April 6, 2014

What Do You Want

Most people don’t know what they want, really want.

They think they want prosperity, but what they really want is freedom or power. They believe they want celebrity and fame, but what they really want is to feel recognized and relevant; they wrongly believe they want to be loved by all. But the answer is to go love someone else, and if their heart is big enough, to go love everyone else. Now is the time of year when everybody is thinking, “What do I want for this year?” “What do you want in the spirit, not in the flesh?” But the first thing to ask is, “What do I really want?” What stirs you at night, interrupts your thoughts during the day, disturbs your peace of mind? Most make the mistake of going to a therapist or calling a nurturing friend to try to make that uncomfortable feeling go away. However, existentially, that gnawing feeling has a very specific purpose. To explain the concept dramatically, a commercial airline pilot saw the engine light pop on, so he told the copilot, “Keep flying while I check the engine.” There he saw a mouse chewing at a wire to the engine (that gnawing feeling) so he went back and said, “Take this plane higher.” Then, the plane entered an atmosphere with no oxygen, so the mouse suffocated. In other words, think about that gnawing feeling and where it is taking you! Gnawing equals go higher. What do you want?