Coaching practices for Do I Want What I Think I Want
Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Do I Want What I Think I Want, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.
Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?
- When I want something I get caught up in how it would feel to have it
- I’m sure that getting this next thing will finally make me happy, but if I’m honest I was just as sure about the last few
- A new want grabs me and I’m off chasing it before I’ve even paused
- I want things I can’t make happen
- I keep saying I want one thing while everything I actually choose points at another, and I want to sit down and write my way to what I genuinely want here
Practices that may help
- Cool the purchase by abstracting it
See the item in "cool," abstract terms to drain the craving before it drives a decision.
The Marshmallow Test and Your Money - Track your desires and their outcomes over time
Log what you wanted this week, whether you got it, and whether getting it produced what you expected.
The Stoic Discipline of Desire - Examining the desire before chasing it
Before pursuing something you want, ask whether the desire serves you or consumes you.
Santosha: The Practice of Contentment - Apply the dichotomy of control to your desires
Before each want, ask: is the object of this desire in my power, or outside it?
The Stoic Discipline of Desire - Know thyself: directed self-inquiry journaling
Use the Delphic injunction as a writing prompt: what do I actually want, believe, and fear — and are these things consistent?
The Socratic Method, Made Practical - Cool down a hot temptation by reframing it
See the reward abstractly ("just a picture of it") to drain its emotional heat.
Delayed Gratification, Made Practical - Correcting hedonic forecasting errors
Before making a significant decision in pursuit of pleasure, check whether similar things have historically produced the wellbeing you predicted.
Epicurean Philosophy: Practical Happiness - Locate where you’re authored from
Notice whether your current decision is driven by others’ expectations or by your own internal standard.
Self-Authorship: Moving From the Socialized to the Self-Authored Mind - Elicit your real standards before you look
Write down what a good outcome actually requires before options are visible.
Choice Overload, Made Practical - Excavate core values before writing goals
Identify what you most fundamentally care about before deciding what you want — or goals will be other people’s.
The Life Crafting Intervention: Scripting Your Future Self
Related concerns
- Talking About Desire
Name what you want without reducing it to a problem to be solved or a complaint to be managed.
Talking about desire without killing it
- When Stoic Discipline Of Desire Dichotomy Of Control Desire
Before each want, ask: is the object of this desire in my power, or outside it?
Apply the dichotomy of control to your desires
- Desire Examination Practice
Pierre Hadot identified the "discipline of desire" as one of the three Stoic spiritual exercises: training yourself to desire only what is in your power (virtue, your own judgments and responses) and to be indifferent to what is not. The practice targets the root cause of most human suffering — craving things outside your control — rather than its symptoms.
- Desire Management Philosophy
Pierre Hadot identified the "discipline of desire" as one of the three Stoic spiritual exercises: training yourself to desire only what is in your power (virtue, your own judgments and responses) and to be indifferent to what is not. The practice targets the root cause of most human suffering — craving things outside your control — rather than its symptoms.
- Epicurean Desire Reality Check
Before pursuing a desire, classify it: is it natural and necessary, natural and unnecessary, or vain?
Classifying desires before pursuing them
- How To Know What You Want
Premature specialization forecloses interests you haven’t discovered yet.
Sample widely before committing to a niche
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