Expectations

I haven’t put up many posts recently and it’s something I’m aware of and haven’t gotten around to doing. I think about it, but don’t get around to it as often as I think I should and instead tend more often to post on my Facebook group instead, which I know isn’t useful to those not interested in Facebook.

Along with seeing clients, I’ve been busy fulfilling my role as GANZ Chair of Membership and Professional Development – and it has kept me very busy! What this involves in part are 6 archive boxes of membership information along with an online database to manage and a website crying out for some love and attention (GANZ’s).

expectations

Along with that, are emails and meetings with the rest of the GANZ council, corresponding with GANZ members, and discussing and negotiating with PACFA staff. While it takes up much of my time, I do enjoy it as it adds variety to my life and I feel that I’m making a worthy contribution to the Gestalt community. There are many changes ahead, which is both challenging and exciting – and also requires balance.

This brings me to the topic of expectations. We all have expectations – of ourselves and of others – and we judge by them. Often we meet them and if we’re lucky, we exceed them, but there are a few times where we disappoint others, as well as ourselves, when those expectations are not met. When that happens we are often left feeling frustrated, disappointed and let down.

Expectations help us strive, help us reach out and connect with experiences and with other people. Sometimes we forget that not everything is going to result in the way we might first hope, but an important part is about paying attention to the experience – those moments of connection, of having been able to take each small step, make each small connection, and make each achievement. Those are sometimes the most sweetest gifts we sometimes forget to remember and value.

As we come up to Christmas, Hanukkah, and the end of another year, at a time where it’s so easy to focus and dwell on what isn’t right with the world, on what we’re unhappy with, on what 2016 may have taken from us or left in our ‘to do’ basket, it’s worth taking time to reflect with gentleness and kindness on the goodness that has been and is still present, and on what has been achieved.

So as we head towards the end of 2016, I wish you much love, joy, kindness and happiness, along with this quote:

“With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.” – from Desiderata, by Max Ehrmann

I’ll see you in the new year!