How To Figure Out What You Want In Life

What Is Wanting?

When most of us are asked what we want, our answer is “I don’t know.” Humans are pretty bad at knowing and defining what we want, but deep down, we really do know. We have an internal compass that tells us exactly what we want and how to get it. We just have to learn to listen.

To want something is basically to prefer one thing over another. We want this thing, but not that thing.

When we want something, it’s because we feel we lack or don’t have something external to us in our life. It’s not physically here for us to have or experience. We believe or hope that when we get this thing, our needs will be fulfilled, and we will ultimately feel better.

For most people, this is an unconscious process. They have a sense of wanting or something lacking but are not sure what. When we start to become aware of our wants and make choices to move towards what we do want and away from what we don’t want, we can begin to create a very different reality.

When we want, we have a preference that something is in our life rather than out of it.

We don’t know what we want, so to continue to ask that question will keep us in that state of not knowing what we want.

When we don’t know what we want and look towards what we want, we are guessing. It’s full of infinite possibilities we have not yet experienced. We decide we want things or experiences we think should want. We decide we want money, houses, things and stuff. But when we get there, we realise we don’t want them anymore and perhaps never did. Because we do not necessarily want these things. We want what we think we will have or feel when we get them.

Instead of looking toward the infinite and unknown possibilities of what you want, you need to flip this and look the other way. You need to look within, not without.

01 | Figure Out What You Don’t Want And Why

You need to start with yourself and what you already know and look for clues.

You need to start with what you don’t want.

To help you with this process, there’s a link to a workbook in the description that you can print out immediately.

Make a list of all the things you are currently experiencing in your life that you don’t like, don’t want, or want less of. Think back over your past to things you have had or experienced that you didn’t want.

Another thing to consider is when you are jealous or envious of someone because you think they have something you want or don’t have. This could give some clues as to things you think you are missing.

Consider all areas of your life such as physical, emotional and mental health, work, business, relationships, hobbies, spirituality, finances and your general quality of life.

You could look at your whole life and group them into different areas. Or, you can focus on one area of life or a few areas of life at a time. Try to push through at least two blank points to help you go deeper. Then, for each thing you don’t want, identify why you don’t want it. Continue to ask why this is a problem and how it makes you feel.

For example, say you work in a job you don’t like. When we ask why you don’t like it, it could be because you’re doing a lot of unpaid overtime. Why is that a problem? Because you have no time for anyone or anything else. Why? Because you’re tired. And how does this make you feel? Exhausted, drained, exploited and undervalued.

02 | Define The Opposite

Once you have a list of the things you don’t want, you can start to identify the opposite or what you would want instead. Consider the things you want to have or experience and the feelings or emotions you want.

The opposite might not be literally the total opposite. For example, If you are overweight, you might not want to be underweight, but instead, you want to be healthy and flexible. You might feel depressed and guilty and want to feel energized and confident.

Start to look at the qualities, characteristics and essence of the things that will make you feel happy and good.

For example, if someone you know has a job they love, and you want the same, figure out the qualities you feel are lacking for you. Perhaps you have a boss that micro-manages, and you feel restricted. It could be they work four days a week, do no overtime, and are trusted to do the work in a way that works for them. So what you want is a flexible work schedule with no overtime. What you want to feel in your work is free, empowered and trusted.

It is not that having exactly their job would make you happy. It is that their job has certain qualities that you feel your job lacks.

Instead of just focussing on the physical things you think you want. Focus on the end goal. Focus on how you want to feel.

Be careful not to drop back into a state of wanting or lack, as you will continue to create wanting and lack. Instead, begin to imagine what it feels like now to have everything you currently want.

Focus on being the emotional state your wants will bring you when you have them. Focus on being happy now.

03 | Prioritise And Align

If you did this exercise focussing on one area of life, then you have something clear to start to work towards. If you looked at your entire life, there could be a whole list of things you want to change, which can be overwhelming.

If you haven’t already, re-organise your wants into categories.

As you wrap up your list of what you want, focus on how you want to feel overall and what it feels like to be happy. Do one final review and really make sure that all the things on your list are going to make you feel the way you want to feel. If they’re not, then get rid of them.

Then, consider your top two or three things to focus on. For most of us, this is likely to be health, relationships or finances.

Now that you know what you want, you can start moving away from what you don’t want and towards what you do. So how do we do that?

04 | Get Out Of Wanting

This last piece of advice may be a little counter-intuitive. Most of us would be tempted at this point to set a plan into action and start to make things happen so we can get what we want.

However, from a broader perspective, we live in an energetic universe.

We create things externally from the same energetic state we hold internally. If we are internally in a state of wanting, we are in a state of belief that we do not have something. We are in a state of lack.

If we remain in this state, we will create the same thing externally. We will create a lack of what we want and remain in a state of wanting.

So, to get what we want now, we must get out of wanting.

We attract what we feel. If we focus on feeling the end state and what it will be like to feel happiness or the other emotions we want to feel, this is the energetic vibration we will project and receive back. Instead of having to work and force things to happen, we must learn to trust the energetic laws of the universe. To do this, we can start to visualise and feel what it is like to know what we want AND to have it. Even if you don’t know how you’re going to get it, start to imagine and practice being in a state of having rather than wanting.

Your emotions are a compass that will keep you on track. When you feel good, you know you are moving towards what you want, and when you feel bad, you are moving away.

Start to become aware of how you feel in response to your external environment, focus on what it feels like to be happy and keep moving towards that.

Follow your emotions towards happiness, and the path will reveal itself.

The choice is yours…

…Liz Watt