Unrealistic expectations come from different sources like the family, media, society or ourselves these expectations come with a certain aura that is unhealthy which leads to anxiety, stress, traumatic conditions and a huge of sense failure that weighs down on our shoulders. It involves our physical appearance, career and personal achievements the aura around it means that it doesn't need to be communicated to us sometimes we just feel that strong feeling that chokes us to the extent that we can't breathe and we begin to shake and falter at things we can do on our own.

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Social media only portrays an idealized version of life where only the good highlights are shared and the bad highlights are filtered off it has affected the reality of things so much that the idealized versions of ourselves are building up in our minds through this idealized version pushes us to become competitive it also creates a strong toxic environment within us that feels like it's going to explode out.

I have had so many experiences like this mostly because of the society I live in, my environment and the strong desire to make my family proud even though my family are not asking that much of me like I feel they are. My environment and society place huge emphasis on age rather than how much you achieve, you get compared to your pairs daily with comparisons like your friend having a car, a house, a family or how your pair are independent already and you are not with one of my dad's infamous words ringing out loud in my head to the extent that those words have become a monster to me he jokingly told me how he was already taking of himself and living at the age of nineteen at the time I was just preparing to get into the university. He didn't have the opportunity to go to the university and the standard of living was more favourable than now but it still didn't matter to him which I understood.

This pushed me to set up goals that almost swallowed me up in the long run, when I had a year left in the university I began to feel the pressure more with the expectations of being dependent and having an immediate career impact which the previous three years in the university had managed to subdue it pushed me into setting two goals one is to complete a software engineering training course that required a year of coding and study dedication also to attain financial freedom before graduation all this in the middle of studying physics in the university and at a time when my required optimal focus and no distractions of any form

Reality check: Did I achieve this unrealistic expectation?

That year is tough to look back at because I not only failed to meet any of these unrealistic expectations but It almost drowned my dream of ever becoming a software engineer it made it look like it was something that only people with the highest intelligence quotient could accomplish when I could have easily learnt at my own and succeed. The training was a year program that required coding for 10 hours a day which was at least 70hours a day and required finances that I wasn't even ready for like a stable power supply, internet and even a working laptop that I didn't have and I had to occasionally make use of my friends laptop or the schools desktop when it's available but I didn't just pick it because I wanted to just achieve this but because I wanted to do it at their pace even though I could have easily attended other self-paced training programs at the end it all felt like a waste of time because I could even last three months and the unrealistic expectations of financial freedom before graduation became only a dream.

We set these expectations for ourselves believing that anything less than perfection is not acceptable and that the pace at which we make this achievement matters forgetting that we don't make an achievement within the blinking of an eye but with a rigorous push that eventually gets us to where we want to be but now I believe I now understand what I need and it will be easier for me to do things at my strength and pace without placing unrealistic expectations on myself that might eventually take my dream away from me.

My submission to the daily inleo prompt I invite others to check out the prompt and participate

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Posted Using InLeo Alpha

Posted Using InLeo Alpha