I find that there are two kinds of expectations that are particularly dangerous in this life: an expectation of ourselves to be perfect and an expectation of others to be perfect.
John Steinbeck once wrote, “Now that you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good.” When we expect ourselves to be perfect, we eliminate any option for us to be good. We push ourselves to an unhealthy state and punish ourselves in any way we see fit. And when we see that the strenuous work we’ve been putting into the process isn’t yielding that result of perfection, we start on a road to self-destruction and escape. We become mean and aggressive and bitter. We let our insecurities run us into the ground. Our expectations are often born from our insecurities. We use our expectations as compensations for our imperfection. But the whole thing is that we cannot achieve perfection. We cannot escape inadequacy or insecurity. That’s what’s so human about us. We screw up. In fact, it may be the thing we do best. As much as we try to use our expectations as a smokescreen of motivation, we cannot escape imperfection. We cannot possibly expect perfection from ourselves because it destroys us. It destroys our good. And when we try to expect perfection from others, we destroy their good.
When we expect others to be perfect, we place them on a sort of pedestal. A pedestal on which they do not belong. When we think we can change someone to fit the mold of perfection (the perfect best friend, the perfect teammate, the perfect boyfriend or girlfriend), we are asking them to become less human than we are. John Green wrote that it is a treacherous thing to believe that a person is more than a person. Yes, a person is imperfect, but they are also complex and beautiful and so, so worth loving. For in this life, where perfection is so unattainable, the only thing left to do to protect ourselves from the destruction of expectation is to love.
Freedom from expectation is found in love. W. H. Auden wrote that “you shall love your crooked neighbor with your crooked heart.” Love does not fill expectations; rather, it transforms them for the better. Love is what ultimately saves us in the end. It allows us to be good rather than perfect. It gives us hope rather than expectation. It is the most satisfying salvation on earth. And that’s because a pure love comes from God. He is the one that belongs on a pedestal in our lives because He is the only one who meets the expectation of perfection. That is the only kind of expectation that is not dangerous. It is an expectation that saves. He is a perfect God. A perfect God that did not command us to be perfect like Him but commanded us to be good. He commanded us to love one another with all our crooked hearts.
