Expectations. How much time have you spent dwelling on them, ruminating on them, being let down by them? If you’re like me, a lot. But how much time have you spent actually questioning their importance?

By this point in life, one thing I can certainly be certain of is the prevailing presence of uncertainty. Nothing ever turns out to be the way you expect it. This unpredictability is the one thing you can count on. So why, then, do we spend so much precious energy investing in our expectations?

expectations: strong belief that something will happen or be the case in the future

The other day in ballet class, the teacher said something that stuck: “Remove your expectations.” He was referring to the expectations every dancer in the room absolutely shared in that moment, preparing for pirouettes across the floor; We were all thinking, “This is the part of class to get in multiple pirouettes. If I don’t hit any triples or higher, this part of class has been a failure.” Our teacher’s suggestion was to abandon this train of thought entirely. Hop off of the expectation train!

In place of expecting, we were instructed to be present. To use the exercise as just that: a learning experience. A chance to build. Check in with our bodies in that moment, remember the techniques that work, try to apply them, and see what happens. If you go into a pirouette expecting three and end up falling out of two, your brain reads only failure. If you go into the pirouette with an open, steady mind, you are more apt to clue in what’s happening- the good and the bad.

Time and time again I come back to life lessons learned in the ballet studio. In the crowded elevator of our brains in their every day shuffle, it can be easy to miss out on these chances to translate ballet into human language. But with a world of 2020 uncertainty and unpredictability around every corner, I’m finding myself relating anecdotes from ballet class directly to my life quite often. Back to expectations…

This lesson might be the most important of the year so far. Remove the expectations. It works for both the high and the low ones. Just don’t expect. Stop trying to predict the future. It will only ever prove you wrong. So let that go. Open yourself up to right here, right now. Do your best to set things up for yourself however you see most fit in this moment.

I’ve been learning a bit about manifestation lately. Whether you believe in its power or not, the practice of bringing yourself what you want in life through a present mindset (not future!) certainly feels powerful. To be clear- in my understanding, manifestation is not a practice of focusing on what you want for your future, rather mindfully embodying what is coming now. It’s about tapping into the things that may not be physically happening, but feel real and true to you somewhere deep in your gut. It’s a difficult thing to tap into, but surely only made more challenging with pesky expectations clouding your vision.

So try this: close your eyes and look out into the horizon of your inner focus. Wipe the skyline clean. Stop picturing things and instead tap into what you feel. Does your gut rise up into your head and jingle any bells? Is your supporting leg telling you to engage the “safety pin of steel” under your glute? Is your throat whispering a command to a little dog named Louie? Tap in, feel them all, and just hang on…