Expectations...

When facing mortality in this life it is difficult to be of a cheerful spirit, and that is especially true when that very mortality hits close to home.  I am currently coming off a difficult week.  Difficult in that the emotions surrounding death still have a heavy effect on this soul.  As I write this I think of Dr. Richard Ganzer, a man that was an influential part of my life for much of my teenage years.  Recently diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer, he lies waiting for the inevitable of all life.  And this on the heels of the passing of a young man and close friend.

My wife and I drove to North Carolina to attend the memorial of Andrew Schultz.  A young man who lived life with expectations.  And certainly expectations of a long and happy life.

During the memorial Andrew’s father, Terry, spoke to the crowd about Andrew.  He told a story of the first time that Andrew and his brother, Benjamin, got the opportunity to snorkel in Hawaii.  Upon hitting the beach the boys donned their snorkel gear and disappeared into the water for an hour and a half.  When finally coming out of the water, his dad recalled the comment that Andrew made… “It was everything that I had hoped it would be.”   Andrew had expectations…and they were realized.

As we left the memorial and headed down the mountain in the shuttle provided by their local church it hit me.  We get what we expect.  We receive in accordance with how we think.  People that speak of how wonderful life is have an expectation that life will be wonderful.  People that speak of how hard and difficult life is expect as much.

Here is the funny thing.  Everyone of you that is experiencing a difficult time in life will likely turn up your nose and say bull-shit!  And everyone that is living the good life will likely say “Right On!” 

This is something so simple and so true to my own personal experiences that I find it difficult to believe that it is only germane to my life. 

I am not talking mysticism, heresy, or anti-biblical teachings.  Contrary.  From Buddhism to Christianity, to new age thought, it is reiterated over and over again.  All spiritual and religious teachings have the same edict expressed in one way or another:  As a Man thinks, he is.

What you believe about yourself, your life, your surroundings, your world is the truth for your life.

So for the skeptics, just think for a moment.  Do the ‘what if’ dance with me.  What if you decided to perceive life with a new perspective?  What if you decided that the troubles that you have had in your life were over.  What if the negativity was gone, and that personal achievement and success were part of your present and future self.  Would things change overnight?  I can’t say that it will or that it will not, because for some of you it may be a quick as flipping the light switch for illumination.  For some it may require rewiring the switch. I believe it is only a matter of how far ensconced you are into a life that has, so far, been exactly what you have expected.

I, personally, have never thought of life as being difficult.  I have experienced some wild things in my life that came to me without effort or without much forethought.  And it is what I have expected to happen for me.   But I think part of the “trick,” if you could use that word, is that I have never expected anything different.  It is just how I believed.  So I have never had to change my perspective.  But now, in this time, I have to decide that while it has been great and easy, in order to have more, I have to expect it.  I have to incorporate the next level into my everyday thinking…yet without thinking about it.  Just expecting.

I, for one, am game!  I am going to broaden my expectations.  So that I can be the proof of my beliefs.  So that all can see the profit in believing in a greater, more successful life.

It begins today!  And to quote Stuart Smiley, “I’m Good Enough, Smart enough, and Doggone it people like me!”

You, also, are good enough, smart enough, and are loved by many!