Expectations - Quotes

A life that is burdened with expectations is a heavy life. Its fruit is sorrow and disappointment. - Douglas Adams

A thing long expected takes the form of the unexpected when at last it comes. - Mark Twain

Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed. - Alexander Pope

Consciously or unconsciously, you always get what you expect. - Robert Anthony

Do a little more every day than you are expected to do, and soon you will be expected to do more. - Evan Esar

Don’t lower your expectations to meet your performance. Raise your level of performance to meet your expectations. Expect the best of yourself, and then do what is necessary to make it a reality. - Ralph Marston

Expect everything so that nothing comes unexpected. - Norton Juster

Expect more from yourself than from others. Because expectations from others hurt a lot, while expectations from yourself inspire a lot. That’s life. - Unknown

Expect nothing from others and you will never be disappointed. - Unknown

Expect people to be better than they are; it helps them to become better. But don’t be disappointed when they are not; it helps them to keep trying. - Merry Browne 

Expect the best, plan for the worst, and prepare to be surprised. - Denis Waitley

Expect the worst and you won't be disappointed. - Helen Macinnes

Expectation is the root of all heartache. - William Shakespeare

Expectations are blossoms; few only mature in fruit. - Emperor Ye-Wang

Expectations are dangerous when they are both too high and unformed. - Lionel Shriver

Expectations are dynamic benchmarks by which others judge performance, quality and relationships. - Unknown

Expectations were like fine pottery. The harder you held them, the more likely they were to crack. - Brandon Sanderson

Expecting is the greatest impediment to living. In anticipation of tomorrow, it loses today. - Seneca

From lean meat do not expect fat broth. - Turkish Proverb

He was swimming in a sea of other people’s expectations. Men had drowned in seas like that. - Robert Jordon

I am not in this world to live up to other people’s expectations, nor do I feel that the world must live up to mine. - Fritz Perls

I know not anything more pleasant, or more instructive, than to compare experience with expectation, or to register from time to time the difference between idea and reality. It is by this kind of observation that we grow daily less liable to be disappointed. - Samuel Johnson

I'm not in this world to live up to your expectations and you’re not in this world to live up to mine. - Bruce Lee

If you expect to have it all, you will have nothing. Learn to be happy with nothing -- and you will have it all! - Ernie J. Zelinski

If you expect nothing, you can never be disappointed. Apart from a few starry-eyed poets or monks living on a mountaintop somewhere, however, we all have expectations. We not only have them, we need them. They fuel our dreams, our hopes, and our lives like some super-caffeinated energy drink. - Tonya Hurley

If you paint in your mind a picture of bright and happy expectations, you put yourself into a condition conductive to your goal. - Norman Vincent Peale

In a little place is hid a great treasure, and in a small hope a boundless expectation. - J. Bodenham

In expectation, there is happiness. - Shi-Ka-Shiu

Nobody succeeds beyond his or her wildest expectations unless he or she begins with some wild expectations. - Ralph Charell

Nothing in this world is so fatal to the development of the intellectual powers of the young, as what are commonly called expectations. - Arster 

Oft expectation fails, and most oft where most it promises; and oft it hits where hope is coldest; and despair most sits. - Shakespeare

Positive expectations are the mark of the superior personality. - Brian Tracy

Promising is the very air o' the time; it opens the eyes of expectation. - William Shakespeare

The best things in life are unexpected – because there were no expectations. - Eli Khamarov

The crane, hoping to eat dried fish when the sea dried up, wasted away in expectancy. - Indian Proverb

There is abundant reason to believe that optimism – big, little, and in between – is useful to a person because positive expectations can be self-fulfilling. - Christopher Peterson

There is only one kind of shock worse than the totally unexpected: the expected for which one has refused to prepare. - Mary Renault

To expect the unexpected shows a thoroughly modern intellect. - Oscar Wilde

Trade your expectation for appreciation and the world changes instantly. - Tony Robbins

Where much is expected from an individual, he may rise to the level of events and make the dream come true. - Elbert Hubbard

We love to expect, and when expectation is disappointed or gratified, we want to be again expecting. - Samuel Johnson

Your expectations opens or closes the doors of your supply. If you expect grand things, and work honestly for them, they will come to you, your supply will correspond with your expectation. - Orison Swett Marden