Member-only story
Psychology
What To Do When Your Expectations Don’t Match Reality
I have Little House on the Prairie fantasies. I want to tend chickens, pickle peaches, or make yogurt. (I don’t).
One day I decided to grow bean sprouts. I bought beans, soaked them overnight, kept them in a dark place, rinsed them twice a day, and voila! They sprouted. I looked up stir fry recipes.
After a while, I noticed that my sprouts were too skinny and too short. I kept watering them and waiting for them to grow bigger.
Instead, they turned brown and died.
WTF?! They sprouted well, and I didn’t miss a step in caring for them. What happened?
At last, I figured it out: I had been expecting giant SOYBEAN sprouts, not delicate MUNG bean sprouts.
My beautiful mung bean sprouts died because they weren’t what I wanted them to be.
Had I been curious sooner about why things weren’t going as I expected, I would have had dinner instead of compost.
Don’t be me. Be curious. If you notice the gap between expectation and reality and have an open mind, you will figure out the cause before it wilts into failure.
Are your expectations or assumptions to blame?
