After significant inner work, desires can feel diffuse or absent. This isn’t the loss of desire—it’s the loss of craving, which many of us have mistaken for wanting our whole lives. The question becomes: are your desires becoming more diffuse, or are they changing into something you don’t yet recognize?
Joe points out that from the moment you wake up, you make a hundred choices with a hundred preferences. Something is clearly not diffuse. What may be happening is that you’re in a period of integration rather than action—an inhale rather than an exhale. Or your desires have genuinely changed and you haven’t yet learned to listen to the new ones.
There’s also the possibility that you were operating on adrenaline for years, and as that subsides, the nervous system simply needs rest before the next phase of wanting can emerge. This rest period isn’t stagnation—it’s recovery.
Brett captures it well: “A lot of us have been used to associating wanting with craving. When the craving falls away, we wonder where the wanting is—but there’s still wants there.”
“How do you know that your desires are becoming more diffuse, or your desires are changing and you’re finding your more authentic desires?”
Related Concepts
- Craving versus wanting
- Craving pushes away what you want
- Stagnation may be wisdom
- Burnout is sustained adrenaline depletion