A lot people don’t even actually know what they want or like. You may be one of them.
Do you remember the scene with Julia Roberts and Richard Gere in Runaway Bride? The one with the eggs? She doesn’t really know how she likes her eggs prepared, she’s just always had “what he is having”. She goes along with whatever the guy she’s currently dating likes to the point that she can’t even remember whether she actually prefers her eggs scrambled, poached, or any of the other ways eggs are prepared or if she ever had a preference in the first place.
Abdicating our wants and desires doesn’t happen overnight.
It might begin with wanting to be seen as pleasant and easy to please. Later, it might show up as deferring to your husband for decisions on recreation, restaurants, movies, and vacations because “his job is so demanding”.
Over time, each of these moments of suppressing your wants can bring you to your tipping point. The point at which you no longer think about what it is you DO want. And because you are so practiced at deferring to the preferences of others it becomes a habit that extends to all of your personal relationships.
Maybe you have been in a situation like I have where you are meeting a friend for lunch and she asks: “where would you like to go?” and you can’t think of a single place you would like to eat. Your thoughts immediately go to wondering where she would like to go, what kinds of food she likes, what she would enjoy, what she would want.
You reply with “you choose” or “I don’t know, what do you think?” or “I don’t care, anywhere is good with me”.
What do you want?
Do you even know?
It is easy to lose track of what we want, and what we like, when we are constantly deferring to someone else to tell us what we should want and like.
What you want is important!
Whether it’s a restaurant for lunch, a movie for date night, where to invest your savings or spend your vacation, you have wants and desires.
You might not be very skilled at accessing them or verbalizing them, but you have them. Everyone does.
The the medical condition that describes being “without wants or desires” is death. There is no life with desire. Our desires are not going to come find us – we’ve got to go looking for them. When I say go look for them, I don’t mean out in the world. I think the best place to go looking is within yourself.
You want something.
Own it.
Write it down.
Say it out loud.
And the next time you have a lunch date on the horizon have the name of a place ready to respond, or better yet suggest it before anyone asks.
We should do lunch so you can practice:-)
If you are struggling to know what it is YOU want, I’ve got something for you. Send me an email or DM asking for the exercise I created just for this! kendra@itgetsbetternow.com
