How to learn to have more realistic expectations?

Throughout our lives we generate positive or negative expectations about everything we do on a day-to-day basis; This ability to establish hypotheses about what will happen in the future allows us to develop projects with medium and long-term goals. However, the key is not to err on the side of excessive pessimism or optimism, since unrealistic expectations can harm us in various ways.

If you are interested learn to have more realistic expectations, keep reading, since here we will review several tips so that your goals and your predictions about what will happen do not lead you to anxiety problems or the frustration of seeing that the good things they expected do not come to pass. comply.

Tips for learning to have more realistic expectations

Surely in many work or personal situations in your life you have expected things to be better than they have really been, and that has generated internal discomfort, frustration or pain.

Expectations are just that, ideas or personal beliefs about what we think will happen in the future as a consequence of our action.

This type of projections and speculations about the future have a direct impact on our mental health., since the more adjusted our predictions are to the reality that we have to live later, the more satisfied we will be with what happens to us.

In the same way, when the expectations are much higher than the result we obtain, we can end up feeling very bad. with ourselves or even angry with ourselves or any of the variables we blame for our failure.

These are some of the guidelines and recommendations that you can apply to your life to be more realistic when having expectations about the future and about your personal or professional projects.

1. Learn to do SWOT analysis

He SWOT analysis is one of the most widely used strategic analysis tools by the most important companies and organizations in the world, as well as by professionals and freelancers of all kinds.

Putting this strategy into practice will help us make important decisions with greater knowledge, with all the data essential to take that important step for our future or to choose the best option among a variety of they.

The SWOT analysis serves professionals as a strategic plan that can be used in any area of ​​daily life and that provides essential information when it comes to make a decision regarding: the weaknesses of the decision or change, the threats, the opportunities it offers and the strengths it entails compared to another path.

2. Take notes of everything relevant that we do

Taking notes in a personal journal that we reread each week to learn from our mistakes will also help us to be aware of our daily progress, as well as to analyze in depth what things we have done wrong and why.

These notes must be taken in a methodical manner and describe in detail each and every one of the obstacles that we encounter during our professional or personal lives.

In addition to that, they can also include our daily time management strategies, noting the time at which we start and finish each block of activities for about 3 or 4 days, so as not to overestimate our ability to production.

• Related article: "Self-knowledge: definition and 8 tips to improve it"

3. Analyze possible success and failure scenarios

Another of the exercises that we can practice daily to learn to have more realistic expectations and ensure that they do not negatively affect our mental health is to analyze possible scenarios of success and failure based on predictions, expectations or decisions that press us at the present moment.

Find a pessimistic, optimistic, and reasonable version for each prediction of what is going to happen to us to compare them, it will help us to understand that the world does not end by failing once, and we will also understand that some frustrations are better to relativize so that they do not govern our feelings.

4. Seek support from other people

Talking to the people around us about our expectations and being interested in their opinion will help us to have a more objective view of ourselves and recognize negative dynamics from the outside that we may have and cost us our health mental.

Both friends and family will always want the best for us and their opinion They can help us to relativize about the errors and to learn that in life not everything is success, but that failure also teaches us a lot.

5. Avoid systematically comparing ourselves to others

People who have a tendency to compare themselves with others usually suffer the most in their lives and those who are more likely to become overwhelmed or stressed because of the unrealistic expectations that are propose.

Wanting to reach the level they are at and constantly being aware of what other people are doing is not a healthy way of living and in the long run it can cause serious damage to our mental health.

Instead, we need to focus on ourselves and compare ourselves solely to our own performance in order to become better every day.

• You may be interested in: "How to stop comparing yourself to others"

6. Appreciate your own effort

Similarly, it is also important value the good we have achieved in life and take into account the effort we are dedicating to achieve each of the milestones in our personal or professional life.

Valuing our own effort will help us to have greater self-esteem, so we will be able to have some expectations more adjusted to our possibilities and we will stop being overwhelmed and suffering for wanting to be top.

7. Do not blindly obey the expectations that others place on us

In addition to avoiding comparisons with others, it is also essential to forget everything that others can comment on our performance and all those expectations that others may have from out.

This will help us, once again, to focus on ourselves and on improving what we must improve to be better.

8. focus on the present

Some people they get frustrated or stressed because they are too focused on the future or the past.

Focusing on the present and in the work that we must carry out at present or in the short term, we will be able to have more realistic expectations and adjusted to our moment and abilities.

9. Go to therapy if nothing works

If none of the above works or we continue to have problems with expectations that are too high, we can also go to a psychology professional.

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