The Truth About Relationship Expectations

why relationship expectation prevents you from getting your needs met

I admit that in the past, I had a lot of expectations about my relationship and rules based on them. But with time I came to the same conclusion as Liz Gilbert did (author of Eat, pray, love)
Marriage becomes hard work once you have poured the entirety of your life’s expectations for happiness into the hands of one mere person. Keeping that going is hard work.

The problem with expectations is that behind every expectation, every need is our yearning for love or for safety.

But no matter how hard your partner is trying to fulfill them, you will feel safe or loved for a few seconds, sometimes even for a day, but this feeling will never last.

Then, he will need to fulfill your needs all over again. That is why almost everybody is telling you that a relationship takes work and effort.

The relationship doesn’t take work. Fulfilling the needs of each other does.

If you want to experience more love in your relationship, expectations are the totally wrong path to follow.

The love between two people is like a flower, that my partner never wanted to pick up for me, while we were walking in nature.
If I pick it up, it will die, he said. I want it to live so that we could enjoy its beauty and aliveness and smell.
If I would pick it up, it will die and ceased to be what we love.
Having expectations about your relationship and trying to get what you need from your partner is the same as picking the flower and bringing it inside.
With a lot of hard work, it will last longer, but it will never be fully alive again.

So, if you truly love your partner, you let him be. When you stop expecting him to show you love on your ways and on your timing, you could be surprised by how many ways he already expresses his love to you. You just didn’t notice it. As I did not notice when I was fixated on getting proof of love by picking up a flower for me.

Your expectation is that they are preventing you from fully seeing all the ways that your needs are already being met. Because they are not on your list of approved ways of showing love, you don’t notice them and miss the moments when you could fully experience them.

On what way your expectation limit what you can get?
If you could imagine getting more than that, what would it be?

Could you imagine even more?
How far could your imagination stretch? How many possibilities of your need being met did you exclude with having this limited expectation?

I discovered that I had an unwritten list of my admirable qualities, things I did, things that I am good at, things that I achieve… After giving up that list I discovered that there is so much more about me to admire, there are so many ways to be admired that I never known or notice.

How to get what you need without expecting anything from him?
Love happens in your heart, it’s a feeling. You could feel that instantly without him doing all the stuff that is on your expectation list.

When you get your heart in sync with your mind, the heart will lead the way instead the mind with his expectations.

When you are in your heart, you are connected with others, you are aware of your partner needs as well as yours. Your mind could fool you into believing that it acts in your best interest when it’s protecting you, but it’s the heart who see the bigger picture, that finds the solution where both of your needs, your partner and yours are met.

What are your relationship expectations?