I mentioned Kir the other week, when she let me share a Proud Mommy Moment with you guys and her readers. I mentioned how she is kind, and supportive, and loving. I’m so happy to have her here today to talk about her expectations.

Kir writes very openly about her struggle with fertility and the birth of her handsome twin boys. She’s inspirational in the way she writes about the hard times she’s been through and the love and friendship she’s found through her writing.

Kir is a fiction writer, a storyteller. Her writing is incredible, and I encourage you to get lost in it for a while.

I’m proud to have her in my corner today. Thanks for sharing with us, Kir!

Hi everyone.

I am so excited to be sharing this space with Greta today; she is a truly phenomenal gal. “Great Expectations” is such a wonderful series and I am so proud and humbled to be here today sharing my thoughts with you today.

I believe that the posts that have come out of us talking about our own expectations show us a very human side of one another and the stories give us a chance to nod our heads and say “yes! Me too!”

Thank you Greta, Your friendship and support has made me smile this year and “Great Expectations” is one of my favorite things about the internet.

You’re awesome Girl! Xo

“Expectations” is such a big word, in so many more ways than the number of letters.

Because unlike having only yourself to count on, it begs your heart to rely on someone or something else, to anticipate events that may not be within your control or to hope for something that is not guaranteed; it simply seeks a trust beyond your own will.

I have been told many times in my life that “I expect too much”. Sometimes it was in the context of a romantic relationship, other times it happened in friendships that I treasured but in every case I fought against myself and had moments of wondering if I was asking too much of the situation.

What I came to see was that when you “expect” you are really asking if you “Deserve”.

Amid those relationships falling apart because of what the other person deemed was “too much” I was also found that in reality what they were saying to me was that maybe I didn’t “deserve” what I was asking for.

Wow. That’s heavy stuff isn’t it?

Yet in my life, good things came from it.

Sure, I have been saddened and hurt when the love, care and concern I have offered to other people never came back around, but that never stopped me from giving those things to the world around me. It never turned my heart to stone or caused me to build a wall around my life never allowing anyone in because of the fear that I would never be treated equally.

Instead it makes me work harder to show people that they mean something to me, it encourages me to reach out and say the words, ease the hurts and celebrate the accomplishments, even when they are not mine.

Sometimes I wonder if that is what keeps us on opposite sides of our fences; the thought that other people or situations can never measure up to the preconceived notion we have of them. If you’ll excuse my use of the word again…do we all “expect too much of the world?”

I don’t think so. I live in a constant state of hope, anticipation and possibility about my life.

Cock-eyed optimist is a title I wear with grinning pride.

“Expecting” anything is a daily practice in self awareness for me. Look, I know it’s a rather selfish request when I am anticipating a reaction, a display or a response that may never happen the way I think it will. That’s not to say that it never happens, it just doesn’t occur the way I envision.

For me, that is the place where I could always wallow in disappointment and lash out at the unfairness of never being treated the same way. But thankfully optimism seems to be tangled in my DNA and even in the darkest moments, it brings me into the light, it reminds me that nothing stays hopeless  forever as long as you let your own energy seep into those gray corners.

Maybe that means I’m still “expecting too much”, perhaps I will never stop anticipating the best case scenario or believing with all my heart that in some small way I ‘deserve” the things I desire, but at the heart of that childlike faith is a simple truth:

My life is happier and more fulfilled when I am giving others more than they expect.

Get to know Kir on her blog, The Kir Corner, Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Pinterest.