12/31/07: Delicious Desires

It is possible to want something and be completely happy in the desiring of it. It is not necessary to eliminate desires in order to be joyous. It is merely a shifting of attention within the desire that makes the difference between pleasure and pain.

There does not have to be pain in desiring. Pain only arises when you focus on the lack of what you want, not when you focus on what you want.

It may seem like a fine line to distinguish the two, but you can tell the difference by the way you feel. If you feel anguish or pain or suffering, you are focusing on the lack of what you want. If you feel joy and anticipation and appreciation, you are focusing on what you want.

If you want something and you revel in the delicious desiring of it, enjoying and anticipating its coming, you can be just as joyful in the mere wanting of it as you would be in the actual having of it.

Sometimes when the thing comes, you find that it isn’t quite as delicious as the experience of wanting it.  

It is neither spiritually wrong to desire nor is desire the cause of our suffering. We do not have to denounce all desires in order to be joyful or “spiritual”. Desires are scrumptious! We are expansive beings; it is our very nature to desire and expand to meet our desires.

Learn to love your desires. When you find exhilaration and joy in the simple experience of desiring, it won’t matter whether the thing you want manifests or not.  You are already deliciously happy without it!