There is this feeling of being right up against something, maybe almost like you’re on the precipice of something great. Almost there, almost reaching a point; nearly experiencing some sort of completion, even if it is simply just one level. However, in the midst of being right up against the wall, or right before the completion of a level, there is generally a lack of awareness that it is one point, or one level; it seems to feel like something much greater than it actually is. This misleading feeling of completion is something that has played with my mind quite a lot, especially in the context of music, but it exceeds beyond that into other things as well. As this is the case, I want to share how I have been able to deal with this false sense of completion, in the hopes that it can help you create more intelligent expectations of what is to come. Yet, I want to establish, more clearly anyway, what it means to be on the brink of something.
To be on the brink of something is to feel like you’re nearly there. An unexciting example, which is not necessarily false, of something like this is to be in a state of recognizing you’re finishing your meal. It might not feel like much if you aren’t stuffing yourself, but if there’s no more space in your stomach, or at least if it feels that way, anything you eat will feel exhausting and excessive. When you see there isn’t much left, and you don’t have much left to finish eating, you might take pleasure in that fact, simply because you don’t want to eat anymore. However, if you’re still hungry, and you’re about to finish your meal, you’ll likely be upset that there won’t be any more food to eat. With this example, we can see that being on the brink of something can both feel negative and positive, depending on the disposition of the person and the state they’re in. The completion, or almost feeling completed, can be additive or subtractive, as well. This feeling of being on the brink, not teetering over it, but in the midst of reaching a completed state, can be quite desirable, and there isn’t always an interest to finish what has been started immediately. An example in the past, which is not exactly false either, that I’ve used is in Team Fortress 2, which was, in that piece of writing, compared to “edging” or, essentially, intentionally stopping an orgasm before it happens.
In Team Fortress 2, on particularly control point maps, ideally with five control points, there is a tendency for things to get a bit static or locked up. Essentially, in the default game mode, there is no timer that stops the game and restarts it; aside from one which runs out of time if neither team captures a point. In this theoretical type of game mode, the match can go on indefinitely, which is something that can be quite satisfying or enjoyable. You feel more involved in the match, and because you’ve spent a considerable amount of time fighting, you want to win, because winning means all the more depending on how much time and effort you put into victory. However, there is another quality, this need to keep the match going; because it is so enjoyable to be in the state of trying to win. It feels good to feel like there is competition, and you have to do all you can, along with your team, to have a decisive victory over the enemy. If you rolled the other team, there’s not much emotional baggage associated with the match; you won, they lost, and it’s just that simple. This, well, can be tied back to a very normal human feeling; an orgasm.
There is a feeling of a transition from one state to another. An individual before they suddenly felt many good-feel chemicals, and one afterwards. This is a system that can be used and abused; a person could potentially attempt to utilize this in order to gain their reward system. This, however, of course, never lasts, and it will eventually stop functioning as it once did; as in, it won’t feel good anymore. The main idea here is that there is a feeling of being on the brink before the good-feel chemicals are released, and some, in many similar cases to those who like particular maps and game-modes in TF2, they hold back on feeling the release. Instead, they want to sustain the feeling of being on the brink; they are not exactly interested in the release. This is quite literally the opposite of my concern, aside from, well, becoming addicted or, perhaps, making this type of behavior normalized. In these two cases, there is a clear indication of when a release is going to come; when you will go over the brink. Along with this, there is likely past experience informing the individual of what it feels like to go beyond something. What it feels like to win a variety of matches, or what a variety of orgasms have felt like. However, in the case of a false feeling of being on the brink, much of the qualities are similar, aside from the actual end result.
I’ve had many experiences in which I felt like I was going to reach a certain point, or obtain something, or finally reach a state of completion, and then finally be in a new state, different from the old. Musically, this has happened many times. I felt like I was finally reaching a certain point where I’d have an idealized version of ability that I desired. Of course, that has not, and will not, ever be the case. During these periods of time, I was growing, but my perception of that growth; the extent of it, has always been incorrect and misleading. The danger in this is that, if you genuinely feel like you’re were almost there, and you aren’t; you’ll feel terrible when your expectation doesn’t live up to reality. It will make you feel like a fool, like it might never come to you; as it clearly has not come when you previously have expected it. It is exactly this: a false or incorrect expectation.
Having the ability to recognize patterns is one way to stop the false expectations from occurring, but what should always come before this is the ability to stop the system of expectation itself. All I’m saying here is that you shouldn’t have an expectation if you haven’t experienced the thing before. It would be irrational to expect random things from occurring unless random things occurred enough times to believe it will happen again; and thus, they no longer would be random. I could not expect myself to reach a certain ability to play an instrument by a certain time because I don’t have experience having that ability; it is something new. I might have experience learning, and I know how long it has taken me to learn certain things before, but when dealing with something new, you cannot hold the expectation that the new thing will act exactly the same as any other. In doing so, you lose your ability to create an expectation based on data that applies to the situation. Using old data, irrelevant data, will create an irrelevant and incomplete prediction. Along with data, starting to actively check on your expectation, considering whether it makes sense or not, will also play an important part in avoiding the false sense of being on the brink.
By checks, I mean checks and balances. You actively have to have an expectation, and then question that expectation. This, in many cases, can be a great tool for any type of thinking, but for our purposes we can focus on specifically using it for avoiding unreasonable and incorrect expectations. The checks I would suggest you should start out with are questions. Ask questions that attack the expectation, ask for the data to prove the expectation as correct, and make you search for previous experiences that would back up the realistic qualities of that prediction. If you fail to bring up any of the things you ask for, perhaps that can help you lean more into thinking the expectation is incorrect, and will help push you towards realizing that the feeling you are on the brink of something is indeed, false.
To stop an unreasonable or irrational expectation, you have to take a step back and realize you’re dealing with something new. In doing this, you can avoid having the false feeling of being on the brink of something. Unfortunately, many have and will continue being let down by inaccurate predictions of what is to occur or what is going to be obtained. However, in recognizing and learning that the predictions are false or inaccurate, one can begin to readjust their hypothesis of the future based on increased amounts of data. Being on the brink of something is not necessarily a bad thing or cannot be predicted, as in many cases, it can be reasonably predicted. The reason for its accurate prediction is simple; it has happened before. When continually experiencing something, the bonds created to recognize the patterns presented only grow stronger, but what has to be remembered above all else is that one should always be aware that variables that they are not aware of can influence the end result. Patterns can change, and doing consistent checks on your predictions can avoid headache and pain as a result of not obtaining something you thought was, without a doubt, going to be in your possession. Hopefully, with this information, you can limit the times you experience this false feeling of being on the brink, and continue to use previous experiences to avoid that feeling.