Thought for the Day - Leave Others with High Expectations of Themselves

This post is inspired by these two ideas 

1) Was it Longfellow who said something like 'when you meet someone bigger than you leave them with a good impression of yourself. When you meet someone smaller than you, leave them with a favorable impression of themselves.'  

And..

2) We often try to live up to others expectations of us. 

There are three things we can do in an interaction with others, especially those to whom our words matter

1) Leave the other with lower expectations that he or she has of himself

A person X is doing something with great enthusiasm and we put a dampener on it. 'You sing horribly', 'You are not good at that' or 'There's no future in dancing' or whatever. This is what we do when we criticise actively or passively. 

In this case the person X is feeling good about something and we actively lower his idea of himself by telling him our expectations of him. 'You are not as good as you think bro' is what we are saying.

We lowered his own expectations of himself - to ours. 

Result - He will lose whatever confidence he had and give up. We do that with children (easiest targets) and also with most others,

Definitely not a good thing so stop doing that.

2) Leave the other with no expectation

This is less harmful than the 1 above but it is not getting the best out of that person either. Here X is clearly not aware of how good he is, or is perhaps looking for some validation from the world. We see the spark in his talent, but then we see that there is a lot of improvement required. We compare him to the greats in the world in our mind - 'You are good but not be a Tendulkar' we think and prefer to leave him alone with no comment. 

We have lost an opportunity to help that person explore that spark. The lack of validation, mostly from someone that person looks up to, dampens his spirit and he loses faith in himself.  

We have not harmed him. But we have not helped him either.

3) Leave the other with a high expectation

This I feel is the best way we can deal with others. Someone does something creative, is passionate about something. You can see their eyes shining, the enthusiasm in their eyes and we know it is something they love doing. Even if they have done a bad job and you can see it, there is no harm is saying 'Brilliant stuff, you're as good as the best'. Suddenly X is thinking - Wow, they really think I have a spark, maybe there is something here. And that remains in them, as a little seed of hope that never dies. If you can actually back your statement with some process orientation, even better.

But those words will make that person feel like reaching up to be a better version of himself. They stand up whenever self-doubt arises. All you have to do is show that possibility.

Leave them with a high expectation and they will live up to that. 

...

Most of us do not have high expectations from ourselves. We are not even sure if we are good enough for anything. We seek validation.

An idea, a possibility, can change things. If we can show every one we meet a greater possibility of themselves, we are setting them up with something to live up to. If not for themselves, they will do it for you! It gives them something bigger to aspire for. Makes them feel good to know that someone thinks they are worthy of something. Big.

Some awareness, imagination, compassion and a few well chosen words and voila - you make every interaction a huge possibility for those who have met you.