Do you know that feeling that you have days before a nice event is going to happen in your life? Let’s say you are going on a vacation, the days before actually going you are very excited and have a lot of great expectations. You are thinking about how you are going to behave on that vacation, and you have visualized some great scenarios for yourself that are going to happen on your vacation. You are also thinking about how you are going to make great memories with the people you are with, and how great those people will behave. You will be counting days after days. After every day, you are a step closer to your vacation which gives you even more excitement, and it may get you a little more nervous. All of this is completely normal; we all look forward to nice events in our lives.
When you think about the days before going on a vacation, what are you mostly doing? Of course, you are packing your suitcase and maybe you are planning to get some last-minute stuff for that vacation. But besides that, what are you really doing, counting days after days and thinking about that vacation? Sure, you look forward to that vacation, but your expectations can ruin your time before and your time at your vacation. Let me explain it to you.
The days before going
Just because you know you have a big event to happen does not mean you cannot do anything else than think about and prepare yourself for that vacation, these days before are no different than any other days in your vacation. You can do the greatest stuff as always; the only difference is that you will be going on vacation soon! A lot of great chances will be missed by spending your time only thinking about your vacation and not doing anything special. Why would you do that to yourself? And you do not even know if that vacation is going to be that great, you only expect it to be! Each day has 86,400 seconds, this also applies to the days before your vacation. Time does not change; you are responsible for filling in your time. By spending most of your time thinking and preparing yourself for that vacation, you are wasting your time before going on vacation.
Expectations
Your expectations can ruin the time at your vacation. As said in the beginning, you maybe have these great expectations visualized. The thing is, it will never be like your expectations, which is one of the things that is so great about life; you cannot exactly know what is going to happen in the future. Watching a football match live is much better than watching the highlights the next day with already knowing the score, right? When you have these great expectations, there is a chance that these will not come true. That will leave you with negative feelings, the good things that you expected to happen did not happen. Let’s say on the other hand you expected a great thing to happen and then it did happen, did that expectation make the situation better or worse? Fill in yourself.
Your view
So now you are maybe thinking “Can I not have any great expectations for the upcoming vacation?” Sure, you can, but you should consider the risks of not fulfilling those expectations and thinking how much of a value these expectations have on you. When you are on your vacation, and you keep thinking about the great memories you will make, you will not enjoy every actual moment that much. You are stuck in your head thinking you must leave your vacation with a lot of great memories, without realizing that those thoughts can ruin it for you. The reason why unexpected great moments become the greatest memories is that you did not expect anything great to happen. You should view your vacation that way, with an open view. Also, do not say to yourself that your vacation will be terrible just to conclude that in the end it was not terrible at all, just live with an open view and do not think too much about these future events, that way you will live in the moment and enjoy it the most :)
