We Are Allowed to Ask for What We Want
There is something about lacking faith and being miserable that goes hand-in-hand and I’m not sure what it is. It’s probably many things. One of those many things is that we don’t have much hope for the future. Things have gone wrong before, so why should we ever imagine they might go right moving forward? The trouble with this logic is that did things really go wrong in the past or is that just what we told ourselves at the time?
This framing or mindset is particularly hard for people who are suffering over the death of a loved one. We focus on the loss and forget about all the incredible Good that may have been taking place around that time and that person before they passed. Yes, the loss always seems incredibly unfair, because we want more of that person and we can no longer have it, but the Good I try to believe in isn’t a God of punishment. It’s more a mindset and a strength, a Universal power that will work with us if we work with it. It does not solve, remove, prevent, or alleviate suffering, but it does help us find meaning and purpose in hardship.
As we become willing to build and develop faith in a basic Good (or God, if you are so inclined) and our worthiness of it, we find ourselves focusing on it more and more. It’s like pouring a solid foundation for a structure. Once it hardens, we have something we can build on. If we were working with BLEEPY, old, broken, untrustworthy concrete, why the BLEEP would be build anything on it? Faith is self-reinforcing. A little bit goes a long way. Just a tiny bit with an open mind and a crazy heart willing to believe and we start seeing Good everywhere.
With that solid foundation, we start to build a little bit more faith in ourselves and our future. A better understanding of what we want, need, and deserve develops overtime. Recently, I caught myself saying to someone, “you are allowed to ask for what you want” only to realize later the same is true for me, too. Moments like this is where God (or Good) works in my life all. the. time.
When we have little faith in the future, we don’t ask the Universe or others for what we want or need because we’re pretty sure we won’t get it. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, because without asking, nothing turns up. As faith builds, and reinforces itself with tiny little (or big whopping) instances of serendipity or Goodness in our lives, we start to have hope and start asking for more. I pray my little BLEEP off all the time throughout the day. I try to be reasonable and I am well aware not all my prayers will be answered, but it’s so much fun asking and then seeing what turns up, pans out, or totally implodes, because I feel like it’s probably all for the best (which I am worthy of).
With faith, we become worthy of asking for what we want. We are allowed to ask the Universe, and maybe more importantly, other people. We are allowed to set boundaries and ask for better or different. So long as we do it with kindness and without force, God (or Good) will decide what’s best for us, but the most important piece is the willingness to ask because we know we are worthy.