Low Expectation Is The Key To Financial Contentment
We all know that expectations create disappointment. Our expectations play a powerful role in our contentment. Currently, if you are getting more than you expect from life you will be happy, if you get lesser, you will be unhappy. That is life!
The same way you improve your investment or saving rate by improving your income or bringing down your expenses, lowering your expectations or improving your situation gives you happiness. However, it is easier to lower your expectation than to improve your situation.
Many times, my expectation has determined my happiness. I think about building something nice for a good cause, but when I build and nobody seems to value it, I become unhappy. Sure, everyone wants to get excellent results in their work but there should be a limit of expectation.
I have been posting consistently since I started posting this year. Despite my day-to-day job in my office, I still post a minimum of 1 post a day, which makes 7 posts weekly. But, on the first of December, I set goals, and it is about posting 3 posts daily. One on Leofinance, One on Photography, and the third could be on Programming, Life, or anything. 3 posts a day will make 21 posts a week, with my day-to-day Job, how possible? Well, I stay with a computer all day and I have over 40 topics I can write on, so I just need to strike my computer keys for a couple of minutes to finish each content.
Well, just as you might think, within the first 7 days, I failed to publish 21 posts. I have only 14 posts, which means an average of two posts a day. I got occupied more within the first week and I struggled to have the 14 posts. You and I know that 14 posts a week for one person is great, but at a point, I felt like I failed my target.
Now, if I set a target that I should make 7 posts a week and I could publish 10, I would appreciate that I am doing great and beyond my goals and my stress life would reduce.
Don’t allow your expectations to exceed reality.
Thus, this got me thinking about how a minor change in expectation will cause peace of mind and happiness. And how I can apply this to every area of my life.
I read the news where Charlie Munger, an American billionaire investor. The vice-chairman of Berkshire Hathaway at the annual meeting of shareholders of the daily journal corporation. The 97-year-old man said the first rule to be happy in life is low expectation. If you live your life with the utopian expectation, you will be miserable for life. I have tried so many things and failed, but I learned. I have found myself in the pool of misery because of high expectations. But that is changing.
Now, I am certain you see that you can apply this idea in your personal finance. Your expectation surrounds your lifestyle. People get used to who they are. So when there is a raise in your lifestyle, you feel a spark of excitement because your new life is better. Then, within time, your expectation will shift to the new style of life. $20 for a meal used to be a pleasant treat. Now $50 doesn’t seem like anything. The next time you will be happy is when you experience another boost.
Sam Harris, a philosopher, explains happiness in his book "waking up". He links some spiritualities of buddha and translates them to understanding the equation of happiness.
Happiness === reality --- expectations.
If you set little expectation to everything, especially your finance, you will have reasons to be happy and appreciate your efforts. You are doing great. You just put too much expectation on yourself.
My name is @tykee (Balogun Michael), a software engineer/content writer and the founder of Meshboc Limited. I use my content to share my opinions on tech, lifestyle, and finance.
Contacts Twitter Instagram Discord: tykee#8770
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