Let go of expectations and replace them with your values

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Welcome back to another episode of Mama Thrive. In this episode we’re talking about dropping expectations and replacing them with values.

When you’re in conflict or you’re having debates or feeling tension with other people, you are most often holding an expectation. 

There is likely something you had expected to have happen (that didn’t).

eg. I expected them to put on their shoes without a problem 

eg. I expected them to go to sleep without having to go to the toilet so many times just before

eg. I expected it to be simpler than it is

And here is an example of a story that happened to me (Lisa)-

A few months ago I went with my children to the local art shop and we decided that we were going to top up all the art and craft supplies that were getting a bit low. I gave both the children a basket and I told them that they had $30 each to go find stuff and put it in the basket, things that looked interesting to them.

 I had expectations about what they would be putting in their baskets. I had this picture of all these beautiful materials that we could create things with- I had loads of expectations.

My daughter came back about 5 minutes later with one $30 item in her basket- a paint-by-numbers.

I had a lot of stories about paint-by-numbers and how it wasn’t creativity and it wasn’t art, and all these other things I was telling myself. 

I had expectations about what she would pick and what she wouldn’t pick and what I thought of what she did pick and we got into quite a conflict in the art shop about it.

I was sticking to my expectations and she was sticking to her desires and we were in a bit of a stalemate. 

At one point it dawned on me to let go of my expectations and replace them with my values.

I stepped back for a moment and saw my daughter and thought about my values. What was really important to me here in this moment.

In that particular situation, supporting my daughter’s passions was actually super important to me. Trusting in her learning path and what she was choosing for herself was really important to me. 

Our connection was more valuable to me than the paint-by-numbers issue.

In that moment I chose those values over the expectations I’d been holding and the conflict resolved,

I did buy her the paint-by-numbers and we went home and she got so excited by the paint-by-numbers and she spent hours doing it.

She came downstairs and she told me everything she loved about it, and when she made a mistake, how she just had to ad-lib herself and be creative. All the things she adored about it and how she’d love to have a girl’s date with me and do a paint-by-numbers together. 

I realised then that my values he’d more importance to me than the expectations I had about what was going in our art and craft draw. 

So I guess that story actually illustrates all that we were going to say. 

I would encourage you, especially when you’re in a conflict, to step back and ask yourself-

Where am I holding expectations?

What are my expectations?

And then step back and again and ask-

What are my values?

Is there a value here that I could replace those expectations with?-

that would feel truly good to me and would actually move us through this in a really empowered way?

Kaya- beautiful! I think Lisa has summed it up perfectly with that story so we’ll leave it at that :-)