What does it take to be happy? One way, it seems, is to want only what we already have or can easily obtain. We can also find contentment by wholeheartedly accepting whatever happens to us, even when our efforts are thwarted or our goals are difficult or impossible to achieve. Wanting what IS holds no strife and is consistent with inner peace and tranquility. This state of mind is not necessarily one of complacency. Indeed, I have met people who appear to find complete satisfaction and fulfillment with whatever they have or are able to obtain; their enthusiasm and joy can be contagious.

Now, if happiness means wanting only what we have and accepting life as it comes, does that necessarily preclude undertaking something unknown or new? Not at all! Exploration and creative investigation certainly can challenge our imagination and generally requires much patience in dealing with uncertainty, frustrations, and even failures. However, to find pleasure and satisfaction from novel adventures, we must accept completely that success is uncertain and that efforts may require many trials, none of which may succeed. To be truly happy, we must feel okay about that – not passively okay, but energetically gratified to learn whatever the endeavors can teach us – successful or not.

To cling to a desire that cannot possibly be satisfied or to strive with insistence upon an inherently futile outcome can only lead to misery. On the other hand, to want what is possible and passionately go for it without insisting upon success can provide the entry to a joyful existence. For the sake of this discussion, the former will be termed insistence-wanting and the latter acceptance-wanting.

In my experience, wanting is accompanied by bodily sensations. With insistence-wanting, I feel inwardly tense, anxious, and an emotional ache in the area above my stomach. These cues act as wake-up calls to focus consciousness on what is going on to produce those feelings. But if they were to persist without consciousness, life would be distressing. Making unrelenting demands can result in much pain, but persistence in insisting on what is impossible leads inevitably to failure and consequent misery. Such demands have qualities of masochism, since the pain of the inevitable failure comes from an unconscious self-infliction. Viewed as an inner drama (see my essay with that title), insistence-wanting can be seen as an attack upon the inner Child, with whom consciousness may be identified, by an inner Tormentor that can be relentless, if it goes unchallenged (e.g., by the inner Hero).

For example, a 50-year-old woman tells me that she has tried since childhood to get her unfeeling, distant, narcissistic mother to listen to her and see her as the person she is, not as her mother wants her to be. But her mother won't (she probably can’t). This woman “only” wants her mother to understand her and love her. If her mother actually is cut off from her feelings, lacks an ability to empathize, and suffers severe narcissism, she must be a very wounded woman herself. Consequently, she could not possibly satisfy the desires of her daughter, unless Mom takes the improbable path of doing some extensive inner work. It is the woman’s insistence-wanting, not her mother’s treatment of her, that causes this woman’s distress.

Or take the elderly mother who complains that her 45-year-old son has lived with her all his life, has made no effort to move out or get a job, and expects her to support him, prepare all his meals, do all his laundry, and perpetually pick up after him. However, in her identification with the nurturing Great Mother, she has automatically and consistently done all of those things for him since his birth! Now she’s tired and would like him to do some of the work for himself. But how can he? Since he has never been taught, he has not developed the ability to know what else to do. Because of her unrelenting maternal indulgence, he has become a totally dependent person. Suddenly she wants him to be different; she is unwilling to accept what is and wants what isn’t. Insisting on the satisfaction of that ‘want’ instead of changing herself is a prescription for misery.

Then there are those who seriously want to play an instrument without learning about music or practicing; those who want high grades in school without studying; those who want everyone to like them even when they treat others with obvious disrespect and/or cruelty; those who want money and material goods without working to earn the money with which to purchase them; those who want to receive services without recompense; those who want things without putting forth effort for anything; and so on and so on and so on. Such ‘wants’ lead to self-inflicted disappointment and suffering.

Finally there are those insistence-wanters who must be “perfect,” where perfection is defined as flawlessness. That is, they want to do things without any possibility of doing them “wrong” or making mistakes and so that there is absolutely no possibility of negative criticism from anywhere. Insisting on being “perfect” is a formula for living with misery and pain. (Interestingly, the definition of perfection in any particular application is subjective. Different people will define what constitutes a perfect X differently, and it is likely that a single person will define a perfect X differently at different times. So even the word ‘perfection’ is itself imperfect.)

Insistence-wanting arises from the victimized, abandoned, or otherwise disturbed inner Child who has no clear perception of the relationship between actions and their consequences. This wanting is primitive, impulsive, and usually unrelenting; it lacks the assumption of personal responsibility. It generally arises in response to the inner Critic’s insistence on what it deems “should” be. (The Critic is the negative or destructive aspect of the inner Father; it is the put-down artist par excellence in the psyche.)

Acceptance-wanting may also arise from the inner Child, but when it does, it is the curious, excited, enthusiastic aspect of the Child in us that has strong inner support. That support comes from the positive inner Parents that boost self-esteem through love, kindness, patience, encouragement, and gentle guidance. With such support, the Child can learn to accept – and often seek fun in -- the things that must be done to accomplish desired goals, assuming they are indeed achievable. If a goal cannot be reached or if efforts fail, that inner support gives comfort and hope to the Child so that it can tolerate frustration and failure. In such an environment, the Child can learn to find joy in the learning process even when it leads to a dead end.

Acceptance-wanting may also arise from our aesthetic connection with the Soul. It is the inner Hero’s urge to do whatever it takes to satisfy the Soul’s longing for beauty – in all its forms. Consequently, when the Hero is functioning, it strives to fulfill the Soul’s yearnings and thereby it acts to bring about inner peace and harmony. The Hero functions with a resolute effort to succeed, but is not discouraged or daunted by failure. The inner Hero simply acts unceasingly toward its innate Soul-satisfying goal. (I perceive the Soul’s longing to be equivalent to “God’s will,” the Self’s urge toward wholeness, Tao, or the oneness with the “All.”)

We can readily recognize the difference between the inner Child’s acceptance-wanting and the Soul’s longing when we are able to stand back and observe our inner experiences in their contexts. For example, we may want to visit a friend (for comfort? for connection? for validation?), shop for something (presumably needed? we just like to shop?), or go to a movie or concert (for entertainment? to satisfy a longing?). Yet the body doesn’t want to move. We can almost hear the Soul say, “At this moment, going somewhere is not of primary importance. Let’s cool it. I would just like to take it easy, and maybe read or listen to some music; it would feel great just to have a quiet evening at home.” I recall one incident like that: I was scheduled to go to a professional meeting. Inner Father/Critic said, “As long as you belong to that group, you should go to every one of their meetings.” The inner Child wanted to be “good” and go. I was on my way to the meeting, when I became aware of the mechanical way I was identifying with the ‘good little boy.’ I pulled the car over, parked, and asked myself, “But what is right for me to do; what is my Soul’s longing?” I heard my Soul saying, “I really want to be there; I feel a warm connection with the other members, and I often leave meetings feeling fulfilled.” So I went. On another occasion, going through essentially the same motions, the response was just the opposite, and I turned the car around and drove home. Once the decision was clearly made, the inner Child could accept either outcome.

Conflicts between 'wantings' can exist even when the inner Child’s involvement is minimal. There are situations in which we are faced with conflicting desires that appear to arise mainly from the Soul’s longing. In this case, the friction lies not between the Child and Soul, but between different Soul-connected ‘wants.’ For example, consider a scenario in which you have tickets to a concert that promises to be exquisitely beautiful and spirit lifting, based on your past experience and reports from reliable sources. Unexpectedly, your dearest friend becomes hospitalized with a serious condition on the very day of the concert. You want to go to the concert, and you want to be with your friend. Clearly, a sacrifice must be made. Of course, other factors may make the choice easy, such as a cancellation of the concert or a ban on visitors to see your friend for a day or two. But when such helpful circumstances do not arise, making the choice can be painful until a resolution is reached and a sacrifice is made with conscious acceptance. At that point the pain of the conflict is likely to subside. (While the inner Child may not want to experience pain, it is an unavoidable feature of living because conflicts are inevitable. The Hero in us accepts that fact unconditionally and accepts the pain.) We can be aided in reaching a resolution of such strife through answering the questions in the next paragraph and by consciously and willingly sacrificing the alternate, untaken path.

To resolve the simultaneous occurrence of contending desires, asking oneself such questions as the following can be of help:

• What do I imagine will be gained?
• What is REALLY important?
• Is there anything else I want at the same moment?
• What are the imagined consequences of taking each alternative course of action?
• What might I do or obtain that will be most fulfilling?
• What course do I imagine will result in feelings of deep satisfaction without any subsequent feelings of regret?
• Regardless of the results, can I truly accept the outcome of my choice?

The inner Child -- like an outer one -- who has the full support of positive inner (or outer) Parents gains the strength to accept an outcome, even when it does not satisfy the Child’s initial wants, because that support protects the Child from feeling victimized, neglected, or demeaned. The unsupported Child is likely to feel lost, abandoned, weak, and (especially) deprived, so that its wants derive from an underlying experience of threat to survival.

Examine your wants. Are they coming from the yearning of your Soul that connects you with life and with God and the universe or from the neediness of your inner Child that feels deprived? Acting out of the inner Child alone leads to the pain of unsatisfied longing; acting in accord with the Soul, even when accompanied by emotional or physical pain, leads to inner peace and harmony.

Which do you choose?