Managing Expectations In Life

Not everyone is cut out to be a manager or a leader, but there is no saying that we cannot be trained to become one. Before we learn how to work, manage and lead with others, we first need to learn how to manage and lead ourselves.

I had a look at a really interesting book from John Maxwell, “The 360 degree leadership”.

This past week I have been thinking about how to manage myself better. This book came as a godsend.

In Maxwell’s book, he suggested us to manage seven areas in our lives, which include emotions, time, priorities, energy, thinking, words, and personal life. I gave it some thought and tried to integrate into my life as I am making my 2014 resolutions. That’s when a realization came to me.

More often than not, our lives revolve around our expectations towards ourselves and the people around us. Take your finances, for example. You might not have been thinking about it, at least I did not think about it in the past. That is because I did not expect anything, and I did not even think about managing it. A huge mistake apparently. To further illustrate, when you go to work, you must be thinking “I should be paid xxxx”. That, is your expectation of how much you are worth. When you rather spend your holiday abroad skiing in Switzerland with your friends and not visiting your parents, that shows how you manage your personal life, and your priorities.

I would like to share with everyone the seven aspects of how to manage our expectations, using six of Maxwell’s ideas, and one of my own. I am in no way an expert, but after thinking through this I feel that it can help me tremendously, and I hope it does the same to you too.

1. Emotions

In the past I was a rather emotional person. I do get upset quite easily over things. These days, I am different. I cannot say that I don’t get raked up, but it is difficult to make me get angry or cry over things. Manage emotions is different from control. When you control, you force yourself, for example, not to cry. Manage, on the other hand, is to teach yourself how to look at things from another perspective and how to manage your expectations to yourself and to others around you. When you begin to see things in new light, you will learn not to take certain things too hard.

Someone once said this, “Nothing is greater than birth and death. So, no matter what happens, smile.”

2. Time

I admit that I have a very bad habit, i.e. I am often late for my appointment with friends. That is not a good thing. First of all I am wasting everyone’s time. Why did this happen? Because I set a high expectation (probably too high) for myself. There were days when I crammed a few activities in a day; I ended up being late for all my appointments and went home with a tired body and mind. That is not a good sign.

How am I going to do this better? By cutting down on the activities I do at one time, and by making sure that I am punctual or early at all times. When I do that, I don’t waste time, and I have extra time to work on things that can increase my productivity, or sleep an extra hour. The other way of doing it is by not procrastinating. Get a book, or use your Google calendar, spend 30 minutes per day before work or after work, write down your tasks (for today or tomorrow). Tackle the tasks immediately when you start work. Get them off your mind. The more work you accumulate, the less efficient you become.

3. Priorities

I know many people will just say, “Yes I know that” or “I do get my priorities right”. But in truth, many of us don’t. My friend complaint to me that he is spending a lot of time on his interpersonal relationships. Now I do think that friendship and networking are both important, but you cannot be everyone’s good friend (you might, however, be able to know all the VIPs if you are one of them, or if you know how to do it.). So, instead of spending time on a friend who doesn’t care about you, why not spend time on someone who cares about you, or, learn some value-added skills?

A friend also pointed out to me that if you spend so much time doing this and that, you might not have enough time to socialize.

Prioritize.

What is more important? Spending time brushing up your English, or watching movie?

Actually. I’d like to do more Japanese haha!

4. Energy

Allocate our energy to important things. Sharing from my personal experience, I always multitask and meet a whole bunch of friends, and sometimes, that’s a bit too much. My friends are probably very aware that I always look energetic, but does that mean that I am never tired? Not true. There are times when I wonder whether I am using my energy in the right places.

If I remembered correctly, Maxwell mentioned that you need to spend 85% of your energy doing things that are important (priorities), 15% learning new things/skills which are important, and 5% of energy for everything else. I can’t exactly measure how much energy I spend, but I can definitely point out one thing. Many of us reserve our energy for the wrong thing and wrong reasons, mostly, for play. Sometimes, I hear some of my friends saying, “I need to save some energy for tonight’s party!”.

We are always saving energy for the wrong things.

My suggestion for us is to start re-prioritize our energy, and work on providing ourselves with a ‘sustainable’ and ‘renewable’ source of energy. One way of doing this, is to work on our health and fitness. When you have good health, then you will have the energy to do many important things. People around me like to give the excuse that “we are still young”. It does not work that way. Start now, so that you won’t regret when you are older.

5. Thinking

“Garbage in, garbage out.”

Our mind is processing information continuously, even if we think we are not thinking. Every day, we have to deal with thousands and thousands of signals and noises that are projected into our brain. Subconsciously, our brain picks what it thinks we might need. That’s why marketing always work.

How can we decide what sort of information we really need?

In order to teach us how to think better, it is advisable to read books or watch television shows or do things that can benefit us. In other words, consume more brain food and lesser brain junk. When we have a clear mind, our thinking can help us manage every area of our life better, that definitely includes our emotions. This, in turn, will aid in managing our expectations.

6. Finances

Your boss pays you for how much he or she thinks you are worth. When you buy something, you assess the value of the goods or services too. You manage your expectations of the value in things. Why managing our finances is important? That is the only way we can ensure our financial stability, which is a great asset and help to our future. Think. What benefits will you get from managing your finances?

OK, maybe some of you still rely on your parents, or you do not have commitments that’s why you don’t think that your personal finance is important. I am one of those who did not think it was important until recently. It’s a grave mistake, and I know better now. If you know how to manage your finances and make your first bucket of gold, gradually you can learn to invest in properties. Who knows, you might be the next Warren Buffett.

7. Personal life

This is something that bothers everyone I think. Either we spend too much time at work, or we spend too much time with our friends, or we don’t really have a personal life. Maxwell said that he wants respect and love from his family, first and foremost, more so than his co-workers. Put your family as your first priority. He is right. Perhaps other people have higher expectations of you, but you can decide for yourself who and what is more important. You are the only one who has a say in your personal life. If you cannot even manage your personal life and family, how do you manage others?

To sum it up, I think it is important for us all to look at these aspects and ponder about 2014.

Take some time. Think about your own shortcomings/weaknesses, don’t be afraid of admitting it. Then, draw some plans, list down SPECIFIC goals/objectives. Tell yourself something like, “I want to lose 5kg in 2014”, then make a fitness plan, and do it. Planning may be easy, keeping up with the plan is another challenge and it is part of self-management too. Hence, avoid coming up with an objective that you will have trouble keeping up with (instead of losing 5kg, lose 30kg a year?). Take small steps towards managing your expectations.

Let’s work on it together!