Desire and Receiving

Tell me what you want …

… what you really, really want!

I ran a little survey of my coaching colleagues who work mainly with women.

• 28% said that most of their clients couldn’t articulate what they wanted, at the start of coaching - they just knew they wanted something different from what they had

• 72% said that partway through the coaching journey, their clients changed trajectory as they realised they’d uncovered dreams and goals they never knew they had

• 0% started coaching with clear desires that remained the same throughout the coaching journey

ZERO percent had powerful, clear and consistent connection to their own true desires.

Clarity of desire is rare indeed, and of course it makes it almost impossible to receive with ease and grace - because either we’re carrying the weight of an unacknowledged yearning; or we’re reluctant to accept that we deserve the incoming thing, just as we are.

And it’s not our fault.

We grew up swimming in the waters of the patriarchy, which teaches little girls from an early age to notice the needs of others and put them first, to conform with the collective, and to suppress their own desires if they’re ‘too much’.

This isn’t an anti-man rant, by the way. That very same system teaches little boys to know their own desires and take action to get them met, without helping them learn how to notice the needs of others. So many end up puzzled and bewildered, accused of being an inconsiderate husband or an absent father, and wondering why the women in their lives are so frustrated. The system is bad for ALL of us. But I digress …

It can be so hard to imagine being completely open and free and clear about what you really want.

• Can’t want THAT thing, it’s unladylike (pearls would be clutched if I even THOUGHT about it)

• Can’t want THAT thing, it’s unattainable (and the distress of FOMO is a terrifying prospect)

• Can’t want THAT thing, it’s too much (too loud, too big, too wild, too weird, too inconvenient for others)

But actually - you are allowed to want what you want, regardless of whether it’s attainable, realistic, ladylike, loud, or any of the other myriad things we keep getting told make desire inappropriate or dangerous.

This isn’t about the FULFILMENT of desire, merely the full acceptance and embracing of its existence.

After all, I will always want a hug from my Dad - but he died in 2010 so that desire is never going to be fulfilled.

Does it make me wrong for wanting it? No. Does it mean I should try to stop wanting it? Ridiculous!

Astrologically, desire is in the remit of Venus, whose very being is infused with the capacity to know what she wants. She’s also the expert at receiving the desire, with grace and ease and an utter belief that she deserves it.

It’s not her job to go out and fulfil it - that’s the role of action hero Mars. But ohhhhhh, she knows what she wants and how to let her acolytes bring it to her!

And our culture has no positive role model for Venus.

Women who easily express what they want, and easily receive it, are regularly castigated as selfish, gold-diggers, divas.

No wonder we’ve suppressed that “dangerous” part of ourselves.

Getting cosy with your own capacity for unapologetic desire is crucial to the process of becoming the version of you that you came here to be.

Because if you can’t fully connect to your biggest dreams, even inside your own head, how can you embark on that quest, and how can you know you’re heading in the right direction?

Desire is what drives us to our own right life - the fully authentic and liberated version of ourselves.

And that is also great for everyone around us: our loved ones, our communities, our colleagues.

Because knowing our own desires in full gives us the power to choose from love.

I don’t HAVE to act upon my desires in every setting.

I can make a choice, on the rare occasions when my desires don’t match what my loved ones want.

I might want sushi for dinner, but my husband doesn’t like it. I don’t suppress my desire for sushi - I relish it, and then I order in Mexican, which we both love.

Pretending your desires don’t exist is a powerful and damaging form of gaslighting. Refusing to open your heart to all of those desires is unkind.

And remember, it’s not your fault. But it is your work to clean up whatever might be in the way.

Does it hurt to have a desire that can’t be fulfilled? Yup, it sure can.

But it’s WAY less painful than twisting ourselves into a pretzel to pretend you don’t want it.

When we do that to ourselves, growth and progress in life becomes incredibly hard.

But when you know what you want without hesitation, it’s the doorway to a much happier life - for you and yours.

If this speaks to you and you’d like some support with unleashing your own unapologetic desire, check out my Unleash Venus short program. Click the button below for more details.