What are you supposed to do when your plan goes awry, or when you are not treated the way that you thought had been completely deserved, without the slightest bit of doubt? How are you supposed to react to the realization that somebody you would swim across an ocean (backward!) for would not even hop a tiny rain puddle in a parking lot for you? When is it appropriate to draw the line between the two categories: "enough is enough" and "that's just how people are." How do you even come up with criteria to distinguish between those groupings?

Dealing with the feeling of disappointment is difficult. It sucks when things do not work out how you had imagined them to. The perfect vision bubble that is floating around inside of your brain, keeping to itself and minding its own business, suddenly gets destroyed by a sharp roadblock that seemed to appear out of nowhere. It can be easy to allow the remnants of that flawlessly sculpted idea to plague your mind after the initial popping of the vision bubble. Expectations are now shattered and begin to emit a toxic gas that quickly takes over your entire body, as you begin to ask yourself, "So now what?"

Disappointment is a messy cocktail of negative thoughts and feelings that if you continue to suck down an excessive amount at a pace that is not monitored, then the chances of doing or saying something that you will totally regret increase immensely. As extremely hard as it may be, you need to remember not to act too quickly on the initial feeling of disappointment. It is easier said than done, but you must step back from the situation and allow yourself ample time to clear your mind so that you can work through the situation rationally as opposed to emotionally. However, it is also imperative to tune into the emotions that you are feeling as a result of the disappointment that you are experiencing; emotions are a component to being human and are nothing to be ashamed of. Ever. Acknowledge how you are feeling, but never wallow in self-pity. In other words, being disappointed is not ideal, which can be really inconvenient at times, yet learning how to accept what has happened and using that specific moment as a learning opportunity may not be as entirely awful as you had initially thought.

Life's excitement stems from the element of the unknown; just think about how boring it would be if you knew exactly what was going to happen every single second of every single day. Additionally, experiencing a disappointment can be a great learning opportunity and has the potential to lead your life in an unexpected direction that could bring so many new adventures. Maybe things didn't work out how you would have preferred, but that doesn't mean that the result is destined to be horrible.

Furthermore, I try to use the instances when I have been disappointed by the actions or words of other people as a glaring example of what I do not want to be. Instead of judging and letting myself grow upset and angry about a certain situation, I use my feelings of disappointment as motivation to make a conscious effort to strive for being the best I can be so that I do not cause identically painful, disappointed feelings in the lives of the people who are important to me.

So if I understand that disappointments are bound to occur all throughout life, then should I feel guilty for having such high expectations for people? While I continue pondering this prescriptive issue, I realize that my attempt to determine the answer is complex and will take, at a minimum, an increase in time and a thorough value preference assessment prior to coming to a conclusion. In the meantime, I will try my best to maintain an optimistic attitude by not allowing the toxic remnants from a burst bubble in my imagination have the power to ruin and set the tone of my life as I continue living from day to day.