Entitlement, Expectations, the Easy Life and Other Misguided Notions
Maybe I just grew up on planet Pluto. Maybe my expectations need tweaking.
Yes, I realize that poor Pluto isn't really a planet anymore — just a dwarf planet — but I don't think that alters the facts.
I own several web sites, I am still a "community volunteer" in several online communities and forums; I write fairly extensively — both here and elsewhere — I keep a variety of blah-gs and yadda, yadda, yadda. Point being, that I get a lot of email, both randomly out of the blue, as well as from people I know a little... or a lot. It's simply the result of having been "visible" online since 1996.
Anyway, there is a pervasive "subtext" I have noticed — and it doesn't seem to be limited to just the online world — that life is, somehow, "supposed to be easier" than it actually is.
I am stunned by the number of people who moan and groan over the slightest difficulties and setbacks, and go on and on about "how unfair" it is that employers aren't lining up at their door with job offers two days after posting their resumé on LinkedIn, Indeed, or CareerBuilder; or how "online dating sites don't work" because they haven't managed to meet the great love of their life after their profile has been up for three days and they haven't lifted a finger to make contact with anyone.
We even see it here in the cryptosphere where people throw $1,000 at some random blockchain project with a "hot" White Paper and then are upset because they haven't ended up with $100,000, three weeks later.
Maybe I just grew up on the planet Pluto, but I was raised with the expectation that much of life will be really hard, really unfair, and will often suck horribly — so you'd better celebrate those occasional moments when everything just works out swimmingly.
In my universe, "swimmingly" has always been a place you get to through a lot of hard work and many and often failures — it's definitely not the "default expectation" of how the world unfolds. The perfect life and other results don't just show up on a silver platter, served up to you by other people!
It strikes me as somewhat funny (strange, not ha-ha) that I am writing this, since most people have described me as a hopeless and naive idealist, rather than a fatalist.
The long and the short of it is that I have always believed that the key operator in the phrase "Create Your Own Reality" is the word "create." That's an active verb, requiring active participation. Yet I am stunned by the number of folks who (appear to me to) operate under the assumption that all you have to do is "think it," and an army of tiny minions make it happen, with no effort on your own behalf.
But then again, it could be that my expectations need tweaking....
The again, it could be that our perception of how much personal effort is required to create the life we want is a reflection of how much effort it has taken us, historically. Some people seem to "think it" and "it" magically and instantaneously appears, while others "think it" for a lifetime, but nothing actually happens till they've spent 20 years crawling through broken glass on their hands and knees.
All I know is that with each passing year, it seems like a lot of people expect things to come to them more easily.
Not sure what that's about, but there it is!
Thanks for reading, and have a great week!
How about YOU? Is life getting "easier?" How hard or easy does it seem to be to get things to work out the way you want? Comments, feedback and other interaction is invited and welcomed! Because — after all — SOCIAL content is about interacting, right? Leave a comment — share your experiences — be part of the conversation!
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Created at 20210503 23:49 PDT
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