What Do We Really Want?

Are the goals we’re chasing really ours?  Are they societies, are they the salesmen’s in front of us, are they the customers who’s need is urgent?  Are they our parents’, families’, religions, our neighborhood or our political parties?  Are we directing what we are ultimately aiming to accomplish, to be, to do with this life??

We’re being bombarded with information this day in age like never before.  Depression, drug addiction and suicide are rampant, people feel more alone than ever.  Everyone and anyone selling, influencing, or pushing their agenda is trying to influence us to achieve their goals.

And we’ve gotten lost.

While at work and an urgent phone call or email comes in, is this our problem, or the person on the other end of the communication?  While at the gym working out, are we getting fit because others expect us to be fit, want us to be fit, or have been we been told that things will be better when we’re fit?  At the mall, buying that new article of clothing or pair of shoes, are we doing it because we really want to, or because someone else has sold us on their agenda, our obligation to fit in, to fill that void we didn’t realize was there, until it was pointed out?  Did we really need that last luxury item? Expensive meal? Bigger car?

Are we truly chasing what you want?  Do we even know what we want anymore?  If we do know what we’re after, do our actions match your ambitions?

I’ve come to the conclusion, or maybe just remembered how this all started, that years ago I got lost.

I wanted to be happy, confident and feel good about myself.  There was an internal struggle that I was not being all that I knew I could be.   I felt unhappy, came to the conclusion that I was unhappy because I was out of shape, and thought “What do I need to be to get me there (in shape)?”  Fit, runners are fit, I’ll become a runner.

Wait, what started this?  I wanted to be happy, confident and feel good about myself, what did I really need to do to be that?  Not who did I need to become.

After running numerous 5’K’s, half Marathons and full marathons, still the feeling of emptiness remained.  Eventually when being a runner was not making me happy, confident or feel good about myself, I looked to my friends who I perceived as being what I wanted to be.  They were Triathletes, whoa!  Surely doing something that took more time and effort would answer those questions to what it was I’m searching for… I was already getting lost from my original goal.

Was this because the running and triathlete friends around me were, what I perceived to be, happy, fit and confident?  Was this because the idea of being perceived as a triathlete was cool?  Who was I doing this for again?

Flash forward a year or so and I’m training and racing for 10+ hours a week.  The underlying question all along being, ‘wait why am I doing this again?’.

But somehow, the original objective that led me down this path was forgotten, lost in the rush of being, not focusing on feeling.  It took over 2,000 miles of racing, yes racing, not even including training time, getting married, having 4 kids listening to 100’s of hours of interviews and several well-timed books to remember what started all of this.  All I wanted was to feel confident, fit and happy.

What do we really want?  What do you really want?  Why are you doing what you’re doing?

When we really know, or have a committed path of what we want, we gain confidence.  We gain a poise that was not there when we were just going with the flow of life.

I used to hate salesmen.  I’d always feel unsure, bad, slightly afraid, and ultimately, they would make decisions for me.  I’d feel bad negotiating hard, fighting for what I stood for, because I stood for nothing.  Because I didn’t have a compass of where I was going to guide me in making the decisions myself.

Now?  I’m a salesman’s worst nightmare.  This deal’s only around today?  No problem there’s another day and another deal.  Have to buy it now?  No, I really don’t need that, no matter how hard you sell.

It’s not just sales either.  It’s everything.  Someone telling us we’re fit enough, fast enough, or just enough in general, when we know deep down it’s not enough for us?  Push through.

DO YOU.

Be what you want.  Do the internal work to figure it out, then set the course, and course correct as necessary.  And don’t let anyone stand in your way.