In our live masterclass last week, someone asked why it was so hard to answer the question, “What do you want?”
This is the first question I ask everyone I work with. And it can feel impossible to answer.
In fact, most times, my clients will answer it with what they don’t want, and then we will return to it over and over during the course of our work together.
You may have experienced the worst kind of torment this question can offer. You are clear on what you want, get it, and then you feel disappointed.
There is a profound and somewhat complex psychological reason for this.
At Whole Leadership Systems, we simplify it and teach a framework for answering it at The Academy.
Ultimately, it comes down to your foundation (or lack thereof.)
All of us have a ‘basement’ in our psychological house.
Your basement is the deepest level of awareness about what is driving you.
If your basement is dirty and packed with a mess from your past (of beliefs about yourself or the way the world works), then what you can see about what you want is distorted by this mess.
Right?
Imagine you are actually standing in a basement that looks like a hoarder lives there. How clearly would you be able to see your way out? To see beyond your way out to what you’d prefer instead?
Do you have a foundation that resembles a hoarder living in your psychological basement?
Most people do.
Inside the dusty boxes are:
- Words they heard from parents that made them feel small.
- Perspectives on what is required to succeed or avoid failure that they neatly packed away when they witnessed a parent lose everything as a child.
- Deep feelings of inadequacy hidden behind shelves from days when they were less popular in school growing up.
If you are unaware that you’re standing in a dirty, packed basement, trying to figure out where you want to go next, but don’t realize that your vision is blocked at every angle, ‘what do I want’ is going to be a nearly impossible question to answer.
What we need to do first is clean out the basement.
Lay a clean foundation.
Otherwise, your answers to that question will feel impossible.
You won’t be able to answer it at all.
Or you’ll answer it, get what you want, and realize it wasn’t what you wanted in the first place.
There are so many reasons we spend so much time on your foundation at The Academy.
At Whole Leadership Systems, we believe that people don’t have what they want because they can’t clearly identify what it is.
This is why we lay out a framework (assess), clear the basement(remove), and teach you to pour a solid foundation (rebuild) at The Academy.
So that you can clearly answer the question “What do I want?” with ease.
And then go get it.
The Academy is happening in Austin on November 2nd and 3rd.
This year’s Academy will rock your world and launch you back into it.
You.must.be.there.
Will you come?
With love,
Mari Carmen
