Say "No" to Other's Expectations

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To use a euphemism, sometimes people will get you f’ed up. Sometimes people will give you a burden that is not your responsibility to carry. Say “no” to the expectations of others.

When you have a certain je ne sais quoi about you, people may feel inclined to deify you or make you a savior of a situation.

They may say something to the effect of, “So and so can fix it”, or “let me ask so and so they always come through”. It is not your job to be the person that someone else wants you to be. Especially not at the detriment of yourself.

It may sound selfish but it’s not. What’s really selfish is someone hoisting something on you because they do not want to carry it themselves. What am I talking about? I recently I was talking to a friend about life and one of our mutual friends.

I told them that I love and care for our mutual friend. However, I also said that it’s not my job to get them to acknowledge their personal mishaps. This was especially true because it’s been happening for some time now.

If you have done everything you can or that is in your scope of what is appropriate; than you can get a good night’s sleep knowing that you have done your part. That is the situation I found myself in.

My friend wanted me to go above and beyond for our mutual friend. Even though we both agreed that our mutual friend was in the wrong.

My friend thought I should bare the load because they had grown accustomed to me doing so. They thought that was a character trait of mine. You have to be careful because even the most well-intentioned people will take your kindness for weakness.

My friend’s expectations of me caused me to wrestle with what my actual responsibility was within the context of the situation. Regardless of what someone tells you to do, there is always a right thing to do.

Think of it like this: someone asks you to park in a handicap spot while they run into a store for example. The proper thing to do is find appropriate parking. I found myself in a situation where I was proverbially asked to park illegally. The worst part was, there was a perfectly legal and open spot that my friend and I both acknowledged.

People will ask you to do some potentially inappropriate things just on the strength of you may have done it before. As a quick aside, anyone who does not allow you to grow is not for you.

Stop hanging out with people who knew you from when you use to hang on the block if they cannot respect the fact that you are paying rent now and haven’t been on “the block” in years.

The expectation was Ken has done it before so he can/will do it again. The problem with that assumption was my friend must have thought I was someone else. An unfortunate truth about life is sometimes people are flat out inconsiderate of you.

Not that they do not care for you necessarily, but rather, you are not a blip on their radar. Have you ever been in a situation where the only time you get a call from someone is when they need something? That is because they are probably not thinking about you in any other context.

When someone asks you to do something they are not willing to do, you have the right to say “no”. You do not go through with what they are asking of you. And while you may not want to admit it, this behavior is coming at your expense.

You have a right to your feelings and emotions; they are yours. They do not have to be right and not everyone has to understand them, but if the people in your life do not respect how you feel about certain things, then they do not respect you.

Now all of a sudden, because someone placed an expectation on you that you feel uncomfortable about or is uncharacteristic of who you are as a person at this stage in your life, you are put in a potentially compromising position. You may feel as though you have to capitulate on your morals to pacify and appease another person or situation.

I am not saying that circumstances like these do not ever come up in life. But you should be cognizant of the people who put you in those types of situations.

When you are put in a situation like this, the person(s) who put you there doesn’t respect you. They are not for you. Stop giving certain people in your life 10 and 15 chances. They are all out of chances and they are compromising your integrity.

You become less of a quality individual when you choose to engage in the obscene games of others. If you are an adult than be one. Don’t let someone else’s expectations of you based on a version of you that may not exist anymore cause you to be less than all you were created to be.