Ep 126 - The Weight of Expectation

It's inevitable. At some point in your transition, you'll run into someone you know, and they'll ask you the simplest, but also hardest question. So what are you doing now? Depending on where you're at in your life shift, you may experience a wide range of super fast, almost subconscious responses, comfort, apathy, even panic. It's not that the question itself is complicated. And it's not that the answer is either. But for many, the question itself stirs up an almost reflexive reaction. And that is your body's response to the mental weight of the gap between what you're doing and what you think you should be doing by now. Hi, this is Jordana, the CEO of the Recon Network and host of the InBrief podcast. And today we're talking about expectations, the ones you set for yourself and the ones other people hand you. We're going to talk about why they can get heavier after a major life change. How to tell which ones deserve to be kept, and how to put down the ones that were never yours to carry at all. This is In Brief. Let's get to it. Every transition comes with 2 things: a timeline and a script. With the latter being shaped by the former. The timeline says, okay, by now you should have the career figured out, and by this point in time you should be making a certain amount, and over here you should feel settled, established, and clear on where you're going. And here's the thing, if you're on that timeline and everything is falling into place according to plan, you probably don't even register it. But if you aren't? Well, that's when the script comes in to run an internal dialogue that tells the story of how you're doing. Sometimes that script is positive. You got this. Things are just hard right now, but they'll get better. Sometimes, though, that script is head trash personified. You know, things would be better if you weren't so bad at it. Or, I can't believe you failed again. But here's the most important thing worth noticing about that script. You didn't write most of it. You inherited it. Some of it came from the military, a culture where progression is visible and timelines are universal. Rank told everyone exactly where you stood, and you learned to measure yourself against a schedule. They gave you checklists and TAP and told you how long everything would take for you to resettle after leaving service. They told you everyone wanted to hire veterans and you'd have no problem finding your next steps. Some of the expectations came from family. They taught you early how to handle conflict and stress. Your inner voice grew from what you heard growing up and absorbed as truth. They told you who you were, even if that definition was an external perception related to how they saw you within the larger whole. And of course, some of the script came from people you served with, and some came from a younger version of you who made very confident predictions about a life that they hadn't lived. The problem is that wherever it came from, you are carrying all of it, whether it makes sense or not. Every expectation from every source is stacked on top of each other, creating a mountain of how things should be and how you should be within the world. And when your real life doesn't match the stack, you don't question the stack. You question yourself. But here's the thing: expectations are not obligations. They're assumptions. They were assumptions about what your life should look like, made at a specific point in time by a specific person who often didn't even know you and certainly didn't have your current reality in view. Those assumptions deserve to be examined, not obeyed. So let's examine them. Take any expectation that's weighing on you and run it through 3 questions. The first is, whose is it? Is this expectation actually yours? Something that you chose because it reflects what you want? Or did you absorb it from someone else? This is an important distinction. A lot of what feels like ambition is really just other people's opinions that moved in and never left. The second question, is it current? Even if it was yours once, was it set by a version of you that no longer exists? The 25-year-old who planned your life didn't know what you know now. They hadn't lived through what you've lived through. Those expectations were built on the information available at the time, and times have changed. You have better information and likely a lot more self-awareness than you did back then. An adaptation to that reality is not failure. The third question: does it serve where you're going? Some expectations pull you forward. They stretch you in directions you actually want to grow. But some just sit on your chest. They don't motivate you. They judge you. And in those cases, they aren't really standards. They're just added weight. That distinction matters. Releasing an expectation is not Equivalent to lowering your standards. Standards are about how you show up, your integrity, your effort, your follow-through. Expectations are about outcomes on timelines. You can hold high standards and still release the expectation that your life follows someone else's schedule or someone else's trajectory. The harder part, of course, is dealing with other people's expectations. Family who expected a certain outcome or a career path, The peers who exited alongside you, but who measure you by where they think you should be. A community with really strong opinions about what success after service looks like, but little understanding about how that success is truly attained. Sure, you can't stop people from having expectations of you, but you can stop signing for the package. Because that's almost exactly what happens. Someone hands you an expectation, and you take ownership of a standard that you never Fully agreed to. Then later, if it isn't a fit for you, you begin defending yourself against it, explaining, justifying, overperforming, signaling that you accepted it as truth. And while it can feel aggressive to push back against those expectations, the alternative isn't necessarily confrontation; it's just declining to carry it. Thanks, but that's not the stage I'm at. Full stop. No explanation. No defense required, not even for Grandma. As for the expectations you decide to keep, make them explicit. Write them down, because expectations that live only in the back of your mind operate like judges, and expectations you've consciously chosen operate like guides. It's the same feedback, but a completely different weight. So here's what I want you to do this week. Name one expectation that's been sitting on you, just one. Run it through the 3 questions: whose is it, is it current, and does it serve where I'm going? If it fails, put it down. Not dramatically, not with a big announcement, just stop carrying it and take a minute and feel the weight release and acknowledge that you won't pick it up again, even accidentally. You'll likely notice something else once you do. The energy that expectation was consuming will come back to you and can fuel your journey to the right place. Because carrying weight takes effort, even when you're standing still. You don't have to meet every expectation you were handed. Most of them weren't designed with you in mind anyway.

Leaving the military can feel chaotic, especially when you feel you should have a plan right away. But not knowing what's next doesn't mean you're failing. It means you're in transition. At the Recon Network, we help veterans and military spouses navigate transition by focusing on stability, direction, and alignment before outcomes are expected, so you can map your future without rushing the wrong move or spending years building a life out of sync with your purpose. Don't rush your next step. Navigate it with intention with Recon. Learn more about our programs and services at recon.vet.