Great Expectations...

So we are reading Great Expectations in ApLit, for those of you who don't know its about a boy named Pip and his "Great Expectations" of life.  We had a seminar in class on the book yesterday and as we were discussing Pip's expectations of life I began to wonder, what were mine? 
Now I wont bore you with what I want my life to be...but as I was sitting there I kept thinking what my expectations of life was, and how, just like Pip's they have changed.  See Pip begins that story wanting something, but when something even better comes along his expectations of life changes.  I guess I could relate a lot to Pip in that way.  But then I realized there was another character in the book I could also relate to, whether I wanted to admit it or not.  Thankfully Mrs. Havisham and I do differ in one very important way.  Mrs. Havisham is a mysterious old lady that brings Pip to her house to ultimately get her adopted daughter to break his heart.  When Pip first goes to the house the woman is sitting in her wedding dress, her hair half done with only one shoe on.  All the clocks in the house have stopped at the exact time her life fell apart.  In all the years that past nothing changed, she still sat in the same chair, wearing the same dress, with the wedding feast rotting in the next room.  At first I looked at Mrs. Havisham's character with disgust and disdain.  But I realized at one point I was a lot like Mrs. Havisham.  I sat in bed wallowing in sadness, because like Pip my expectations in life drastically changed.  But, thankfully, Mrs. Havisham and I have something very different.  I got out of bed, got dressed, and got stronger.  Mrs. Havisham on the other hand, well I haven't finished the book, But I'm guessing she'll end up dying in that chair.  My expectations of life did change.  But instead of being like the characters of a Charles Dickens novel, I didn't change my expectations, they were changed for me.  But when they did change I didn't step all over friends and ignore them, I drew them closer.  And I did wallow like Mrs Havisham, but at least I stopped.
  So my advice?  Well one I think is to read old literature, because interestingly enough  it still applies to our lives.  And don't wallow,  well no wallow, but learn to know when enough is enough.  And your expectations of life will change, you meet people or circumstances that cause you to change them.  But you also loose people and circumstances that change them for you.  Whatever way, take control, and go make what you want happen.