The Fear of Disappointing

So it was interesting that, on his final day on the campaign trail, that was also what President Obama was telling his closest advisors — his concern that expectations were so high and the challenges so great that he was bound to disappoint. And the morning after his victory, Garrison Keillor, in his advice to Obama, wrote that he would inevitably disappoint his supporters, and not to let it get him down. The pathological Bush was a self-declared master at lowering expectations, though somehow he still managed to disappoint us all, again and again.

I wonder to what extent this fear of disappointing drives me, and others. My desire to live simply, without responsibilities or possessions, to practice instead of intending and aspiring, my interest in polyamorism — are these all ways to hedge my bets if I fail to live up to others’ expectations, and my own?

The new way of damning a subordinate in the workplace, instead of calling them a fuck-up, is to tell them (and others) they disappointed you. On the surface it seems politer, but it’s really a nasty and cowardly way of trying to make them feel guilty and keeping them in wage slavery. I’ve never told anyone I was disappointed with them, though I’ve been tempted.

Same thing in many people’s “second job” as a family member, or as a team member in a recreational activity. Tell a mate they “let you down”, or give ’em that sigh and disappointed look, and it gets them to do what you want far more effectively than yelling, arguing, or even crying.

What is it about us that we are always rising to others’ expectations? Is some of our anxiety because we think they expect more of us than they really do? Is it really our own unreasonable expectations we’re trying to live up to?

Or is it just society’s way of getting us to conform, to obey, to do what others want, to make us everybody-else?

I’ve noticed, in many people who communicate in writing (IM, e-mail, Second Life text, and even real letters) a great anxiety about meeting in person (if they haven’t previously), and an even greater anxiety about speaking on the telephone (or VoIP). As writers, do we set a standard of communication we can’t hope to live up to in real-time? Is that space, that silence on the line, just too unbearable to contemplate, an admission of not really knowing what to say?

As I’ve aged I’ve become a bit ornery about others’ expectations of me, and of others (“the government”, business “leaders”, “society”). We should know better than to expect much of people and institutions. Most of us really are doing the best we can, even we slackers. Most people don’t have the skills, the capacities, the resources or the time to do better than they do now, every day. Most people are ignorant, and distracted by personal challenges and sorrows, and unimaginative, and incompetent, and under these circumstances it’s remarkable that they do for us, and for themselves, as much as they do.

My hope for others, now, is that they will simply be more authentically themselves. That’s hard, and a lifetime challenge, but it’s possible for everyone and, I think, a worthy pursuit. I do not expect it of them; I just do my best to help them get started on that journey, and wish them well. I do expect this of myself, but I have the good fortune to have learned, at last, who I am, so becoming nobody-but-myself is now just a matter of practice. If people expect me to be something more, or different, they will be disappointed. That is their business, not mine.

This is, of course, easy to say. The look, and the expression, of disappointment, of having let someone down, yet again, is still hard for me to take. But I’m learning to recognize it for what it is, and I try, now, to tell people I cannot and will not live up to others’ expectations of me, and I refuse to feel badly when others are disappointed in me or feel I have let them down. I usually pave the way for this by being brutally honest with people, from the moment I meet them, and declaring what I will and will not do, for them or for their cause, whatever it may be.

Learning to say no may be the most important, and liberating, lesson of our lives.

It is in our nature to seek attention and appreciation, and the quid quo pro for that is usually offering something to others in return, and raising their expectations in the process. So many people are looking for someone to lead them out of their particular situation of anguish, hopelessness, despair, loneliness, or constant struggle. The best we can do for them, and ourselves, is to help them to help themselves, and to realize that they have to help themselves. That is the ultimate generosity, and it can be given with no strings attached.

So if you feel, dear readers, friends, colleagues, loved ones, that I have disappointed you, let you down, failed to live up to your expectations, then I apologize — not for that failure, but for having given you somehow the impression that I had accepted or could ever offer to do more than share my thoughts, ideas, knowledge, love, and, most precious, time with you.

I am, after all, just the space through which stuff passes, a part of the unfathomably complex dance of all-life-on-Earth, learning to improvise which of that passing-through stuff to touch, and which to just let go. “Ah, I know how I can make this better, or clearer, or more interesting, or more useful, or more innovative, or more fun — there!” Just being the space, and touchingthe right stuff in just the right way as it passes through.

I hope some of that stuff is yours.