Expectations vs Expectancy

I have always been one of those people who say expectations are my own worst enemy. I really had no idea what this truly meant in my life. I would be excited about an event and then after it was over, I would feel a sense of disappointment. I wouldn't have lived in the moment and then I would be frustrated that I spent lots of energy waiting for it and then I had no happy memory to keep with me.

While I was reading The Shack, the author raised the point of the expectations vs expectancy. This point was, at first, lost on me. It didn't apply. But the more I started to go through therapy and realized how much disappointment was affecting my every day life in association with expectations, I started to reconsider. To me, an expectation is a noun. A finite thing. It is a bar or a line in the sand I expect an experience to live up to. Something I had to realize was some of my expectations were unrealistic. (Example: When I graduated college, my family took me to Hawaii. John went with us and the whole time I was expecting him to propose. He didn't. I was disappointed. I remember very little about the trip)

So I started thinking. Why does an event have to only live up to a single measuring point? Why can't something be a good experience and not make it to the set expectation? Or, what happens if something 'exceeds my expectation"? Will I truly appreciate it if I am too busy trying to measure it?

I asked myself, "Why can't I just live in a sense of expectancy"? Why can't I just know things are going to happen and appreciate them for what they are? This allows me to live in the moment and make lasting memories. I mean, I graduated from college, went to Hawaii with the man I love and I don't remember much because I was swimming in a pool of anxiety and disappointment from my expectations. I completely this was self-inflicted, but I do not think I am the only one out there who lives this way.

I know I will be disappointed in life and this is not an attempt to never be. That in of itself is a unrealistic expectations. I had a sweet talk with a good friend about anxiety and I believe that if I can enter into a situation without set expectations, but aware that things will happen (living in expectancy) I will be more relaxed. I will have less anxiety and be better emotionally equipped to handle what will happen.