“Disappointment is the gap that exists between expectation and reality.” ~ John C. Maxwell

Last night was the big boxing match between 58 year old Mike Tyson and 27 year old Jake Paul. I’m not a boxing fan but I watched the fight. It was underwhelming. An old man (and by that I mean a guy just a year older than me) could not keep up with a younger, fitter man. But even then the young man was overly cautious for 4 of 8 rounds, then a bit cocky as he took control of the more and more gassed and exhausted older man.

In the end, neither got really hurt and I’m sure they both took home a significant amount of money. And they were not the only fighters fighting, with 2 other big fights on the card as well as some preliminary fights. So I guess fight fans got a good event.

But if you were only interested in this one fight like me, it wasn’t worth the hype. Part of it is that I remember how great Tyson was and I wanted to think he still had it in him. But another part of it is that there was so much hype that it had to be an amazing fight or it just wouldn’t have met expectations… and it really wasn’t a good fight.

If nothing else, it was a good lesson about high expectations leading to disappointment. Only hype things up if you are already extremely confident about the outcome. Because being pleasantly surprised is better than feeling let down.