Why lowering expectations doesn’t make us happier – 04/11/2023 – Equilibrium

Finland was recently recognized as the happiest country in the world for the sixth consecutive year.

Several theories have already been presented to explain why the Nordic country continues to figure at the top of the happiness ranking. They range from greater income equality to time spent in nature.

But a Finnish sociology professor credited the country’s position to “a cultural orientation that sets realistic limits on expectations for the good life”. That is, he seems to believe that Finns are happy because their expectations are not too high.

Should we then lower our expectations to be happier? I would argue that research in psychology indicates the opposite. High expectations are important because they allow us to dream and create goals.

The process known as mental contrasting causes us to create judgments about our expectations of the future to decide which dreams are realistic and can be pursued – and which ones we should abandon.

Imagine, for example, living a life with many friends around you.

If you are sitting alone at home having this dream and feeling sad about your lonely reality, mental contrasting helps you to identify your dream, anticipate possible obstacles, plan the actions to be taken to overcome them and pursue a goal that help him make friends, like joining a club, for example.

Therefore, high expectations, when they are realistic, can serve as a motivating force towards change. And high expectations also keep us optimistic, to continue advancing in the face of adversity.

When something bad happens to someone who develops the expectation that everything will turn out well – despite the adversity and even if it doesn’t seem realistic at the time – it can cause that person to take positive steps to move forward.

Let’s say, for example, that you’ve gone through a breakup and your expectation of finding a life partner has waned. If you continue to have high expectations that you will meet the right person, you will be more likely to join a dating site and look for opportunities to meet new people.

On the other hand…

Low expectations limit our ability to develop and grow.

Having low expectations of achieving what we hope for is not a good way of adapting to life changes and can lead to feelings of helplessness and despair.

When we have low expectations of success after adversity, we are more likely to give up – not trying a dating app, for example. And even when our chances of success are objectively high, we pass up opportunities – to meet new people, perhaps – because of our low expectations that things will work out well for us.

Therefore, with high expectations, we can adapt to changing circumstances and move forward. It is a sign of resilience, adaptability and well-being.

Expectations of others

While it’s helpful to set high expectations for ourselves, we also tend to achieve better results when other people have high expectations of us. It’s called the Pygmalion effect.

When we know that other people consider us capable and believe that we can accomplish more than we think, it encourages us to strive for better performance. And similarly, when others have low expectations of us, our results often decline.

The Pygmalion effect has been extensively tested at work and at school, with similar results.

When can high expectations be bad?

Setting expectations too high can have negative effects.

Imagine that you have overestimated your knowledge and set challenges that are too big for yourself. You might have started playing Candy Crush on your partner’s cell phone and his level is much higher than yours. The lack of competence between you and the new level of the game can generate frustration and even anxiety.

To counteract this situation, all you need to do is go back to a level more suited to your experience – a level that is challenging but allows you to achieve high scores to progress through the game.

Our tendency is to do the same in real life to maintain balance.

Let’s say you’re hosting a dinner party for your friends. If you commit to a fancy meal that poses great difficulties, your anxiety may reach such high levels that you won’t be able to enjoy your own dinner.

But you can lower your expectations by preparing a meal that is less skill-intensive but still challenging (and which your friends will no doubt still enjoy).

managing expectations

We all have yearnings – the desire for an ideal version of our lives.

Some of our yearnings become goals (to have children, for example), while others become lifelong desires that will probably never come true (like winning on a television show).

One of the reasons people don’t want to have high expectations is to protect themselves from disappointment when their hopes don’t come true. The concern is valid. But learning to control emotions at the time of sadness and frustration helps us deal with adversity more effectively.

The pros of high expectations when it motivates us to set and achieve goals far outweigh the cons and any kind of “protection” we might have with low expectations.

Considering all this, I think it is too simplistic to believe that this is the reason for the happiness of the Finns.

This article was originally published on the academic news site The Conversation and republished under a Creative Commons license. Read the original English version here.

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