A Better Question
crossing the threshold of 2025
Dear Reader,
I’m writing to you from my favorite IKEA chair which is placed squarely in front of our fireplace. It’s a coveted spot in winter because the rest of our house tends to stay chilly. I’ve been fervently advocating for a portable space heater in the dining room but negotiations are still in progress.
Since I last sat down to write, the new year has arrived and I feel thankful to be carrying a question to guide me as I cross the threshold to 2025. It’s a question that wasn’t on my radar at this time last year.
Choosing a question wasn’t something I was trying to do intentionally, the way some people choose a word every January. This question was a surprise gift from a friend last year and ever since it’s been reframing situations for me. That’s how it earned a spot as a close companion in 2025.
Before I could hear the new question, God had to expose the one that had been whispering into my ear for most of my life:
“What’s expected of me?”
I’ve spent a lot of (wasted) time in my own head trying to determine the exact parameters of a situation so that I could meet them as close to perfectly as possible. Endless stacks of “how to” books and blogs have helped fill in the blanks that I couldn’t fill in myself.
What’s expected of me in this job? In this friendship? As a wife? As a mother? As a daughter? In this community? By the culture? By the church? By God?
If only I can figure out what people expect of me I can avoid any anger or disappointment that could potentially get directed my way.
To put it another way: if I could decipher the expectations, I could keep myself safe.
Except that forty-seven years of life have taught me that even if it’s possible to meet someone’s expectations (or my own conjured idea of their expectations) it doesn’t equal safety. Expectations are relative, they’re constantly changing based on the people setting them, the culture, or my own interpretation of them.
It was after a church trip last July that I realized how much power this question of expectations carried in my life. Looking back, I could see the pressure that had built up inside of me throughout the week. In this case, it was mostly the way I internalized the expectations and not about the expectations themselves. I remembered an hour when I consciously set aside the pressure and got out my art supplies so that I could paint the Ionian sea. Allowing myself to hold the paintbrush was similar to entering a decompression chamber. Then I was able to return to the challenging tasks in front of me.
After the trip, the question began to light up in my head as if someone had plugged in a neon sign. Once I saw it, there was no way to unsee it.
It was actually the Lord’s grace to bring the question fully to my attention before I began a new teaching job in the Fall of 2024. During a conversation with a friend about the job, she suggested I think less about the board’s expectations and more about what I wanted to bring to the class. To spur me on she told me that I was good at encouraging people to create, simply for the joy of creating.
“What do I want to bring?”
My efforts to define expectations all the time had the tendency to paralyze me. On the other hand, thinking about what I wanted to bring to the situation led me toward words with energy and movement, like “play” and “experiment”. It led me to think about the gifts and passions I have, which in turn helped me remember the God who created me this way. I was reminded that I’m not on my own when I’m leaning into who he made me to be.
I’m also not naive.
I realize my husband can’t walk into his corporate headquarters tomorrow and tell his boss that their expectations don’t matter. I’m not suggesting we throw out expectations. But something interesting starts happening when the two questions get paired together.
For now, I’ll end with my favorite quote about living with questions. Here’s a bit of it, but I recommend you check out the entire quote:
Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”
-Rainer Maria Rilke
What about you? What do you want to bring to parenthood? To marriage? To friendship? To your church? To your job?
This and That
A fun bit of news: I started this newsletter two years go (December 2023). This the 96th issue I’ve written. I hope you’ll help me countdown to my 100th issue! 🥳
Blessings from the Guest Nest,
-Aimee
Thanks so much for reading, sharing, and contributing to the conversation. You can support my art and writing by donating to my art supply fund and by sharing this newsletter with friends who might enjoy it.
What a wonderful question to ask yourself! I can see how it transforms the approach. You’re right that we can’t eliminate or ignore expectations but your reframing helps set aside the unspoken (sometimes imagined) expectations. I can’t wait to see what you bring to 2025 and the world around you.
Aimee, these are beautifully powerful questions. I'll be sitting quietly with them in the days ahead ... and can't help believing that their answers will both surprise and free me. Thank you.