’re gonna be disappointed = low serenity.
Turn that around
- If my only goal for myself is to be better today than yesterday … and be optimistic that I can try to be better tomorrow than today … if that is my only expectation of myself, I will gain serenity.
- When I look at other people and my reaction to whatever they’re doing is “They’re going to do them. I can’t fix them and it’s not my place.” … I have low or no expectations of them, means I get higher serenity for me.
It doesn’t matter whether we’re talking about professional or personal:
Your serenity is inversely proportional to your expectations
De Colores to my serene brother John for sharing that one … please consider clicking like, commenting, or re-sharing … and I will see you next Monday
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