Expectations quotes
1.7K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
Explore further
Browse quotes that often appear alongside expectations — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
Quote collection
Follow a thought to its author, or read the full quote page.
"'Efficient' scheduling and control of time are often counterproductive. The efficiency focus creates expectations that clash with the opportunities to develop rich relationships, to meet human needs, and to enjoy spontaneous moments on a daily basis."
"I have a lack of fear, whereas in the past the fear of failure was a powerful motivator. Anyway, I have great expectations for the future, but I just don't know if I'm the monarch of all I survey."
"Archimedes, that he might transport the entire globe ... demanded only a point that was firm and immovable; so also, I shall be entitled to entertain the highest expectations, if I am fortunate enough to discover only one thing that is certain and indubitable."
"A person who suffers from severe locomotor anxiety finds himself in an almost permanent state of mental tension. He wakes in the morning with the anxious expectation of having to go out somewhere in the course of the day."
"Nothing is so great an adversary to those who make it their business to please as expectation."
"In order to grow your audience, you must betray their expectations."
"We all remember epochs in our experience when some dear expectation dies, or some new motive is born."
"You're not going to be different ... you're going to be the same as you've always been; with doubts, everlasting dissatisfaction with yourself, vain efforts to amend, and falls, and everlasting expectation, of a happiness which you won't get, and which isn't possible for you."
"I don't know whether it's spiritual development or trying to learn the psychologically with being an actor, but I realise the more I get into it that this was something I was always supposed to do. That allowed me to sit easiser in the life I was living. But that doesn't mean to say you just stroll through it. It takes work and the work is not always about acting. It's sometimes about how you deal with the ups and downs of hope, of expectation."
"WANT shows up in conversation - EXPECTATION shows up in behavior."
"Make each day count by setting specific goals to succeed, then putting forth every effort to exceed your own expectations."
"I try not to have expectations because they can tend to tear you apart. I expect to work as hard as I can possibly work and I expect to give every ounce of a hundred percent."
"Girls see enough of this body that we can't imitate, that we'll never be able to obtain, these unrealistic expectations...it's better to look strong and healthy..."
"Long after Salinger sent me away, I continued to believe his standards and expectations were the best ones."
"It is not rude to turn off your telephone by switching it on to an answering machine, which is cheaper and less disruptive than ripping it out of the wall. Those who are offended because they cannot always get through when they seek, at their own convenience, to barge in on people are suffering from a rude expectation."
"Revolution always unfolds inside an atmosphere of rising expectations."
"A lot of the best work I've ever done started out as something completely different because I gave myself permission to have space around my time and expectations."
"Love has no meaning if it isn't shared. We have been created for greater things - to love and to be loved... To love a person without any conditions, without any expectations. Small things, done in great love, bring joy and peace. To love, it is necessary to give. To give, it is necessary to be free from selfishness."
"With every one, the expectation of a misfortune constitutes a dreadful, punishment. Suffering then assumes the proportions of the unknown, which is the soul's infinite."
"I let go of all expectations. People, places and things are free to be themselves, and I am free to be me."
