Ever go into something expecting things to go a certain way, and then when they don’t you not only get frustrated, worn out, and discouraged; but you also question if you were ever supposed to “go into” whatever situation it is you went into? If I were to be honest (which, obviously, I am about to be with ya’ll) I do that ALL the time.
I went into college expecting to meet a ton of people that would be lifelong friends that would be in my life DAILY and stand by me no matter what. But that didn’t happen.
I moved to Texas expecting to find this AWESOME KILLER job that EVERYONE would be envious of, but that didn’t happen either.
I started my cleaning business expecting it to TAKE OFF and have 5 employees by now and not have to work at Jimmy Jacobs Homes to sustain me financially anymore. But that too, didn’t happen.
I even jumped out in faith on this World Race journey expecting to be insanely closer to God, have random people hand me $1,000 because “God led them to”, and for everyone in my life to be 110% committed to helping me on this journey that no one can do alone. I expected to be HAPPY, MOTIVATED, and EXCITED everyday about this opportunity. I expected to have my first goal met LONG before May 3 with 95% of the people I asked jumping at the chance to donate, even if it was just $5. I even expected to feel God in my life more than I have ever felt Him before with a renewed strength that grew every day. I expected God to speak to me and lead me with such certainty that I KNEW without a doubt what to do, where to go, and when to act. In short, I expected perfection. But NONE of these have happened and nothing has been perfect.
I would be lying if I said that the majority of my days since accepting this opportunity to be on the race were filled with motivation, joy, and excitement. The truth is that quite the opposite has happened. Going in with so many expectations and not a single one of them being fulfilled has been discouraging. I have grown tired and weary. I have become frustrated and numb. I have lost my joy, and I have lost my excitement. I have not “felt” God’s presence in over a month. It is as if I keep running into brick walls time and time again, effort after effort I am barricaded into a corner of fear, worry, and doubt.
I began to question AGAIN, if this is what God wants me to do. The only thing that kept me going was remembering the confirmation I felt from God after my week of fasting and the peace of KNOWING that the race is somewhere God wants me. I felt that even that could have been faulty, though. The truth of the matter is, for the past few weeks I have been crumbling. Crumbling under the pressure and stress and crumbling under trying to build my relationship with God and not FEELING Him. My perfect “race preparation” expectations were crumbling and I was growing weary, I was growing weak, and I was most certainly growing faint.
By the end of this last week, I was to the point I was crying all day every day. I could not hold it in, the tears just kept flowing from my eyes onto whatever my face was hanging over. I tried to handle it all on my own, but I knew that there was nothing I could do and that I needed some serious wisdom spoken into my life. Desperate, I texted a woman that has been a tremendous source of wisdom, encouragement, and inspiration in my life the last year. I frantically typed out a text asking if I could call that weekend as I needed some wisdom and advice. Almost immediately her response confirmed her availability. But then, the CRAZIEST idea entered into my head, almost as if God knew I needed the push. “Why don’t you ask to meet her face to face?”
Now, you may be thinking, “What is so crazy about meeting face to face?!” Well, when you live in San Antonio, TX and your “mentor” lives in Oklahoma, North of OKC, that is a CRAZY idea to just randomly drive up there, meet and talk, just to turn around and come home. I debated about asking her. I didn’t want to intrude and most certainly didn’t want to be a burden. Not to mention, it can range anywhere from a 7 ½ hour drive to an 8 hour drive one way.
But then God asked me a few questions to get me thinking. “How important is it to you that you understand what is going on in your inner self?” and “What do you need Rachel?” and even “How far are you willing to go to find your strength and wisdom and how far are you willing to go for ME?”
After a few moments of hesitation, I worked up the courage to ask if I could drive up and meet her face to face. Nervous I was overstepping my bounds, her response was that it was totally fine with her. She even offered me to be the first guest in her new home!
On my drive up to OKC area, I had many moments where I broke out into tears. I couldn’t understand why everything wasn’t going the way I EXPECTED it to and why nothing seemed perfect. “God must not LOVE me despite what I have been told my whole life,” I thought. How can I not feel excitement and joy for something that I had so much peace about doing?! Why did everything feel like it was crashing down on me? I felt like I was the worst person ever when it comes to understanding WHERE God is leading. Despite my emotional breakdowns here and there, I was anxious for the words she would share with me and how God was going to bring everything full circle.
Arriving in Oklahoma, I grew nervous to open myself up and be so vulnerable despite the trust I have with this woman. I almost turned around right before reaching her house to go back home. But I was way too invested to give up. I needed wisdom, I needed rest, and I needed help.
As we sat on her front porch, I worked up the courage to express everything that was going on in my life that I was struggling with. To my shock, tears barely fell down my face. Perhaps it was because I cried for almost a week straight and so much on my drive up. With everything hanging in the balance, my life up in the air so much with the nearing deadline, and my apathetic numbness to the race; I sat and listened to her responsive thoughts, questions, and words of wisdom.
There is SOO much that I gathered from her and her husband that weekend, but the main point is this, I have way too many expectations. And it wasn’t just that I was expecting things to go a certain way and then they went differently, I was expecting everything to be PERFECT. Not just my circumstances and outcomes, but also, I was expecting myself to be PERFECT. And then one thing she told me, stood out about my “faulty” expectations that were slowly killing me.
She said, “Rachel, I have learned not to expect perfection, but to expect excellence. We are human, we live in a sinful world, and NOTHING will be perfect. But we can hope and work for excellence.”
That mixed with her pointing out that “feelings are fleeting” and they cannot be my foundation I base everything on made me come to a strong realization that expectations can kill.
When you expect things to happen and you almost DEMAND they happen that way for you to KNOW you are in the right spot, then you can end up how I was when they don’t go the way you plan. Defeated in a state of discouragement and apathy I almost thought God didn’t want me on the race and I misunderstood everything. My expectations of perfection were killing me slowly and day after day, week after week, they were getting in the way of my relationship with God and desire to go on the race.
Having unmet expectations made me think God was SLAMMING doors. It made me think that I was a fool for thinking He would want someone like me on the race. It made me question my readiness to handle the race since things were not turning out how I planned or expected!
So it wasn’t that my problem was me having expectations, it was that my expectations were ones from a perfect world that doesn’t exist. I was expecting the fundraising process to be perfect, I was expecting my relationship with God to be PERFECT, I was expecting my friends and family to be PERFECT, I was expecting EVERYTHING to be PERFECT.
When our expectations are based on perfection, our expectations become deadly. But when our expectations are based on excellence, our expectations are life giving. I came across the following poem while I was researching perfection vs. excellence. I added my revelations about each phrase in following parentheses:
Excellence vs. Perfection
_____________________________
Perfection is being right.
Excellence is being willing to be wrong.
(When I expect perfection, it says that I am right no matter what. But when I expect excellence out of myself, I am willing to be wrong about certain things.)
_____________________________
Perfection is fear.
Excellence is taking a risk
(My expectations of perfection made me afraid of not meeting my deadlines, but my expectations of excellence risks the deadline not being met and switching to a later route and learning more from the experience.)
_____________________________
Perfection is anger and frustration.
Excellence is powerful
(Expectations of perfection made me angry and frustrated when things didn’t go as my perfect plans demanded. But my expectations of excellence are powerful when they understand that whatever happens is for the best.)
_____________________________
Perfection is control
Excellence is spontaneous
(When I expected perfection, I wanted things to go as I planned and the way I wanted them to. I wanted to be in CONTROL. However, having expectations of excellence enables me to go with the flow and leave things in the hands of the creator by having spontaneity)
_____________________________
Perfection is judgement
Excellence is accepting
(Perfect expectations made me judge the outcome when it didn’t go as planned for being God saying “The race is not for you”. Yet, having expectations of excellence allow me to accept the outcome as being a different journey NOW that God has planned to prepare me for the race.) _____________________________
Perfection is taking
Excellence is giving
(When I expected perfection, I was taking people’s donations. But expecting excellence says that I am giving people the opportunity to go on this journey with me through their gifts.) _____________________________
Perfection is doubt
Excellence is confidence
(When I had expectations of everything being perfect, I began to doubt I was meant for the race when things didn’t go perfectly as planned. But when I change my expectations to excellence, I am confident that whatever happens is the will of God and I am filled with peace.)
_____________________________
Perfection is pressure
Excellence is natural
(There is SOO much pressure with having the deadly expectations of perfection. But when I expect excellence, there is a natural peace that things, no matter the outcome, will work out.)_____________________________
Perfection is the destination
Excellence is the journey
(When my mind is wrapped up in expecting everything to be perfect, I forget about the journey because I am focused on reaching the destination of the 11 different countries. When I anticipate and expect excellence, I take time to enjoy the journey of learning, growing, and being molded into what I need to be not just the 11 months of the trip, but the rest of my life.)
_____________________________
-author unknown
The words of my mentor and this poem have made me realize that I was letting the storms of my unmet expectations of perfection rob me of my faith in God. Since this last weekend, I have changed my way of thinking. No longer am I expecting things to be perfect. Perfection cannot happen this side of Heaven, but excellence can. When I expect God to work excellently in my life, the journey is filled with a natural peace that leaves me with confidence. I no longer have the deadly expectations of a perfect race experience, but I do have the life giving expectations of the excellence this next year can bring and the lives I will meet that can be changed. If you are anything like me, I encourage you to stop having the deadly expectations of perfections like myself and switch to the peaceful natural expectations of excellence. I can assure you, it is worth the journey.
