Expectations

EXPECTATIONS

Man is a social animal. He needs society for his social development and survival too. As a member of a community, he is surrounded by people and relationships, duties and responsibilities, chores and mores, customs and rituals, and rules and regulations. And as he comes face-to-face with all these elements, he is also engulfed by a deep sea of expectations.
Right from the cradle to our very last breath, expectations fly in all directions around us... expectations from family and loved ones, neighbours and friends, colleagues and bosses, institutions and authorities, and the list is endless. Formally speaking, `expectations` are hopes and beliefs that something will happen. Sometimes we are tied to expectations under the guise of responsibilities. But eventually we cannot be labelled as denizens of Utopia, where all expectations will live to see the light of the day.
We exist in a world where nothing is perfect or lasting. With the passage of time, people do change. Human nature can be so strange and unpredictable. Relationships develop in a jiffy and fade away before sunrise. Rules undergo replacement. Roles constantly keep on evolving. Customs get complicated. Duties become more complex. In short, everything under the sun changes. Change is the law of nature. In such a scenario, expectations are bound to be amended, altered and replaced too.
Expectations bog us down. When unrealistic expectations are thrust on our shoulders overnight, we begin to perceive them as bogeymen. Every time someone somewhere fails to live upto someone`s expectation, you will hear the sound of disappointment, smell the scent of resentment and see the colour of gloominess, in addition to the ugly sight of loneliness, despair, depression and even suicides.
Expectations can never make us happy. They have the potential to mar stable relationships. They can never don the mantle of ambassadors of goodwill and cheer. Our life is not destined to be a mere fragile bundle of...