Disappointment is basically your emotional response to a ‘prediction error’: Reality did not match your expectations and the bigger the gap, the larger the emotional response.
First, expect prediction error. Humans across the board are lousy predictors of future emotional states. Research has repeatedly shown that we consistently overestimate both how happy success will make us and how miserable failure will leave us, a phenomenon known as impact bias. We predict permanent emotional states and yet we quickly adapt, both to the negative and the positive. On the upside, this is called hedonic adaptation; the mind quickly normalizes success, yesterday’s dream is today’s everyday.
Second, beware expectation inflation. Disappointment is measured by the distance between your expectations and the actual outcome and expectations are socially contagious; social media, advertising, and selective storytelling distort our concept of normal as we compare our everyday lives to other’s highlight reels. Excessively high expectations create more opportunities for disappointment. Aim high yet hold your expectations lightly.
Third, remember it’s all relative. It’s all in your head: $10,000 out of the blue is pure joy… Unless you were expecting $100,000. You outran reality, you had already begun living a projected future in your mind, you had moved into (and furnished?) a house you didn’t own.
Fourth, it’s just data and an opportunity to improve. Disappointment shows where and how our prediction models are off and gives valuable feedback on how to update our mental prediction models.
The upside lies in the chance to recalibrate, to flex, to adapt, to avoid future error. Disappointment may be unpleasant however it is a very useful signal. Those who seek wisdom and growth rise above the momentary negative emotion, reflect and learn and thus succeed far beyond those who merely dwell in their disappointment without deconstructing the pathways that led thereto.
Closing Quotes:
“Turn your wounds into wisdom.” – Oprah Winfrey
“The size of your disappointment is directly proportional to the size of the unstated contract you made with a future that hadn’t happened yet.” – Dr. Brené Brown, Atlas of the Heart
“Expectation is a sensory illusion; disappointment is the reality check. The mind requires the friction of a miss if it is to keep its predictive edge razor-sharp.” – Dr. James H. Austin, Zen and the Brain
“Disappointment is the psychological tax we pay for running inaccurate mental models. Evolution designed it to hurt so that we would stop wasting energy on strategies that yield no reward.” – Dr. Randolph M. Nesse, Good Reasons for Bad Feelings
As always, I share what I most want and need to learn. – Nathan S. Collier
Note: Every effort has been made to properly source any 3rd person material. I am, however, a voracious reader. If anyone finds any unattributed material, pls let me know asap and I will be delighted to give credit where credit is due.
“All intelligent thoughts have already been thought; what is necessary is only to try to think them again.” – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1749-1832
