Nothing is more powerful than belief. If I desire a loving partnership, but expect another codependent one to come along, then what I have faith in is the codependent relationship. ONLY diving into the emotions of my desire, expectation and faith can lead me to acquiring what I desire.
WHAT IS DESIRE?
Desire is the longing or burning feeling we get when we really want something. When we truly desire something, it’s a tangible emotion we can feel. We can have a desire for more money, a relationship, the healing of someone we love, a gift, receiving a job promotion or any other goal, objective or aspiration. Desire is something that can grow over time. Desire absent asking or action is just a feeling. Desire is the spark that leads to a flame.
WHAT IS EXPECTATION?
Expectation is what we believe we are worthy of or deserve. When we expect bad things to happen, this may be because in the past, similar scenarios have presented themselves and something bad was always the end result. When we expect something, we may believe that we are entitled to it or that we have earned it in some way. Sylvia Plath once said, “If you expect nothing, you’re never disappointed.” Expectation is closely linked to emotion. When we expect something, we have a strong belief that we are entitled to it and when we do not get it, that is when the oppositional emotions of anger, jealousy, and disappointment can arise. Understanding this can help with realizing that to get what we desire we must expect that it will come. However, understanding that expecting the universe to bring us something and being open to how that something comes is different than projecting expectation onto one person and believing that if they love us, value us or care about us, that they will give us what we want will lead us to anger, jealousy or disappointment. When we have a pure desire, a confident expectation that this desire will be granted and faith in it coming along with the openness for how it arrives, we will be able to steer clear of oppositional emotions because we will understand the process and have faith in it!
WHAT IS FAITH?
Faith from a religious or sometimes spiritual perspective suggests this idea of believing in an entity outside of ourselves to bring us whatever we desire or need. Faith can also be a tangible feeling. When we have enough wisdom and experience with something, we begin to have faith or trust in some things and not others. I may have faith that I’ll wake up tomorrow, that my job will still be there 20 years from now, that my partner is committed to me for life…after we have enough experience with something happening, we grow to have unconscious faith that it will happen again tomorrow and the day after that. Having faith in a new desire may prove more challenging for the unconscious of faith because there is no history with new desires. It is often the new desire that makes us question our own faith or belief that this new thing will come. Faith as I am talking about is something that is developed through a self-discovery process. Once we become conscious of our beliefs, thoughts, conditioning, emotions, and behaviors and can test them against our faith we can come to discover what we truly have faith in. When we have faith in our desires, we always get them. When we have faith in our doubts, we always get them.
HOW ARE DESIRE, EXPECTATION AND FAITH LINKED?
When I have a desire and I expect to get it, this can be considered faith. I believe that I will get it. “Ask and it will be given to you,” is the old principle we’ve all been exposed to, right? If we’ve had a childhood where we learned that what we desired or wished for would come to pass, we came to believe in this idea of “asking and getting,” but for those who had a childhood where when we asked for something, we either didn’t receive it or hardly received it, we come to have a belief in “ask and you will not receive,” mindset. Our conditioning plays the most pivotal part in this dichotomy of desire, expectation and faith.
If we have a feeling of desire and a belief that we can receive the desire, then we have a higher chance of getting the desire.
If we have a feeling of desire and a belief that we cannot get the desire, then we have an even higher chance of not getting the desire.
UNCONSCIOUS CONDITIONING
Our conditioning plays such a powerful part on our unconscious mind (which is to say the mind that is in charge of this desire, expectation, faith trio). When we become conscious of what we feel, think and do, we simultaneously gain dominion over our unconscious mind. Through investigative and exploratory work, we discover all the parts that make up the whole of our human experience. I call this investigative and exploratory work, SELF-DISCOVERY. It is ONLY through self-discovery that we gain the insight and understanding of how things like desire, expectation and faith are all interconnected and how to influence our own desires and outcomes. Absent this process, we are at the whim of blind faith. With this process, we come to see not only how faith works, but the force behind faith actually working.
THE PRINCIPLES ARE TRUE
I have a practice that I started early on in my self-discovery journey. At first I would try to learn and understand everything, but after awhile, I realized that there was no way that I could have infinite knowledge and wisdom. Every day I gained new wisdom and so it became an impossible goal. I created a filing system in my brain instead of three bins. 1. What I know is true. 2. What I think is true. 3. What I still do not know. ALL of the stories of our past–the Old Testament, the New Testament, pretty much all religions, Native American stories, the question of whether Jesus was a real person or a story, the extraterrestrial theories, the matrix and so much more all fall into the “what I still do not know,” bin. And this is after I pretty much obsessed about the book of Genesis for a few years which led me to do extensive research into extraterrestrial, genetics and virtual realities. In the end, while I came to conclude that genetics is not only a thing, but that it is so accurate and so awe-inspiring that if I could get a redo on college, I would major in genetics, for sure! The point I am trying to make is that years of study and research could not answer the questions that I had about certain subjects. Instead I found that taking my own journey, applying all of these teachings–I amalgamated my own recipe from everything I learned–I could discover for myself what is true and what is not true (even if my truth is different than others truth!). And I want to say here that this is not to say that I do not find value in all of the listed resources above. Like Einstein, I find Jesus to be a fascinating character. It is more about the subject of absolute knowing and for me I have found that taking the journey Jesus and other sages suggested is how I am determining for myself.
Here’s one thing I found to be true: Desire, expectation and faith are interconnected. When we believe in one outcome at the conscious level, we cannot get its opposite. Our desire, expectation and faith must be in alignment to receive whatever desire we have.
CHANGING OUR BELIEFS
It is impossible to change our beliefs at the unconscious level. Auto-pilot is much too powerful and even with the strongest of wills, auto-pilot will win in the end. This is why it is essential to become conscious of our desires, expectations and faith. It is only where we are conscious that we can see for ourselves what is happening and why it is happening and therefore implement solutions to resolve whatever block or false belief is in the way of us manifesting what it is we desire. If I believe that only God can heal my sickness and I am unconscious to the truth that if I change my eating habits and get healthier that I may be able to heal my own sickness, I will not engage the latter. Here’s a story I was once told that I feel is super powerful in helping to understand this theory.
John was in the ocean practically drowning. He had nothing, but a small piece of wood to grab hold of. He called out in prayer for God’s help–for someone to rescue him. About an hour later a boat showed up and offered to pull John to safety. John replied, “No thanks, I’m waiting on God.” And so the boat drove away. About an hour later, a helicopter showed up and threw down a ladder. John once again declined the help claiming he was waiting on God and the helicopter flew away. Finally, an old man in a row boat came by and threw a life saver over board for John to grab hold of. As you might already guess, John declined the offer, only the man in the row boat being very wise and understanding desire, expectation and faith said to John, “Have you not prayed for help?” And John replied, “Yes, I have.” So the old man tossed the life saver again and said, “Then grab hold. God heard your prayer, but is much too busy to rescue you himself so he sent me. Get in.” And so it was that John’s beliefs were challenged. To survive, he was forced to put blind trust in a new belief system in order to live. Simultaneously though, his experience shifted his faith as he could now see with his own eyes how his desires were answered and how his expectations and faith my not be in alignment.
HOW TO CHANGE A BELIEF
Before we can challenge a belief, we need to understand the feedback system for studying our progress on changing a belief. This feedback system is our emotional system. The reason that Sylvia Plath said “if we expect nothing, we are never disappointed,” is because she understood the following:
When we expect things from others and we do not get them, disappoint is among the feelings that arise. If we do not like feeling disappointed with our current experience with the person “disappointing us”, then we only have two choices, to stop expecting things of this person or to continue to suffer. When we make the decision to stop expecting things of someone and then run into the same disappointment with every other person, then we step into the realm of self-reliance or God-reliance. Rumi once said, “I searched for God and found only myself. I searched for myself and found only God.” This quote perfectly captures the idea of self-reliance to find God and God-reliance to find self. Once we radically accept that expecting from others is not always guaranteed and that there will be times when we do not get what we want and we could be disappointed or angry, we understand that we have other options. We can depend on ourselves or on an omniscient entity or entities. We can grow and learn how to discern those individuals who do have the capacity to help us or we can grow to see and appreciate that which is given to us freely even if it does not measure up to what we expect it to be. All of these things are ways that we can change our beliefs. We can change how we perceive our reality–instead of expecting, simply be grateful for what we are given–or we can accept personal responsibility to let go of relying on those around us who are unable to meet our needs and seek out alternative ways to meet those needs. Changing beliefs is all about first SEEING our beliefs, second FEELING our beliefs and third, CHOOSING our beliefs. Just because we have been conditioned to believe a belief does not mean that we have to believe it anymore than it means we have to feel it. If something is not working for us, we have the power to change it. At the same time, changing a belief is easier said than done. I will write a blog on this at a later date!
BELIEVE TO RECEIVE
If we have reached a place in our development where we have shifted our mindset from blind faith to conscious faith, then we understand the concept that we have to believe to receive. One powerful way to take the self-discovery journey is to use something that we truly desire to act as our lighthouse. This light at the end of the tunnel acts as our inspiration reminding us why we are on the path. It gives us hope in times of doubt. It motivates us to keep going. When we have faith in a desire and we understand that when we are not immediately receiving a desire, the problem may be with us. We may believe that we believe in something, but upon deeper reflection we come to discover that an unconscious belief deep down still exists. We discover that when it comes to achieving big dreams, that can only happen after we’ve completed every obligation and responsibility and so like Cinderella, we believe that until every chore is complete, we cannot prepare ourselves for the ball. We have a belief that we must take care of everyone else first. As we discover the blocks holding us back, we can do the work to change these beliefs and with the changed beliefs and actions, move the block and progress.
ALIGNING OUR DESIRES, EXPECTATIONS AND FAITH
Similar to aligning our feelings, thoughts and actions, only aligning our desires, expectations and faith with each desire we have will lead to us receiving the desire. If we expect that we will not get the promotion because we are not as talented as our coworkers, then it does not matter what we desire or have faith in, in the end, we will not get the promotion. Instead we will experience the same reality that we have always experienced again and again. Until we understand what the CAUSE of not receiving is, we will not be able TO receive. If we desire a loving relationship and we have done our emotional work to pluck out the beliefs of unworthiness and now expect to and have faith in a loving relationship, we will attract a loving relationship. Simialrly, if we do not attract a loving relationship and believed that we did all the work to pluck out our incompatible beliefs, then we will know that we have not plucked out our incompatible beliefs and be clear on the work to be done.
A NOTE ABOUT OTHER’S WILL, SICKNESS AND MIRACLES
When we desire something that involves another person, we must understand the principle of control. We only have control over our own feelings, thoughts and actions. If we desire a relationship with someone, for example, and that someone does not want a relationship with us, our desire cannot be granted with all our will and emotional work. Instead, we can desire to have a relationship like this one or perhaps if we believe this person is our soul mate, we can continue to desire the relationship while accepting that we are powerless to the other person’s will and desires. Similarly, when a loved one is sick, we can pray for miracles, but we are not in control of those miracles. This truly is an example of something that is outside of our abilities. We can pray and ask others to pray, but aside from that, this is truly an example of blind faith. And this is an example of something that remains in my “I do not know” bin. We are at times helpless and powerless and we scream out in confusion and fear. The only thing that I do know for sure is that the more that we understand, the less fear we have. Where we are at the whim of blind faith, all we have control over is seeking understanding. Sometimes that understanding can only be found years later. This is why I find the greatest way to understand things is by looking backwards. When I can reflect on the past and see how far I’ve come, I can see God’s hand in my life and how those answered desires have propelled me to where I am now. And I simultaneously understand that only years from now will I be able to look back to understand that which I am struggling to understand or receive right now.
FINAL THOUGHTS
When we understand that life will teach us always, we can come to trust the process. The only way to know where we are on our desires, expectations, and faith is to live life. Make wishes, believe in those wishes and note the outcome. For bigger wishes, this may take longer. For tiny wishes the results may be quick. Finally, sometimes our beliefs are just fine. We may not have any unconscious beliefs standing in our way. It may just take more time to receive what we are asking for. Sometimes, we may need to investigate our expectations and faith and travel down the rabbit hole to see what is actually going on. In times like these, it is helpful to have a resource like this so that we feel less alone. If you have a question or would like me to write about a particular topic, reach out to me at selfdiscoverly@gmail.com
Much Love!
Self Discoverly 