Wedged

Image found here

Sometimes I get my hopes up so high that they can only be dashed. ― No. You know what? Scratch that.

Pretty much any time I'm excited my expectations reach unattainable heights.
 
Unfortunately, this means I find myself falling from emotional extremes on the regular. It sucks, but I have always been this way. At least now I am able to recognize it. I do this by comparing the sensation to my first frustrating experience of letting myself down, which is mortifyingly stereotypical with wardrobe-centricity.

I was in middle school. Therefore, my appearance was overwhelmingly important to me. I truly believed that the right outfit would one day catapult me to social success, because that's what mattered. The right Gap sweatshirt was going to get me in with the cool kids, and the wrong platform sneakers were sure to loose me any chance with the hottest pock-faced guy in the commons.

Keeping this in mind, I carefully selected everything I wore. I perused catalogs, and back-to school shopping with Mom was, at times, a weekend long experience. One time I walked away from this epic adventure with what I thought was the most beautiful summery pale blue skirt. It had pink flowers embroidered along the bottom hem, and I was in love with it. In my eyes, it was incredible and no one at school had ever seen anything like it. In reality, I would not actually fill it out for about 5 years.

When we arrived home, I immediately ran it to my room to prepare for the parental fashion show that followed every shopping endeavor of my adolescence. I put it on, paired with a white button up, and ran downstairs to show it off.


"Very pretty," My mom said, "but what shoes are you going to wear with it."

Panicked, I looked down at my bare feet. I didn't own anything that would go with this outfit. Fortunately, an image of the most perfect pair of white platform wedges came to mind. I explained them to my mom, and the next weekend we set out to find them, but to no avail.

We must have gone to 20 stores that day. Several had shoes similar to my idea, but these shoes did not seem to actually exist as I had imagined them. I found white shoes with tacky flowers, tan shoes with white designs, pale brown wedges, summery flip-flop heels, and white dress shoes. Nowhere did anyone have a pair of plain white wedges.

In retrospect, any number of the shoes we stumbled upon probably would have gone with my outfit. However, I had my heart set on this concept that seemed to be stuck in my brain, and something close just wasn't it. So, I gave up. I went home pouting. I put the beautiful summery skirt in my closet, and looked at it longingly each morning for far too long. The passion I had invested into actualizing my dream of perfection was replaced by complete refusal to even try.

I have since grown to understand this as an incredibly typical developmental experience. Getting your hopes up is risky. The heightened excitement exposes vulnerabilities. It's awesome when it pays out, but the odds are not always in our favor. Ramped up expectations increase the odds for failure, setting us up for a greater chance of disappointment. Which makes giving up a reasonable reaction.

So, should we stop hoping for the best?  Should we protect ourselves from distress by increasingly lowering our aim from the moon, to the stars, to earth's atmosphere, and then to the sky? These are choices we all must consider. However, it is also important to consider that decreased risk of failure comes with an equivalent decrease in expectation and anticipation. This may also impair your true ability to experience pride, surprise, and elation.  Even emotional protection comes at a cost.