Expectations; Mine and Yours

I have been thinking a lot about expectations lately.
There is an old saying that unmet expectations lead to disappointment.
I think this can be true.

I have tried throughout my life to not place unrealistic expectations on my children, my husband, my loved ones because I didn't want my own unmet expectations to be the cause of my own disappointment.
I think for the most part I have allowed my loved ones to grow into who they were meant to be without placing my own expectations on them.
I believe that is important to allowing my children to find their own happiness.  I hope they don't disagree.

This is important to me because I have always felt as if I let my parents down and didn't live up to their expectations of me... but that is another blog for another day.

Today was to be my sons graduation day from high school.
He didn't make it.
He is short a few credits and will need summer school.
So the box of invitations and envelopes sits unstuffed, unaddressed, and unmailed.
His cap and gown will be worn by a friend who unexpectedly is graduating and didn't have the money to pay for the cap and gown last January.  (at least my money won't go to waste)
I offered to press the cap and gown for my son's friend if he didn't have an iron at home.
And guess I am struggling with letting go of my own expectations for this day.

I know my son has his own expectations for himself.  I don't know how he feels.
I wonder if he is disappointed too?
I have tried to talk to him about it, but I am still left wondering.

I've been think about expectations a fair amount lately;
Expectations of my own for my self,
Expectations of others for me,
Expectations of mine for others.

Expectations aren't easy to sort out especially when someone has such low expectations for you.
When someone I love has low expectations of me, what does that say about my character?
What does that say about who I am?
How should I...,
How will I respond to such low expectations?

Every decision we make,
every choice we choose leads us to who we want to be.

So a couple of questions that need to be considered are:
Should we live up to another's expectations of us whether they be low or high?
Or is it more important to set one's own expectations based on who you are, and who you choose to be and live up to those?