The Gifts in Expectation
I was pondering the idea of expectations today…
And, as I’m writing this I’m hearing the words “be here now,” and delicately allowing this idea of full presence to dance with the idea that there are sometimes beautiful gifts in expecting. I know full well that expectations take you out of the now, but this piece and wandering of the heart is about where these expectations take you - because sometimes these places are delicious.
For nearly ten years as a wedding planner in a small town in Indiana (that sounds like the first line of a really beautiful book that couldn’t possibly be true, but it is and it is part of the incredible life I have lived), I spent countless hours carefully curating and crafting the expectations of my brides for their special day. The margin of error for missing the mark on a bride’s expectations is tiny in this line of work - everything rides on implementing a plan she has in her mind right down to the color of the peonies and the placement of the favors…I like to think I got it right nearly every time.
It was important to me.
Expectations are important to me. And I remember reminding each bride how delicious expecting was, I invited each one to not rush the time, to revel in the anticipation of the coming day…because time moves quickly when you are planning such affairs, and you only (well, sometimes) have one chance.
In their expectations were dreams, full permission to have it exactly as they wanted. In their expectations were perfect details, sunshine, happy faces, a lover waiting at the end of the aisle to say yes to them, forever. So many “gifts” in expectation if we just freeze this part of the story and focus on this…and this expectation, and anticipation is what I invited each one of them to focus on. To revel in the delicious moment in time where they could “expect” anything they wanted…
I’ve learned in my life that expecting is where I often feel goosebumps, and deep yearning…it is where missing lives and where dreams of being reunited with a lover take place. It is where I let my heart take me when I’m shopping for a trip to Italy or planning for a rendezvous with a friend.
Expecting lives on a lover’s lips when he is in a Paris cab on his way to you, expecting you to answer the door in your birthday suit - this exquisite moment, frozen in its absolute perfection can be a beautiful gift if we let it be.
Expectations help me in business too, this is what allows me to anticipate the user experience as my students open the Temple page of my website for the very first time and feel my heart there waiting for them…created piece by piece, word by word based on my expectations.
Expectations help carry us along in peaceful ways when we know what is coming ahead, the gift of this as we know especially right now is a welcome one.
I live in this place of expectation, I let it (very deliberately) take me from the now sometimes into a place where these gifts can be found…I dream, and dance, and wander, and plan…all of it.
It isn’t the act of expecting, or even the act of being disappointed when expectations aren’t perfectly met that causes us any harm. It is the mastery of managing these expectations that tends to temper our experience here; and perhaps that’s where the “be here now” comes in.
Can you allow yourself to fully receive the gifts in expecting, as if they in themselves are enough? And then, can you carefully slip into the now when it comes time to realize the expected thing, packaging the gifts collected before this moment, and find the place that you’ve been led to is absolutely perfect too?
How absolutely delicious that would be…