Our Expectations Are Killing Us

Sometimes we’re not anxious because of the difficulty of life, we’re anxious because our expectations were unhealthy. In this episode, Princeton talks about how we can manage our anxiety by managing our expectations of life, people, and ourselves.

 

Episode Highlights: 

• As the anxiety series continues, Princeton will discuss expectations concerning anxiety.
• People have expectations, but people need to practice asking what builds these expectations.
• Princeton often compares himself so much with young influencers, which made him feel down on his own and creates much sense of delay.
• Princeton shares 2Kings 5:1-7 passage, which will help people deal with anxiety.
• John 10:10 implies not to focus primarily on what the enemy's doing, but on how you live your life based on your purposes.  
• Look at life and life more abundantly- the quality of life as lived upon the earth. 
• People tend to ignore mental health in pursuing the ultimate life-ending.
• As we learn a lot of things in life, our enemies continue to gain grounds because we don't have the discussion.
• Anxiety must be dealt on three levels, and understand that self is a tripart who has a spirit, a soul that lives in a body.
• Luke used Agony, a very particular word describing Jesus' emotion in the garden of Gethsemane.
• The cause of anxiety can be from external shapers, such as trauma or a perceived threat, but the most significant reason for it is our thought.
• People build their lives in unhealthy expectations, and then anxiety comes from the process of those unhealthy expectations not being fulfilled.
• It is not wrong to have expectations, but it is essential to know the difference between healthy and unhealthy expectations.
• Healthy expectations produce hope, while unhealthy expectations produce anxiety.
• The separator between healthy and unhealthy expectations is the question, "What shaped your expectations? Was it by God or by people? By wisdom or by fear? By your identity or by your insecurity? Out of purpose or out of pride? 
• Princeton tells a story from 2 King 5:1-7, about a proud leprotic man named Namaan, who meets Elisha to heal him. 
• Namaan was so proud that he felt he was doing them a favor by coming over and not killing them all. 
• Namaan is on the verge of not being healed because his process is not going according to his unhealthy expectations. 
• On Princeton's 6th grade activity, the teacher asked why he expected to go to Princeton University, was it by purpose, or is the pride that “Princeton went to Princeton”? 
• Going to USC, Princeton expected to live with all other freshmen but ended up living a hundred-mile off-campus house with Juniors. 
• Because of unexpected things that happened in his life, he gets to meet the most amazing people in his life. 
• Princeton realized that the greatest miracles in his life occurred on the other side of his unhealthy expectations.
• Princeton challenged everyone to reshape where they thought they'd be at this age and rethink what they would have accomplished by now.
• People tend to make the situation worse by trying to turn “what is” to “what they thought”. 
• Micromanaging every piece of the process will send yourself to further anxiety. 
• Healthy expectations will free you to the present, to serve, and to rest, which ultimately allows you to build discipline as you focus on how to be obedient to the process. 
• The greatest help for our anxiety is to remove the pressure we put on our experience to be perfect. 
• Stop building your brand, and remember to build your life.
• Everything God's promise will come to pass.

 

3 Key Points:

1. It is not wrong to have expectations, but you must know the difference between healthy and unhealthy expectations.
2. Remove too much pressure in life, the pressure we put on our lives, become the pressure that we put on our minds. 
3. Submit to process beyond your expectation to achieve the healing that you have been desiring. 

 

Tweetable Quotes: 

• "I really believe that sometimes, our expectations are killing us"- Princeton Parker
• "I want to be saved and delivered. I want the fullness of what Jesus promised me." -Princeton Parker
• "It is not wrong to have expectations" - Princeton Parker
• "I am fixated on the way I thought, my life was supposed to go, not in the way it is productive for my life to go." - Princeton Parker
• "Sometimes the greatest thing in your lives are on the other side of your expectation"-Princeton Parker
• "Every time God challenges me to think differently, every time that God, challenged me to submit, every time to challenge to embrace a process, I have found the most impactful healing."-Princeton Parker

 

Resources Mentioned: 

• Building Without a Blueprint Podcast 
• Princeton's Website
• Email Princeton: buildingwithprinceton@gmail.com
• Princeton Parker: Instagram  Facebook  Twitter