Dealing With Desire

Wanting things is intrinsic to the human state. It’s a potent force and lies at the heart of the thrust for progress but if your relationship to want is unbalanced it can lead to great distress, especially if compounded by a lack of confidence in your ability to manifest what you want. Yet learning how to handle this potential self-destructive force of wanting things is not taught at school, so let’s look at the Taoist approach.

When want for something arises within, train your mind to observe the physical sensation in the belly and chest the wanting produces. Rather than lose yourself in the thoughts associated with the object of your desire, train your awareness on the physical sensation the wanting produces.

Next step is to use your mind to relax that sensation enough to make it disperse.

In its place you’ll feel a subtle burst of energy in your belly and chest.

Next determine the emotional state you believe having the object of your desire will produce for you – satisfaction and fulfilment, say.

Now picture yourself looking and feeling totally satisfied and fulfilled, as if you’ve already manifested whatever it is you want and sit that image of you feeling that way on top of the energy burst in your belly and chest and say thankyou to Big You (the Tao) for it, as if your circumstances have already changed for the better.

Repeat this procedure every time you notice distress building up in relation to the object of your desire and augment the positive effects of that by affirming to yourself that the Tao, the Great Path will always lead you to your highest good, no matter how apparently circuitous the route it causes you to take, implying if you don’t get whatever it is you want, you’ll get something even better.

May what you get so far exceed your expectations you never question the Tao again.

Love, D