Focussing on wants rather than opportunities

I’m sick of wanting things. I want more free time. I want to be successful, liked, and funny. I want to fit in but somehow be respected and esteemed because I’m unique. I want to know more but not grow older. What don’t I want? Ironically, I don’t want this desire I have of wanting things. Wants are never fulfilled, because if they are, they become “haves” instead of “wants”. All wants ever do for me, or perhaps to me, is make me more bitter for not having what I think I should have. It’s stupid, really.

What will I do? Trying to not want things doesn’t work. It just leaves this temporary vacuum in my mind that quickly slurps in more things to want when I’m not looking, like a mischievous little child beside an empty cookie jar… Trying to want different things doesn’t work, because I’d still be wanting things and it would just shift the target.

No, a much better idea I had today is to replace this want of things all together with something better. The thought I had today was that maybe I could look and be glad for what opportunities I have instead. Looking at opportunities seems better, because instead of being off in a daydream wishing I had what I wanted I could be engaging the real world. Looking at opportunities is seeing what I can actually do instead of being distracted by what I wish I could do, and it might help keep my outlandish expectations more realistic.

This idea gives me the opportunity to start thinking in a different way, and perhaps prevent myself from becoming a bitter old man who never got what he wanted and never wanted what he got. See, I didn’t say that I want to start thinking in a different way, I said it was an opportunity. That way, if I don't manage to take this opportunity, I won't be depressed that I haven't got yet another thing to add to my enormous pile of things I don't have. Yes, that's the pile I'm sick of. But missed opportunities don't pile up on top of me like wants, they just drift of out of sight if you're looking ahead for more opportunities.

I now have the opportunity to end. =)