Do expectations kill happiness? I want to make my parents happy, but sometimes their expectations are crushing me! Help!

Depending on our personal experience, expectations can be perceived as pleasant or unpleasant. 

One side of expectation is our hopefulness, excitement, and anticipation for great things to come. But when expectations become heavy, they also become a burden, creating a chokehold on the expectations’ recipient. 

Parents and expectations

From the moment a child is born to a family, parents cannot help but have expectations. As parents, our human nature, culture and traditions, our personal upbringing can influence the kinds of expectations we have for our child. 

For example, the moment we know whether our child will be male or female, we already have hopes and dreams for them. 

As children grow older, the types of expectations parents have also evolve. 

• Academic expectations

Once a child enters school, many parents set academic expectations on their children, expecting them to get good grades, excel in school activities, and some to even pursue graduate education. 

• Career expectations

In modern society where there is a high value placed on getting good education in order to have better chances of getting high-paying and prestigious jobs, parents may do their best to support their children until they land these desirable careers. 

• Social expectations

Parents want their children to be able to function well in society by helping them develop people skills, create desirable community-centered values and habits. For example, commonly desired values include respect of elders and authority, empathy, and volunteerism. 

• Performance expectations

It is not uncommon for parents to involve their children in activities that teach them to perform various skills and enhance their talents, in order to give them the confidence to do them in front of others. These include playing sports, learning musical instruments or being involved in creating different types of art. 

It is true that research has shown the positive effects these kinds of parental expectations have on children’s success that even influence their adult life. 

The desirable effects of parental expectations

• Children feel that they belong to the family, and that they are encouraged and guided.

Showing our children that we hope for and support activities that bring them good, they feel a sense of belonging and being cared for. It shows that what they do matters to parents! 

This parental excitement also assists children in staying safe and productive while they explore and grow. For example, having high parental expectations on children's academics seems to be linked to their attendance to university and pursuit of higher education. 

The less desirable impact of parental expectations

• Children receive the negative effects of feeling that they failed to measure up to parental expectations. This results in low-self esteem, shame, and even perfectionism. 

Parental expectations affect children’s mental health when children feel that parents become overbearing, with some describing it as “toxic.” 

This usually happens when the expectations are made without taking into consideration the child’s talents, strengths, passions, and skills. Rather, the expectations are merely fantasies of the ideal, not realistic and not supportive of the child’s development. 

In fact, a research in the US, Canada and the UK that spanned 32 years has shown a link between parents’ expectations to children developing perfectionism as adults. 

Parenting skills involve learning how to assess whether our expectations are beneficial or harmful to our children and their development. Parenting advice on social media may further burden parents in trying to check off society’s definition of parenting success. 

Instead, be more attuned to your child’s innate personality, skills, talents and passions. Help and walk with them as they grow to become responsible, and healthy individuals. 

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