You may be wondering what this blog is about when you initially come across the title. My hope is that you find yourself super inspired and are able to relate it to your experience in life. The inspiration to this topic is born out of my own frustration of expectations that don’t play out the way you…. Ahh…. well…expected. The subject of expectations could take us on a worldwide tour in some cases, especially once you have lived long enough to experience let downs.
What am I talking about here?
Alright so here goes my best effort to explain. One of my biggest frustrations in life has been expectations gone wrong! As humans we do have expectations of certain people in our lives. Countless times I have found myself feeling disappointed when it seemed that someone I looked up to did not share the same idea. It may initially be going somewhere within the interaction yet the tendency is that it generally falls short and one realises that the other party was not on the same page or they may have had a different agenda. These expectations may be as simple as someone walking past and saying “hello”. It may extend a little further with a generous minute of conversation with them. If by chance that precious minute extends to a genuine conversation whereby you sense that the other party is truly interested in knowing you, then that turns into a bonus!
Life is busy! No doubt I may have unintentionally walked past someone and failed to acknowledge them. It does take effort to step out of your comfort zone and talk with someone you may never have had a conversation with. Let’s face it we do all like our comfort zones, right? However,
We all crave connection.
So where does ‘turning the tables’ come into this conversation? Having heard this reference spoken of in conversation, I decided to look it up for a clearer understanding of what it means: Turning the tables as cited in: http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/turn+the+tables
“To change a situation so that someone’s position is the opposite of what it was”
In my case I made a decision to do the opposite of what I had been doing. To challenge myself to another level of thinking and perspective! Rather than having expectations on others I decided a while ago to turn the tables! My heart told me that if I felt the same disappointment in a social situation or with a particular person then there had to be others who felt the same. This moved me into a zone of “others” rather than “self”. As the saying goes, you “put yourself in another person’s shoes” so to speak. It gives you an inside story to how you can meet the needs of others. With intention I decided that it was time to do my best to offer others that which I had been seeking for myself. This change in perspective has opened up a whole new world for me.
It has been such a revelation to realise that in fact others experience the same let downs that I have.
It is so much more rewarding when you decide to be to others what you would have always wanted for yourself! When we are hang up on waiting for what we are expecting to receive from others we can become sorely disappointed. In the disappointment we tend to do the same to those people in our circle. We can be so focused on people that are unreachable that we end up doing the same to people who may want to connect with us. It is quite the cycle.
The truth is humans do disappointment! We all fall short on many occasions, whether it is intentional or not.
My guess is most of us crave the same things, we all desire true connections with genuinely interested persons. In some instances we do lose our focus and perhaps fall into the trap of idolising another person at the expense of not seeing who may be there waiting in our circle.
As I made the choice to ‘turn the tables’ of this disappointing cycle of let downs it has opened my eyes and heart to those around me. To those that do want to have a conversation. It has helped me to connect with others better. It has allowed me to fill in the gaps of another person’s life and in turn it has filled in mine.
It’s all about perspective! When we ‘turn the tables’ off our own interest onto others it gives back to you everything that you thought you were missing out on. In other words it becomes a WIN WIN situation for everyone involved.
Let’s turn those tables and start winning, excuse the pun but Winners are Grinners!!!!
🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂
The Change that changes you 