What Do You Do When You Can't Stop Wishing?

[JEKBreatheandBelieve]

I can't stop wishing things were different. That I wasn't struggling. That I could live my life the way I want to (though I know some say I can, I disagree). I wish the past had never happened or happened in a different way. I wish I had more people to understand me or at least sit in comfort with me when I struggle. And there is the problem, I just keep finding more things to wish. I wish my doctor wasn't leaving. I wish I knew the result of my resigning from my job (like how it will affect my family and my career should I choose to pursue it eventually). I wish I knew how to apply skills instead of just rattle them off. And if I keep this up I will spend my whole life wishing instead of living, but I can't seem to stop wishing even though I just wrote that statement! Anyone have any ideas on how to stop wishing or at least on how to make the wishing not such a big part of one's time?

 

[Mallaky]

I can relate. What do I do? Hmm.
I try to understand the wish.

For example, today I watched a show with a scientist character in it. I wanted to be a scientist for many years, until I realized I can't. Not with my learning disability.
But what I can do is figure out what that character had that I was lacking, that "triggered" the sadness of the wish that won't come true. This then eventually leads me to something I can actually do. I now try to spent at least half an hour a day trying to learn something about conventional science. No matter how life continues, this moves me closer to the life I wanted to have. Step by step.

 

[Friday]

It's an impossible thing. I didn't want to go into a certain MOS that I knew I tested into, so I lied and said I talk in my sleep, which automatically DQ'd me. I was thinking about that the other day. How would my life be different? 10,000 possibilities, some great, some terrible, most middling. If I'd joined the circus, taken that internship, turned left instead of right... The choices we make on a daily basis, the people we run into, the twists of fate entirely outside of our control... How would our lives be different? Easy. There are 7 billion examples of how things might have been. Both better & worse. Taking the bloody time to think through roughly 80 years times 6 billion? (Cutting 1 billion off for early demise), on the other hand? That would take more than a lifetime to do. It's impossible.

Do I do it sometimes? Sure. But life isn't different. It is what it is. So what I do instead, as I can is look at what I want. Then try and make choices in my life to bring those things to me in this life.

The road not taken is too long to follow.

 

[Tinyflame]

@JEKBreatheandBelieve I can only think of, thinking of what you have of value in your life, eg husband, kids -? (I'm sorry I can't recall, or fur kids), a home, possibility for therapy, health or senses in certain ways, etc. Not to list things thankful for, but meant as reframing the thoughts. One never knows, because the path if different might have had other things but not the things you have now.

But I understand, it used to come to me, often, "2 roads diveged in a yellow wood.. and that has made all the difference". What changes things though is when trauma or ptsd takes away the choice, then it feels like losses. But, meant to be, because not of your choosing. Grieving it is normal though.

Still having 'wishes' is a good sign, & maybe one that will lead you to fulfill those wishes in another way.

:hug:

 

[JEKBreatheandBelieve]

Thanks, @Mallaky , @FridayJones , and @Junebug . Those are all very thoughtful response. And all things that cross my mind when I wander down the path of wishing too much. I know that if I wished that my earliest trauma never happened and that wish came true there is no telling what my life would be like now. And I can ponder billions of ways in which things throughout my life could have changed, but I don't want to spend my life wishing and pondering while missing what I do have. Yet, it's really hard right now not to wish. Perhaps it is a sign that some grieving needs to be done, some reframing, and working towards making choices towards helping some future-oriented wishes to come true. Thanks, I really needed the supportive and thought-provoking words.

 

[mary1979]

They say its the whole 'live in the now' concept that Buddhists preach that helps to bring contentment.

Think only of what needs to be done now, and never focus on yesterday or tomorrow.

I've tried it. Worked on it for a long time.
But succeed?
Sometimes I can pull it off for 5 minutes... Sometimes aha

 

[Changing4Best]

Are there any of your wishes that could actually come true, if you took just ONE of them and worked hard at it? Or if you tried to view it in a different light?

 

[JEKBreatheandBelieve]

@SheilaKathy , wishing I could focus on just one to work on...but eventually I will get there, because I know there are some things I can work one if I choose that path eventually.

 

[The Albatross]

So you can accept that this is a process and that you are in a place where you are consciously acknowledging you're wishful thinking. Good on you.

 

[The Albatross]

What methods have you tried for the "can't stop" part?

 

[JEKBreatheandBelieve]

What methods have you tried for the "can't stop" part?

That is a very good question. My favorite is to just pretend that I am not wishing and that everything is fine, but that's not really a method. I have tried mindfulness. I had some good success with that a few months back so I am working on getting back into that again. I suppose challenging distortions comes into play in a way. That's about all I can think of.

 

[The Albatross]

Right, pretending is smoke and mirrors as you are enabling the "wishful" cycling yet at your core, you have not yet seemed to come to terms with the idea that whatever happened has happened yet you can actualize a life. I think I would start running down some core belief stuff.