Avoid Getting Stuck in Conflicting 'Wants' — Head for 'Choice' to Get Moving!

by Heron Saline, CHT CMT ©2007

Recently I have been fascinated by a common block that I'm noticing in people who are trying to make changes. I first picked up on it in a guy who is wanting to get his career going. First he mentioned wanting to work for himself, and immediately followed it by commenting that he also wants lots of free time, but that to him free time seemed incompatible with establishing his own business. (Which it might be, or not.)

I think that he genuinely desired both working for himself AND free time — we often make a step toward improving our lives by noting two or more things and applying our creative thoughts to bringing them together. And sometimes we are ready to do that, which is great! But I noticed in his case that he stayed in the idea of "wanting" both, going back and forth between them like pingpong, without being able to move forward! At some point I believe he would NEED to focus instead on what he would CHOOSE to do! Choice — or action — is a necessary ingredient for forward movement. And even considering it gets us in forward motion!

I have remarked on this same dynamic over and over in less than a month with clients, friends, and in myself! I often hear from people that they really "want" something. As they speak about that want and other things that they *want*, sometimes they go back and forth from one 'want' to another, knowing that they are all important characteristics of our dream. But the only movement is circular, more like a whirlpool than the forward direction we would prefer!

When I gently ask someone in that pattern what they are going to choose as a course of action, a shift happens energetically in their relationship to what they are contemplating. They almost immediately drop down into their creative thinking and get unstuck! Sometimes the course of action they immediately think of might be surprising, like a step they hadn't considered that they really need to take first before moving on otherwise. And sometimes they realize clearly what they like about how things currently are!

How can this be useful to you in getting moving, especially with longterm or "core" issues that tend to boggle you?? Ask yourself, when you notice the A-or-Z-only conceptualization of options, what your next step to take will be.

If your mind says you aren't sure, (which is often natural and true!), I use an old Hypnotherapy trick: I ask "Well, if you DID know, THEN what would you choose?!?" Imagining a scenario of making a choice drops you easily and quickly from your linear-rational stuckness into the broad, creative and associative kind of thinking that new ideas are born of! It doesn't matter if you are able to actually arrive at your eventual right decision right then, at least it gets your focus on some new direction instead of being stuck between two apparent polarities. Being in creative contemplation about how to enter into a given, desired change isn't a bad thing at all, in fact it's completely natural, unless you get stuck there!

I wish you well in finding your own good pace and form of progress in making your dreams come true!

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Are you interested in the different kinds of thought your mind runs and how they serve you differently at different times? Want to learn how to recognize and use them at will?? Call me at 415-706-9740 to schedule a private session or sign up for one of my inexpensive classes and you'll be on your way to *working* your whole mind!!



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