WHAT DO YOU EXPECT?

What we expect is what we truly experience.

I once was chatting with my friend who mentioned to me that the people in our local area and my gym are quite unfriendly and suspicious. Now, that was not my experience and I tried to share with her, that that experience might not be quite what she thinks. She looked at me, puzzled and said, ‘but I know what I experienced.’

‘OK’ I said. I invited her to my spin class at the gym and we walked in together. From the fitness centre car park, everyone started saying hello as soon as I said hello myself. I looked at her and mouthed…’you see, they are friendly.’ As we got into the spin class itself, I walked in and said, ’hello ladies, meet my friend’ they all said hello and then tried to learn how to pronounce her name and then the class started. My trainer who is again an extremely friendly lady also walked up to her during the class, told her to take her time to ensure she does not hurt herself and asked her after the class what her experience was.

When we finished, I once more asked her where she got the impression that people were unfriendly from; only for me to discover that she was projecting her experience in the previous community she was in and was reacting to the people here based on what she thought their response would be.

This made me think about what most of us experience in life and that is – what we expect is what we attract!

The bible says:

‘Surely there is an end, and thine expectation shall not be cut off.’ Proverbs 23:18

Now as true as this is when it comes to positive expectations, it is the same with negative expectations. If we expect harsh and negative reactions from people, we will unknowingly come across in such a way that we will receive that reaction from them.

We behave what we expect and then receive the response from others based on that. Readjust your expectations of people, have a positive expectation and you will react in positive ways that will in turn lead to positive reactions.

Don’t forget, it all starts with you. Your expectation is what you believe, behave, and become. So be mindful of your expectations.