If you expect nothing, you're apt to be surprised. You'll get it.
Interpretation
Expecting little can lead to pleasant surprises.
This quote by Malcolm Forbes suggests that having low expectations can make one more receptive to unexpected outcomes. When you do not hold a strong anticipation for a particular result, you leave room for surprise, thereby allowing even the smallest positive outcomes to bring joy and satisfaction.
In practice
In a motivational speech about embracing life's uncertainties.
Over the years, I've evolved a somewhat heretical but time-and mind-saving approach to books, articles, editorials that deal with weighty matters. More often than not, by beginning at the end and contemplating the conclusions, one can determine if it's worth going through the whole to get there.
Those who enjoy responsibility usually get it; those who merely like exercising authority usually lose it.
To live long and achieve happiness, cultivate the art of radiating happiness.
The purpose of education is to replace an empty mind with an open one.
If you never budge, don't expect a push.
It's never a good deal when only one party thinks it is.
The young have aspirations that never come to pass, the old have reminiscences of what never happened.
Not to help justice in her need would be an impiety.
If a man achieves victory over this body, who in the world can exercise power over him? He who rules himself rules over the whole world.
The ignorant man never enjoys.
Jealousy is cruel as the grave: the coals thereof are coals of fire, which hath a most vehement flame. [Therefore do not compare your lot with another's lest you see their advantages and lose the joy of what you already have.]
I know a lot of people think therapy is about sitting around staring at your own navel - but it's staring at your own navel with a goal. And the goal is to one day to see the world in a better way and treat your loved ones with more kindness and have more to give.
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