Walking the Dao

3rd December 2009

High Expectations

As I have known since childhood, expectations set the tone for most things in life. As an Asian (yes, the stereotypical studious nerd kind), I've always had a secret complaint: How is it that someone can have good grades all her life and then get yelled at or punished for getting a slightly lower grade, while someone else can have all bad grades all her life and then get praised and adored for getting a slightly higher grade?

Well, this article in the Economist brought up that once you see a person a certain way, it's difficult to change it. It's also what people call the "first impression is hard to shake." This works both ways. You can first see a person as good and then it's hard to convince you that he's bad... or you first see a person as bad and it's hard to convince you otherwise. It's extremely unfair, but it's so very true. We've all been and we continue to be guilty of this.

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="240" caption="I'm not that Innocent. "]

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There's no way to avoid it. Humans like to categorize things, as early as Aristotle and probably far beyond human records. It helps us cope with the complexities of life. The problem is that once we have established our opinion, we are extremely reluctant to overturn it, because that represents going back on our own egos and judgment. Big issue.

But this reluctance is what brings us to misunderstandings and false expectations. Humans are actually extremely versatile, but being versatile also means having a lack of security, so generally we choose stability over change. Once we have confined ourselves in a certain train of thought, we drop everything else. That is not to say we should divide our attention into a million tiny bits. There is a very simple thing that we can think about:

We are free humans (at least those that I know). This gives us the privilege to judge and choose. If we limit ourselves, then we have taken away our own choices.

For example, because I have always been a good student, I was expected to take (and so I "chose") a suitable career path, let's say a lawyer, and then work towards becoming a high power partner, though I really only like to make yummy desserts and being buried in a stack of paperwork bores me to tears. Because I was smart, I was expected to... so I don't even think of myself as being able to choose....

Another aspect of this is that once we have seen something in a certain light, we don't like to change our perspective of it, which in effect rejects the notion that humans can change. Well, yes, they can, some more some less, and everyone at their own pace. If/when we change, other options come forth to greet us.

If you can see through all the levels of expectations, then you see that... some of us do not choose, some of us do chose, but there was always a choice.

3rd December 2009

High Expectations

Sze K. Aka Chan's Posterous

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