What To Do With Disappointment

Everyone knows the feeling of disappointment. It’s one of the more unpleasant human emotions we experience. The interesting thing about our human emotions is this: they all call to one another. It seems they all play in the same sandbox. What I mean is, one emotion is usually related to another. But, I digress.

One important way to deal with disappointment is to understand what it is. The word disappointment is a compound word made up of dis and appointment. When we appoint someone, we are designating an area or specific place for them. The prefix dis means lack or away from - so, disappointment is the feeling we get when we realize someone or something is not where we’ve placed them. In other words, disappointment is essentially our response to emotional and relational misplacement. As you can see, this makes disappointment more about us than any other person or thing.

Disappointment forces us to re-evaluate where we’ve placed people in our emotional life, why they are there and what we expect from them. Its important to be moderate in our thoughts because disappointment can easily redirect and turn inward and we focus too much on our relational misplacement. I am learning that disappointment has less to do with unmet expectations, and more to do with how I feel about my own mis-judgement. This awareness is where the real work begins. Step into it!