inconvenient desire = your best roadmap
Galium growing in the forest
Yesterday, I asked about your most inconvenient desire. Do you know what it is?
I’ll tell you mine: my most inconvenient desire is to be outside most of the time.
This might sound nice, and not that bothersome. But take a moment to reflect on which jobs allow you to be outside most of the time, and then reflect on how much those jobs tend to pay and whether or not those wages result in being able to afford new socks, or a house. Right.
This desire is highly inconvenient. But it is strong. I have arranged my entire adult life around it, and it has resulted in long periods of not being able to buy socks, and as yet no house.
This desire led me to choose veggie farming over law school, to resist having a salaried job, and to ultimately start my own business (this has been my strategy for outdoor time + ample socks. So far, it’s increasingly effective each year).
Basically this one inconvenient desire has defined my life. I’ve allowed it to. And whenever I get frustrated and think that my ultimate goal (owning an herb farm that I can invite you to) would be easier if I could just be a normal person and have a normal job or pursue normal “business strategies,” I stop to think about all the time spent inside, and I know I can’t do it. All I’d be doing, every moment, would be scheming to be outside again.
(There was a period of desperation years ago in which I took a normal, salaried, indoor job for 9 months. On beautiful days, I would cry at my desk. I was finally wooed away by a friend who offered me a gardening job.)
And the truth is that as challenging as my adult life has been due to this highly inconvenient desire, I don’t regret any of it.
I’ve learned things I never would have learned otherwise. I’ve been stretched in directions I didn’t know were possible. I left the path I thought I’d be on and I’ve become someone I like so much more. I enjoy the days that make up my life. I spend time with fascinating, creative, kind people. I’m living a dream life, truly.
So, that inconvenient desire you identified yesterday — it’s your road map to happiness and fulfillment.
It might not make sense or seem important. And it’s definitely your roadmap to a lot of other things, too — things like challenge, uncomfortable stretching, and even harder challenges that force you to re-define your entire philosophy of existence. But you won’t regret following it, I promise.
yours in motivational speeches,
Amanda
P.S. I hope that counts as a motivational speech. Like I said, following the “roadmap of my desire” led to not being able to afford socks (and plenty of other things) for a long time. So I don’t want to overpromise on the glamor.
P.P.S. The Ritual & Magic courses can help you with all this soul-searching and life development. I’ve written a fun guide below. It’s fun because it includes arrows.
How Ritual & Magic courses can help further your inconvenient desire
where are you at with your inconvenient desire?
you know what it is, but you don't know how it fits into your life's purpose → Ritual & Potion
you're living your desire, but you're stuck/confused and need guidance from the spirit realm → Ritual & Smoke
you've identified your desire, but you feel too nervous or intimidated to take action → Ritual & Bath
you're taking action steps, but you need more oomph, more power, more magic! → Ritual & Spell
“I am in the midst of a spiritual awakening. This course was key in encouraging me to step into my own power and authority to engage in ritual and create my own magic.
I’m more attentive to the objects and herbs I use, and learned I can speak to their energy as allies in ritual.”