Live Free
Exceed Your Highest Expectations
Book Edition Details
Summary
In a world where anticipation often dictates our every move, DeVon Franklin presents a groundbreaking manifesto that challenges the very fabric of expectation. "Live Free" is a daring invitation to strip away the invisible chains that bind us—those self-imposed forecasts about our lives, careers, and relationships that stifle true joy. Franklin exposes how these silent scripts script our discontent, urging us to question how much of our heartache stems not from reality, but from what we imagined reality should be. With wisdom and clarity, he offers the liberating truth: by casting off these burdensome expectations, we unlock a life of genuine peace and unbridled happiness. Franklin's vision is bold, promising a cultural upheaval where freedom is found not in more, but in less. Here lies the secret to living authentically and abundantly, free from the tyranny of preconceived notions.
Introduction
Sarah sat in her car after another disappointing performance review, tears streaming down her face. Despite working overtime every week for two years, the promotion she'd been counting on never materialized. Her marriage felt strained, her friendships had grown distant, and despite checking all the boxes society told her would bring happiness, she felt more trapped than ever. What Sarah didn't realize was that she wasn't struggling with failure—she was struggling with expectations that had never been properly set. We live in a world where unspoken assumptions rule our relationships, where cultural pressures dictate our choices, and where we mistake other people's dreams for our own. Every day, millions of people wake up feeling disappointed, frustrated, or stuck, not because they're failing, but because they're operating under a system of expectations that was never designed to serve their authentic selves. The weight of unmet expectations becomes a prison of our own making. But there's a way out. When we learn to identify, examine, and consciously set our expectations—rather than letting them set us—everything changes. This isn't about lowering your standards or accepting less from life. It's about discovering the profound freedom that comes when you stop living according to other people's scripts and start writing your own. The transformation begins the moment you realize that your expectations, properly set, become the foundation for a life of genuine purpose, deeper relationships, and lasting fulfillment.
The Perfect Prison: When Expectations Become Chains
Marcus had always been the golden child. Straight A's, law school, prestigious firm—each achievement earned him pride and validation. But at thirty-five, sitting in his corner office overlooking the city, he felt completely empty. The success everyone celebrated felt like a trap. His father had been a lawyer, his grandfather too, and somewhere along the way, Marcus had absorbed their dreams as his own. Every day felt like a performance for an audience he'd never chosen. The breaking point came during a family dinner when his younger sister announced she was leaving her corporate job to start a nonprofit. The room erupted in concerned voices about security and sensibility. But Marcus saw something in her eyes he'd lost years ago—genuine excitement about her future. That night, he stayed awake wondering when he'd stopped asking what he wanted and started asking what was expected of him. This is how expectations become prisons. We inherit beliefs from family, society, and culture without ever examining whether they align with our authentic selves. These inherited expectations feel so natural, so obviously correct, that we never think to question them. We mistake other people's definitions of success for our own, their fears for our limitations, their dreams for our destiny. The result is a life that looks impressive from the outside but feels hollow within—a perfect prison built from other people's expectations, where we serve a sentence we never consciously chose.
Finding Your Voice: Setting Boundaries in Love and Work
When Lisa married Tom, she assumed they shared the same vision of partnership. Three years later, resentment poisoned their once-joyful relationship. She expected him to intuitively know her needs—that she valued quality time over expensive gifts, that she needed emotional support after difficult days, that household responsibilities should be shared equally. Meanwhile, Tom expected appreciation for his long work hours and felt criticized no matter what he did. Neither had ever clearly communicated their actual expectations to the other. The marriage nearly ended before they learned a crucial lesson: unspoken expectations are relationship killers. In therapy, they discovered they'd been having two completely different marriages in their minds. Lisa's expectation that Tom should "just know" what she needed was as unrealistic as Tom's expectation that working hard automatically demonstrated love. The breakthrough came when they started treating expectations like negotiations rather than assumptions. They began asking each other direct questions: "What do you need from me to feel loved?" "How can we share responsibilities in a way that feels fair to both of us?" "What matters most to you in how we spend our free time?" These conversations weren't always comfortable, but they transformed their relationship from a series of disappointments into a genuine partnership. The key was learning that healthy relationships require explicit agreements about what each person can realistically expect from the other.
The Faith Factor: Trusting the Process Over Results
At thirty-eight, Michael felt like God had forgotten him. He'd prayed for a promotion for three years, worked harder than anyone in his department, and maintained unwavering faith that his breakthrough was coming. When the position went to someone else, his faith shattered. He'd expected God to reward his devotion with the specific outcome he'd requested, and when that didn't happen, he questioned everything he believed about prayer and purpose. What Michael discovered in his spiritual crisis changed everything. His pastor helped him see that he'd been treating God like a cosmic vending machine—put in enough prayer and good behavior, get out the exact result you want. He'd confused faith with control, expecting divine intervention on his timeline and terms. This wasn't faith at all, but a sophisticated form of spiritual manipulation. True faith, he learned, meant trusting the process without demanding specific outcomes. Instead of praying for the promotion, he began praying for guidance, growth, and the ability to serve wherever he was placed. He shifted his focus from controlling results to perfecting his character and skills. Paradoxically, this surrender opened doors he'd never imagined. Six months later, an opportunity arose at another company that was far better than the promotion he'd originally wanted. By releasing his grip on specific expectations, he created space for possibilities beyond his limited imagination.
Living Free: Choosing Your Own Path to Joy
Jennifer's awakening came at her twentieth high school reunion. Surrounded by former classmates comparing achievements like scorecards, she realized she'd been living someone else's definition of success for two decades. The suburban house, corporate salary, and conventional lifestyle everyone admired felt suffocating. At forty, she made a radical decision: she sold everything and moved to a small coastal town to open the bookstore café she'd dreamed about since college. The reaction was predictably harsh. Family members questioned her sanity, friends worried about her future, and former colleagues saw her choice as professional suicide. But for the first time in years, Jennifer woke up excited about her days. The bookstore struggled initially, and her income dropped dramatically, but something profound had shifted. She was finally living according to her own expectations rather than performing for others. Two years later, the café had become the heart of the community, hosting book clubs, poetry nights, and intimate concerts. Jennifer had less money but more joy, fewer possessions but greater peace, smaller social circles but deeper connections. She'd discovered that living free doesn't mean living without expectations—it means carefully choosing which expectations deserve your life energy and releasing all the others.
Summary
The prison of unset expectations keeps millions of people trapped in lives they never consciously chose, serving sentences handed down by family, culture, and circumstance. But freedom is always available to those brave enough to examine their assumptions, communicate their needs, and release expectations that don't serve their authentic selves. The most profound transformation comes not from eliminating expectations entirely, but from becoming the conscious architect of the ones that remain. True freedom lies in the space between rigid control and passive acceptance—where we hold our dreams lightly enough to remain open to better possibilities, yet firmly enough to guide our actions. When we learn to set expectations that align with our deepest values rather than external pressures, we create lives of genuine purpose and lasting satisfaction. The invitation is always present: to step out of the perfect prison of other people's expectations and into the messy, beautiful, authentic life that's been waiting for us all along.
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By DeVon Franklin
