What do I want?

Hello all.  This is Saturday’s update, but I’m actually writing it Friday afternoon: tomorrow will be busy.  To take the heaviness of the last two posts down a notch, I want to talk about something that happens to all of us, and to me about an hour ago: I could not think of what to do.  I have reached a point of pause in a large project I am completing, and I am not scheduled for work this afternoon so my options are pretty much endless.  How is it that I could not find anything to do?

So what did I do?  Of all things, I sat down and thought about why I could think of nothing to do.  And, as it quickly became apparent, this was not at all the case: I was thinking of several things to do, and systematically rejecting them.  I thought about finding a party for tomorrow (today), but hesitated because I haven’t seen these friends for a while, I don’t like situations where I don’t know many people, and I haven’t completed my costume (out of a desire to not spend money).  I thought about working out, but I was feeling lazy.  I thought about embarking upon the next stage of the project, but I want to talk with my advisor before proceeding.  And the list goes on.

Why does this happen?  I started thinking that it’s possible that we don’t know what to do when we are confused about what we truly want.  In the first case, I realized, I didn’t really want to attend a Halloween party: I just wanted to show off costume (so scratch that, it isn’t done), and my train of thought has been completely derailed because my boss called in the middle of this sentence to tell me that I was needed at work ASAP and it’s six and a half hours since this sentence began :-).  Anyway, what I really wanted was to get in touch with some friends I hadn’t seen in a while.  Once I realized that, doing something about it was easy enough.

So often we don’t stop to think about what we want: in a given moment, day, week, year, or in the greater course of life.  We plow headlong into things we don’t attempt to understand, fill our lives with objects, and we don’t even stop to wonder why we aren’t happy.  I know not everyone is a deep thinker, and not everyone has the patience for prolonged introspection.  But, try asking yourself: when you want to buy a new plasma TV, why?  What is it you really want?  If the answer is genuinely “I need a TV and have money to kill”, then sure, why not?  But if it’s not really necessary, why?

Long story short, I don’t know how you can be happy if you don’t what you want: if you don’t know what it is you really want, how can you expect to make a plan to get it?  Try asking yourself this question sometime: find out something you truly want, and make a plan to get it.  I suspect the feelings of happiness you’ll get from realizing such a goal will dwarf the temporary distraction the television and Internet can provide.  Cheers!