Aim for a few enjoyable moments

Sometimes it's better to have limited expectations

Any readers who have young kids know that traveling with a toddler is always challenging. On a recent family vacation, my then-2-year-old screamed for long chunks of the flight, threw crackers all over the plane, and stayed up from 2 a.m. to 4 a.m. one night, requiring Herculean feats from me to keep him from waking everyone else.

So it wasn’t exactly a week at the spa. Indeed, if I had seized on those points of evidence, I might have deemed the trip a disaster. Here I was, theoretically on vacation on a gorgeous island (and paying for the privilege!), and for many hours of the trip I was miserable.

But fortunately, I went in with a different goal than non-stop bliss. I know that non-stop bliss isn’t possible. Instead, my goal for the trip was to have a few enjoyable moments. By keeping my expectations low, and being on the hunt for those enjoyable moments, I was able to deem the trip a success.

Looking for the good stuff

There were definitely a few enjoyable moments on that trip. My husband and I got to go on a sunset boat cruise and we saw a double rainbow. I went night kayaking with one of my older children and saw lots of fish through our clear bottomed boat. I spotted a giant sea turtle while snorkeling. Since I was aiming for a few enjoyable moments, I made sure to note these, which is why I can recount them now. When I think of that trip, I do not only think of my toddler and my wee hours vigils. The sea turtle gets a spot in my memories too.

Maybe you, too, have something coming up in your life that is theoretically supposed to be fun, but might have its challenges. Maybe it’s a wedding where you’ll have to deal with a difficult family member. Maybe it’s a work event for your spouse where partners are expected to come along and then feign interest in random work details the entire time. Maybe it’s a parade or a bonfire or dinner out or a week at the beach or basically anything where you are going to be the primary caregiver for a toddler.

What if you went in with limited expectations? You know that the experience probably won’t be non-stop fantastic. But what if you aimed for at least a few enjoyable moments?

Reality won’t change; mindsets can

Most likely you would clear that bar. Perhaps you’d note that the cake at that family wedding was uncommonly good, and you enjoyed talking to the bride’s uncle, who managed to find all that unresolved family tension funny. Maybe you’d really appreciate the shrimp appetizer at the work event, even as you listened to your spouse’s boss tell that story about the rock band he played with in college again. And you’d pause and savor the two hours you got to read on the beach house porch while the toddler was napping. You’d appreciate these moments for themselves, and the joy they brought you, rather than losing them in the narrative of the whole event being underwhelming.

This mindset shift really can help. Once, when I shared this strategy, a woman told me that it changed her perspective about her recent multi-week family road trip. There had been a lot of rough spots. But did they have at least a few enjoyable moments in the course of their travels? Why yes. Yes they did. The headaches alone did not need to define the experience.

In any case, low expectations are easy to meet. Reality is what it is. It is better to have low expectations and wildly exceed them, than to hope for perfection and be constantly disappointed. Anyone can have a few enjoyable moments. We often can’t change reality, but we can change how we view it, and it does make a difference.