About a year after my daughter was born, I decided
that I was going to start scrapbooking. I
could match together cute paper with the pictures and add a few stickers or embellishments
here or there. It would be a good
creative outlet and I would have albums that we could enjoy for years to come. I started off great, got all the stuff and
enjoyed pouring over the pages for hours on end getting them just right. Slowly I started to fall behind. I thought if I group the holidays together I
can do three years of Christmas all at once.
While that helped, I now have 4 years’ worth of books in various states
of completion. The photos, paper and
supplies are neatly stacked and have not moved in a number of months. My desire is still there to get them done, we
all love looking through the books and remembering. What’s been holding me back is this feeling
that I don’t have enough time to do it – getting it all out, organized and put
onto the pages is not something that can be done in an hour or two. I picture a day where I have a big chunk of
time to lay it all out and get a bunch of it done, but until that day, the
project sits and waits.
My scrapbooking project is a very simple example of
a scenario that everyone can relate to.
You would like to create a photo album/work out/make a new recipe/tackle
a home improvement project/organize the junk closet/etc. but you never get
around to it because you have subconsciously created expectations around the
activity that are holding you back. You
may think I’m being over dramatic, that expectations don’t have anything to do
with it, but expectations are a sneaky thing and may be present without you
even realizing it.
Expectations simmer under the surface of nearly
everything that we do every day. We have
expectations related to situations -if I go to a restaurant, I can get food. We have expectations related to friends,
family, spouses, co-workers, fellow drivers on the road, our children and
nearly every other person we come into contact with. And of course we have expectations of
ourselves. Expectations can influence
your mood, for better or for worse. When
something meets your expectations you are happy and excited. When something does not meet your expectation
it can make you angry, frustrated, disappointed, etc. Many times expectations lie dormant. You don’t realize they are secretly
influencing the things you do, or do not do.
When
I started thinking about the scrapbooks I realized I had inflated this
expectation of the time I needed to the point where it was insurmountable. I also realized I had an expectation on the
amount of effort and “bling” that had to be on every page, which also made the
task seem more daunting. In the end,
what is most important is that the pictures are in a book that we can all look
at and enjoy. Once I acknowledged these
points, I had an idea – why don’t I get the kids to help me? Will the pages look the exact way that I
would have done them? No, but, they are
old enough to do a good job and will be excited that they get to help…….at
least that is my expectation.
Heart-FULLy
Yours,
Kacey
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