Disappointment.

Disappointment is the other side of expectation.

Without expectation there can be no disappointment and so the question is, how to live in the world without expectation?

In Dhamma training we are encouraged to cultivate the 'don't know mind' as this is the way to live in the world and harmonise with the ever changing possibilities of life without struggling.

'Not knowing' is the reality of every moment and all beings meet the experience of life changing suddenly because of one, often seemingly innocent moment that they could not have foreseen or prepared for.

So, the idea that everything will work out well or even its opposite, that nothing will go well for us, are in the end, only ideas and aspects of mind based in our own personal ways of thinking. They have no more reality than we give them.

The truth is that we don't know what can happen in the next moment and certainly not in the next five weeks, months or years.

Therefore, the 'don't know mind' is our protection against sufferings as it aligns us with reality.

So, when we ask what will be the outcome of a particular moment in our future, we can answer with complete honesty, ‘I don’t know’. Now we can be in peace and allow things to take their natural course. We can interact, do our best for the result we would like, but nothing can ever be guaranteed.

In a universe of infinite possibilities getting what we want is never a sure thing, so relax, you didn't do anything wrong, it's just life.

 

May all beings be happy.