I’ve noticed that often I will fail to ask for what I want for fear of coming across as arrogant, dominant or insensitive. A core value of mine is compassion and respect for others, but I am learning that this sometimes gets in the way of actually articulating what I want.
But how do we work out what we actually want? Often I say ‘I don’t mind’ in response to a question about what I want to do with the day ahead. And really, I don’t mind what I do. I do mind however how I will feel. And it is with this realisation that I am going to head into 2016 with the intention to ask myself how I want to feel each day.
Because when we ask ourselves how we want to feel, a myriad of routes to get to that feeling open up. If say today, I want to feel loving and calm, I can think of a million different ways to achieve that. I could buy myself a gift, I could go to bed early, I could take a bath, I could meditate, I could read, I could ponder, I could think of all the things I am grateful for, I could write a letter or an email to someone I love, or I could have a conversation with that person instead. The answer to ‘what do I want’ comes so easily once I’ve established how I want to feel.
Saying how you want to feel gets to that layer beneath what you want to do. It’s a different kind of conversation, it is rich and leads to connection and compassion.
So I invite you to head into 2016 with that question – how do I want to feel, and then from there, what do I want to do in order to achieve that feeling?
*Image by Kelley Bozarth – www.unsplash.com