Editorial commentary in italics
What is “wanting”? Wanting is just simply, Moving Toward. We often say that we use wanting as a motivation. But wanting is the same thing as motivation.
From Monday Night Study Group, 1973
We often use unhappiness to stay in touch with our wanting. What are we trying to achieve with our unhappiness?
- To stay in touch with what we want more.
- To stay in touch with preconditions on wanting.
- To stay in touch with the wanting that motivates intermediate steps.
1) To stay in touch with what we want more: We often want two things that are not practically compatible, for example, to be honest in a conversation, and to be agreeable. Then we might get unhappy that “we have to act agreeable towards you” in order to ensure we act agreeable (which is what we wanted more than to be honest), and to ensure we don’t fall “victim” to the “temptation” to be honest.
See the idea is to stay in touch with what you want more. That’s what this is all about. To make sure that we keep wanting what we want more, that we won’t go ahead and want less.
This dilemma is caused by instituting in the first place the belief that I will be unhappy unless I get what I want. The degree of unhappiness is in proportion to the temptation to give up wanting.
From Monday Night Study Group, 1973
2) To stay in touch with preconditions on what is wanted: This form of happiness often arises as the dilemma: “I have to decide . . . but I can’t decide”.
The simple fact is that we know exactly what we want, but there are other things wanted as part of that wanting. For example, I want to go to that party (and I want to bring a friend, or I want it to start earlier, etc.) In other words, I want something like what you propose but not exactly as proposed.
Why not realize that we want whatever we want and we want to wait to act? What else can we do? Become numb or paralyzed? We can if we want to.
From Writing, June 1975: When someone says they do not know what they want
3) To stay in touch with the wanting that motivates intermediate steps: For example, we don’t want a job in itself; we want the benefits that money brings. We use unhappiness in the form of “I have to go to work” in order to stay in touch that we do want to go to work, as an intermediate step towards the benefits we want that money brings.
Right now it attracts me to continue talking to you but it also attracts me to go out and have some coffee. That’s not a problem, that’s just a question. But in order to make that decision I can use fear, or I could use desire. In order to use desire I have to get in touch with, “What do I want these actions for?”
Both actions are attractive. The choosing of one and the not choosing of the other has consequences. Each will, perhaps, lead to totally different ends and conclusions. If I decide to continue to talk to you, that is going to give me certain advantages or disadvantages in terms of other things. That’s the package. If I decide not to continue to talk to you and go have some coffee that’s another package that has its prices and its rewards.
From Monday Night Study Group, 1973
Notice, in each case, there is a choice: happy wanting or unhappy restriction on our freedom.
“I want this for the sake of that” becomes “I have to do this”
“I want this more” becomes “I have to do this”
“I want that only if this is included” becomes “I have to make a choice I don’t like”