Stop Looking for What You Want and It Will Find You

The Energy You Embody Will Be Reflected Back

David Herbert Lawrence was an English novelist, writer, poet, and essayist from the early twentieth century.

One of his most famous works was a poem that stated:

Those that go searching for love only make manifest of their own lovelessness, and the loveless never find love, only the loving find love, and they never have to seek for it.

David was teaching us about one of the most important laws of life.

Whenever you go in search of something, you’re implicitly reminding yourself, “This thing is missing.”

In other words, if you’re seeking, you’re simultaneously experiencing absence. Your quest is to fill the void.

But that’s not how things work…

Instead of filling the void of what you lack, you knock yourself further out of balance.

You continue to experience the lack because you’re weighted more heavily in that direction.

As the popular adage goes, “What you think about most grows.”

If you’re constantly thinking about getting something you want, you’re implicitly and simultaneously thinking about your lack, so it grows.

The true way to get why you want is to follow the words of YouTuber, Aaron Doughty, “Turn off the searchlights and dismiss the search party.”

Stop looking for what you want. Become the embodiment of it.

In other words…

Detach yourself from the outcome and enjoy the ride!

The problem of looking for what you want

Jane is a 27-year-old freelancer from London.

She’s only ever been in one relationship, which was over 10 years ago.

In her own words, “I needed time to work on myself.”

She’s now content with the place she’s at in life and is ready to settle down with someone she shares a genuine connection with.

All she has to do is find that person, but here’s where the problem lies…

The people Jane likes don’t like her, and she doesn’t like those who do.

Typical of modern dating.

In an attempt to increase her odds of finding her personal person, Jane started accepting more invitations from friends to go out.

Till this point, she’d always been an extremely hard-working person who preferred to stay home and focus on building new skills to excel in her freelance endeavors.

For the most part, her values don’t align with the people she meets in clubs, yet she’s been finding herself in one every weekend — “You never know where you can find love,” she would tell herself while reluctantly getting ready.

In case it’s not clear, Jane hates clubbing.

Every night, after she gets home, she opens up her journal to document how lonely she feels and how much she hates clubs.

All she wants is to find her personal person, but the search has only reinforced how lonely she feels.

This happens because our reality is defined by our experiences — and these experiences shape our brains too.

Every thought or emotion you constantly repeat to yourself creates a neural pathway or reinforces an old one.

Despite being an organ, our brain functions like a muscle — well, not really, but that’s how you should think of it...

Replaying the same thought over and over again makes the neural pathway stronger.

Over time, these thoughts become automatic and begin to influence your actions, which determines who you become.

Many would break this cycle if they knew what was happening, but that’s exactly the problem…

They don’t.

Most people don’t realize there’s a need for change when they’re constantly reinforcing the absence of what they want.

They lack the insight to understand how the behavior or attitude is affecting their lives, so they make no effort to change.

What you focus on grows

The main danger of searching for what you want has to do with what you’re teaching yourself subconsciously.

Your relationship with whatever you’re focused on evokes a certain emotion within you.

If you’re focused on something you lack, regardless of whether is deliberate or not, you open the door to a build-up of negative emotions for as long as you don’t have it.

This creates a resistance that prevents you from ever getting it.

For example, let’s say you’re focusing on reducing your body fat percentage, so you can be as shredded as a Greek God.

Every day, when you wake up, you run to the body composition scale to check your progress.

If the numbers haven’t gone down, you feel miserable – you might even starve yourself for the day to see if it helps.

After a while of the numbers not changing, which is quite normal, you eventually get fed up and quit.

This is known as the failure state trap – “When I achieve X then I’ll be happy.”

For context, the failure state trap is when happiness is pushed to a later date when you’ve achieved your objective.

Until you’ve got what you want, you’ll remain miserable, but the day never comes due to a build-up of negative emotions.

The outcome first trap is also part of the problem…

This is when you constantly think about what you want but become blind to the development required to achieve or maintain the outcome.

As a result, if you do end up getting what you want, it doesn’t last long.

Begin by ending your search

You must stop looking for what you want and bring the energy back to yourself.

The energy you embody will always be reflected back to you.

All I’m saying is you’ve gotta become the person who attracts the thing you want naturally.

For example, if you wanna get shredded abs, stop worrying about the abs and start focusing on what someone with shredded abs will do (e.g., eating healthy, regular exercise, etc.).

The same rule applies for anything you want…

You must divert your mind away from the outcome and focus on the process of becoming the person who embodies it.

As a wise man once told me, “I was a millionaire well before the money ever showed up in my bank account. It was in mind and spirit – I was just waiting for the physical world to catch up.”

This doesn’t mean you should sit around and wait for what you’re looking for.

You must go out more and meet people if you wanna find your soulmate.

Just go to places you like.

You must write often if you wanna become a better writer.

Just write about topics you like.

You must let as many people as possible know about your products and services if you wanna make money selling them.

Just reach out to the people you would like to serve.

You’re not doing it with an expectation; you’re doing it because that's what you like to do.

The minute you catch yourself thinking something along the lines of, “I’m going to do this because I might find what I want,” don’t do it!

You’re not showing up as your authentic self.

Here’s the action point…

Determine the principles you must follow to achieve your objective, but tailor the actions to fit what you enjoy doing.

It’s only when you’ve embodied the energy of what you want most that you can have it.

Final thoughts

If there’s something you want badly in your life right now, don’t look for it.

Your constant pursuit reminds you of your lack of it, and what you think about most grows.

Even if you’re unintentionally thinking of your lack all the time, you’ll get more of it since you’re signaling to your brain it’s important to you.

The way to get what you want is to turn off the searchlights and dismiss the search party.

Tune your mind into the process of becoming the person who attracts what you want naturally.

Forget about doing things for the benefit it could bring you.

Instead, do it for the joy you get from taking part.

Have fun doing the things you’re supposed to do to move closer to your objective.

Eventually, the thing you’re looking for will find you.

Thanks for reading!

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