Self Help In Sight

The holiday season offers challenges to all relationships.  One area of challenge is expectations–your own as well as the expectations of your romantic partner.

Being clear about your own expectations, managing the major expectations of your partner, and helping your partner to manage his or her other expectations are strategies for surviving the holidays without major disappointment or upheaval. As with most relationship dynamics, the better you are at communicating your desires and needs, the better the outcome.

It is important to be clear about your own expectations.

Managing your own expectations of a relationship partner is important whether your relationship is new or established. If you’ve been with someone a long time, managing your expectations may not be too challenging because you know what you can expect of him or her. If your relationship is new, setting expectations can be very challenging.

One strategy to avoid the disappointment of unmet expectations is to set them low. As a college girlfriend told me, “if you live in hope, you die in despair”. She helped me avoid expecting too much and the disappointment associated with not getting my expectations met.

Constantly setting expectations low may help you avoid disappointment but likely means selling your self short. Today, my college girlfriend’s words would give me pause. I’d wonder if my interest in her was greater than she could return. At least, I’d want to check out how serious she was about me and us. As it turned out, I could have saved myself some pain.

As in most things, setting expectations is about balance. Have reasonable expectations of a romantic partner. Don’t sell your self short by having no expectations even if it means being disappointed and perhaps deciding that someone isn’t the right person for you.

Managing your partner’s major expectations is hard but also important.

It is much easier to manage your own expectations than the expectations of someone else. Indeed, it can be near impossible to manage another’s expectations even if you are a skilled diplomat with time to spare. Nonetheless, it is important to try to manage a partner’s major expectations by letting him or her know tactfully if you think his or her expectations are way too great (or way too small).

The expectations I am referring to are the “big” ones like an engagement ring or maybe even a special trip to your partner’s “home” to meet his or her parents. Of course, there is no end to the variety of what a partner might expect of you. Use your best observation skills to see if you and your partner are widely different in your expectations of each other. If you discover wide differences, it’s time to use your diplomacy skills to temper your partner’s expectations.

Help your partner figure out your minor and reasonable expectations.

If you have reasonable expectations of your partner and you are fairly sure his or her expectations are not widely different than your own, you can help him or her by hinting at what you expect. One way to do this is by “floating trial balloons” about what your expectations are. For example, you might say, “It would be nice if we could spend Christmas Day together, what are your plans?” Or, you might say, “I’ve really enjoyed the time we’ve spent together so far and put a lot of thought into what you get you. I really hope you like it and that we can get to use it together soon.”

These trial balloons can help him or her manage his/her own expectations. Obviously, floating trial balloons or giving any other sort of hint about how you view your relationship takes skill and, maybe, bravery. Doing it well is just another element of communicating your wants and needs in a relationship. That has benefits at all times of the year not just during the holidays.