Expectations: Ego or Evidence Based?

Expectations without the work ethic.

Are said from a place of insecurity, they set you up for failure. 

Expectations said from a place of knowing yourself, can be a statement of fact.

But there is a big chasm that separates the two.

The first is bravado, ego talking. Prideful boasting, a big fish in a little pond. Expecting a result that might happen, but in all probability will not.

The other is based on evidence. Sweat and blood that has been shed in deference to the growth mindset. 

We are all an amalgamation of our past. Our stories to this very day are written. Our future is still full of possibilities. 

With those stories comes wins and loses, victories and defeats. Growth and atrophy. 

You learn more from failures than you ever will from winning. You can choose to take an honest appraisal, or you can make excuses and not learn a thing.

The stories we tell ourselves vary from individual to individual. Some are harsher on themselves then they should be, and some not harsh enough. 

There needs to be a happy medium of self love and self loathing, the good kind of self loathing, not destructive, but constructive. Like, “Hey dip shit, it’s not the suspension's fault you blew that corner, maybe it was because you missed the last 5 out of 6 turn track moto sessions that you were supposed to do”. 

If you really care about something, there must be an honest accounting of what you invested. How you invested. If you really care about something, then showing up is not enough. You need to put intentional effort in every time you set foot in the arena.

The “Hero’s Journey” has been documented, written about, and studied for thousands of years. Every movie we watch or book we read has some aspect of it intertwined in the story. Think Lord of The Rings or Sword in the Stone. Every successful Disney movie (from back in the day at least) was a “Hero’s Journey” tale.

When you start something new, you suck, you realise how bad you are. Then you have two choices, make excuses, or become the hero of your own story.

You begin the path to becoming what you need to become. You discover a calling, you pick up tools and learn new skills along the way. You face and overcome your biggest fears, and prevail against the odds to gain the freedom that you were seeking. 

When you complete the challenge, the biggest change is that whether you win or not almost becomes irrelevant, because you are not the same anymore. You are better, tougher, and know what you are made of.

Expectations now are not made from a place of insecurity or ego, they are driven by a trial of past behavior. They are more realistic, they are reasonable. They are attainable. 

If you want your future self to tell a story that you are proud of, then start living that story everyday.

If your story you tell yourself is false and always letting your own standards go by without an audit. Then when the curtain is called and you are asked to put it out on the line, the field of battle will be littered with regret and excuses. A shadow of what could have been will always haunt the grounds.

On the other hand, if you pioneered a grand tale, and the story was written with hard work and intentional effort, but still comes short of a fairy tale ending…That is not a defeat but a victory. You will leave a different person than when you started.

The goal is not about what you “tell” yourself leading up to or during an event. But what you did to prepare. Either you did the work or not.

No work, don’t cry over a poor performance.

You either make excuses or you grow. 

There are no failures in growth.

You either write your own story, control the narrative, or you are at the whims of weighted dice that are not tilted in your favor.  

Josh