Optimistic October: Day 21 - Not Great Expectations

You're never going to please everyone all of the time, but a lot of us beat ourselves up trying to do just that.

My mental health journey has to a large extent been about reducing the amount of time I spend floating around outside myself and making assumptions about what everybody else thinks - and expects - of me. In fact, when I'm at my lowest I tend to describe how I'm feeling as almost literally not being inside my own body.

What you think other people think is not what's important. What's important is:

1. That you're doing what you're doing for reasons;
2. That those reasons are good ones

Of course, everybody's ideas of what entails "good" reasons can be very different, so I think a decent number 3. to put on that list is you can justify those reasons and a number 4. could be and you're open to redefining them in light of new knowledge, understanding and evidence.

I find that it's a good idea to remind myself now and than that one of the reasons that what I think other people think is not important is that if I'm honest I don't and can't know what other people are thinking. Most of the time the unrealistic expectations of other people turn out to be my own unrealistic expectations of myself projected outwards on other people.

I'm sure they wouldn't be very impressed with me if they knew...