On Sunday night I woke up at 1:45am and never went back to sleep. I HATE nights like that. I could not turn off my brain. AND I was hungry. So, I got up, ate and tried to read something to let my mind rest, but no luck. So after 3 hours of laying there, I got up and went to the pool. What else would I do? I surely wasn’t sleeping. And, my favorite thing to do at 5am is swim….so..swim, I did!
Most of the things I have on my mind are trivial – nothing important but when you are laying there – wide awake in the middle of the night – everything seems important and magnified. Part of it is the house stuff….this market is SO crappy right now, it is a tad stressful. But, that is not that big of a deal. Then, I was worried about my kids’ teeth that are hurting them and I need to get them into the Ortho stat….and then getting my work done so we can take off to Tucson on Thursday for a long weekend…We lost our basketball game on Saturday (Graham’s team) and I hate losing – even though these kids played their guts out…I still come home and try to figure out HOW to win next time. And, what am I going to race this year? Big, small? Local?…. And, more and more of things like that – see ALL stupid and not important…but funny how they feel at 2am!
One of the things I was thinking about in the middle of the night was expectations. I think my expectations of myself are high. Sometimes, I wonder if they are WAY too high. And, I do think that my expectations of some of my friends are high. Sometimes I find myself disappointed with some of my friends – whether they are my childhood friends, triathlon friends, neighbors….or my athletes I work with. I think it is not good.
But, what I struggle with is do I lower my expectations for myself and others? You know they always say, “If lower your expectations and they will only rise to that level of expectations….” I do think that as we get older and busier, I think most people cannot do it all and do it all well. We all try so hard, but at the end of the day we can only really meet our own expectations for ourselves – NOT other people’s expectations. Of course, in the Triathlon world, we have to have expectations of our athletes and of our coaches and our support system. And, I do not find myself trying to live up to anyone else’s expectations (except my Mother’s and my own)…but, I find myself having HIGH expectations of people I interact with frequently and I find myself getting disappointed by some of these people – but because my expectations are probably too high.
Clearly, I need to re-group and fix that because no one is really thinking about this but me – so I need to manage my own expectations of myself, my family and my work….and learn not to be so hard on myself and the people that mean the most to me! I still have not answered that question after tossing and turning all night! And, now I am off to bed…hopefully I will just dream about rainbows and fairies and nothing else!
Interesting post. It is hard enough dealing with ouselves, and I don’t put much pressure on myself training, but I do try, and support people, and even I cannot do it alone. I woke up this morning, and the last thing I wanted to do was read blogs… So I skimmed and drank coffee, and took the morning off.
I guess I am O.K. With me, and that is a good feeling to be honest.
As always my best!!
I have exceptionally high expectations for myself as well and sometimes these expectations lead to my “failure.” Make sense? I believe I have also had high expectations of others as well but now I am trying to remember that I can control them. I can only control myself.
FYI, I love the new look of your website!
I totally understand where you are coming from. I don’t expect more of others than I expect of myself, but I expect alot of myself. I try every day not to judge people to harshly, but am not always successful.
since I gave up beer (mostly), I often wake up in the middle of the night and have trouble going back to sleep. Stupid brain! There’s a big difference between having high expectations and being constantly “unhappy”, versus having high expectations, but being happy (and living large).
We shouldn’t be so hard on ourselves. We are after all, our own worst critic. On the other hand, if we don’t motivate and push ourselves, then who will?
Your expectations of you need to be aligned with your time available. I know you know that already. Don’t even try to put expectations on others is my .02. I can’t ever get in my athlete’s body and walk around. I can only work with what is given to me. Same goes for my own expectations of myself. Certain things I am willing to do. Other things, not so much. Will it slow my progress? Maybe. There is an opportunity cost to everything. I think a lot of people miss that. COULD you over extend yourself? Sure. You’d probably do real well too. (You and a certain guy we know could jump into a race any time and be competitive.)
1) Would it be YOUR definition of fun?
2) YOUR definition of success?
One thing I’ve learned… I’m too old to really care about what other people think of me. I only need to worry about what I think of me followed closely by my wife and dog (nuclear family) then followed by the rest of my family and friends.
Balance that with the cost of “time” – we cannot make more, we cannot stop it. Time is invaluable and we need to spend it as wisely as possible. I tell my athletes that ‘tomorrow is promised to no one’. Live your life as you think is best and to hell with anyone who thinks they can tell you what is important. Only you can do that and even then we second guess ourselves.
Whatever you choose… it will be right for you.
Hi there,
Nice post. I’ve just come in from walking in the rain after taking 3hrs of swim classes with little kids and it, and the rain was so refreshing.
I too have high expectations of myself and my friends. I get frustrated when I don’t meet my expectations but try and learn from the disparity in those expectations with what I actually achieve. As far as friends and family – yep, my expectatons are high and invariably I feel let down. This feeling I’ve really had to work on because it has in the past eaten away at me and had nothing but an adverse effect on the way I perform. I’m sure friends and family don’t mean to impose their views and feelings on me and they certainly have no idea what-so-ever how it can effect me, so it’s up to me to sort it out – it’s a work in progress:)
I certainly don’t want to drop my personal high standards or expectations but I realise I need to get them in balance with the reality of who I am, what I can achieve and really what I want out of life. At the end of the day like another post says, I only really care what my husband thinks about me – he is my barometer. Even the dog doesn’t get a look in and certainly the teen doesn’t because it’s all about him anyway.
i love this about you jen. you do know yourself and you are so freaking smart about training and eating, etc. and i love the fact that we are journalists. hah! xo!