Ask for Things
Act on Your Yearnings & Urges—Ask for Things
You have been deepening your journey of self-expression through the natural release of emotion. You are opening your heart more fully and are beginning to experience the freedom of this new level of expression. You are more open to the wisdom your emotions reveal to you and are becoming more aware of your yearnings that lead you to live an authentic, radiant life!
You have also been experiencing your emotions as the arbiter of the pleasure-pain principle, helping you generate more pleasure and avoid unnecessary pain. You’ve been learning that, rather than being hindrances or something to stuff down or ignore, your emotions are the gateway to joy, satisfaction, and fulfillment. Through feeling and expressing your hurt and sadness, you can experience your yearning to connect, to love and be loved, to be seen, to be affirmed. By feeling and expressing your fear, you can recognize danger and seek the safety you need to flourish. Through feeling and expressing your anger, you get in touch with what you want and what you don’t want.
Through feeling and expressing joy, you touch what matters to you and the delight of fulfillment. It is through your emotions that you experience life fully and are guided to fulfill your yearning.
Our feelings and their expression open us to our humanity and lead us to the greater aliveness that we all crave. We can touch the universal experience shared by all human beings and experience being fully alive as we feel and express our emotions. The joy of being human, in all its splendor, is available to us as we feel our feelings and open our hearts.
By learning to identify and feel your feelings, you begin to regain the skill of expressing them. This has led you to become increasingly aware of your deeper yearnings—the longings of your heart, the things that really matter to you. As the floodgates of emotions open, you now can seek satisfaction in ways that were not available to you without this level of emotional expression. By following your emotions through their expression, identifying what matters to you, and taking action to satisfy your yearnings, you can move toward satisfaction and nourishment. Expressing your emotions is a new path to identifying your wants and your deeper yearnings.
Emotions and Fulfilling Your Yearning
This week, we explore the relationship between emotions and going for what you want. Every emotion is related to your yearning—prompting you to follow your urges, to satisfy your yearning, or to sense when your yearning is not fulfilled. It is an interactive process: going for what you want will stir your emotions and yearning, and expressing your emotions will lead you to go for what you want.
In the past few weeks, we focused on leading with your emotions and becoming more aware of your yearnings. This week, we focus on acting on your feelings by asking for things and following where that leads you. Explore how asking for things can lead to meeting your yearnings and being nourished. Begin to see the relationship between your emotions, urges, and yearnings. By being more aware of your emotions, you are also more aware of your urges—the pulses that come from your heart’s desire, the impulses that leads you to action to fulfill your desire. Following your urges may lead you to ask for something more impulsively—and get it! Asking for things then helps you to fulfill your yearning—to matter, to be cared about, to connect, to make a difference, to love and be loved.
Following Urges and Fulfilling Yearning by Asking for Things
You’ve been focusing on identifying your wants and yearnings. Now, use your emotions and follow your urges and yearnings to lead you to action— to ask for things!
Asking for things is a critical skill of nourishment and self-care. Yet, we often have blocks to asking for things, and many of us have given up on asking. We have been conditioned out of the natural human urge to make requests. Instead, we hold back, afraid that we will be rejected, or that we want too much, or that people will take advantage of us if they know how much we want something, or that we will be ridiculed, or we feel unworthy or undeserving of receiving. Or we think it is greedy to ask, or that we’ll be humiliated, or too disappointed if we ask for something and don’t receive it. or...Our mistaken beliefs about asking for things keeps us from discovering the abundance that exists for us. We don’t realize how often people may want to do things for us or give us things.
Asking for things is a key tool that helps us bring into the world that which we envision, that which we desire.
To fulfill our visions, to follow our heart’s desires, we need to ask for help, support, material things, favors, assistance, resources, etc. It is impossible to achieve everything in life without asking others. Not only can we not achieve our visions or fulfill our heart’s desires without asking for things from others, but we also deprive ourselves from amazing possibilities of human interaction. You may be surprised by how much others want to help you or give to you when you ask.
Asking for things is an expression of our emotions of pleasure and pain. Asking for things removes pain and acquires pleasure. This is a powerful and critical tool of humanity—a vital element of synergy, connection, and nourishment between and among all human beings.
Ask for Things!
Main Assignment
Ask for things! Ask for as many things in as many ways and with as many people as you can this week. Ask for big things. Ask for little things. Ask for material things. Ask for small things. Ask someone to open the door for you, to save a seat for you, to push your elevator button. Ask for favors, ask for support, ask for deeper conversations. Ask for kind words, hugs, kisses, a nudge to wake you up, favors, support, tangible things, intangible things...whatever!
Ask for what you need in your relationships, at work, from your family... Ask even when you don’t need something!
Ask for things early in the morning, in the middle of the day, late at night, 2 A.M.... whenever! Ask for things from dearest loved ones, bosses, co-workers, complete strangers...whomever! Ask for the raise you deserve, the loving you want, the house to be the way you want it, the report to be submitted in a way that pleases you, for people to interact with you in ways that satisfy you...Follow your urges and fulfill your yearning by asking for things!
Discover how much support exists for you in the world around you. Experience the nourishment available for you. Discover the truth of the adage: Ask and you shall receive.
Notice what you are thinking as you ask for things. What beliefs have you had that have kept you from asking? How did you challenge those beliefs this week by asking for things?
Notice what you are feeling as you contemplate asking for things. What do you feel as you ask? After you ask? How does it feel when you receive what you ask for? How does it feel when you do not receive what you ask for? What have you learned about yourself and the role of your emotions in asking for things? What yearnings are expressed and met as you ask for things— the yearning to be seen, to matter, to be loved, or affirmed or...?
Bust your beliefs about what is possible this week. Ask and ask again—and keep track of what you ask for, because we have a contest next week. Win the contest and contribute to your whole learning lab winning the overall contest to see who can ask for the most! Keep track of how many things you ask for, how many things you get, their monetary value, and the level of risk and the fulfillment you receive.
As you bust your beliefs and ask for things, make notes of your discoveries, the new visions and beliefs you have for yourself, and the skills you want to develop to help you meet your deeper yearnings.
Engage fully in asking for things all week—big and small. Discover how much more nourishment is available to you when you just ask. Follow your urges and your yearnings and Ask, Ask, Ask!
Very-Able Assignments
What Do You Yearn for?––Ask to Get Them Met!
Be aware of what you yearn for—and ask for things to meet your yearning. Think about what you yearn for and what you could ask for to meet that yearning. List your yearnings and brainstorm as many things as you can think of that would tend to that yearning—and then Ask! Use the worksheet to capture possibilities and then act on them. For example, if you yearn to be valued, ask for a compliment or for someone to tell you what they value about you. If you yearn to be touched, ask for a hug. If you yearn to be heard, ask someone to listen to you and tell you what they heard. If you yearn to matter, ask someone what you mean to them. If you yearn to known, ask someone out to lunch and share more deeply with them. There are multiple ways to ask for things to meet your yearnings—have fun and ask for as many things as you can this week!
Ask for Difficult Things!
What things are most difficult for you to ask for? Take the risk to ask—and learn about yourself through the interaction. And who knows...?
Ask for Outrageous Things
Go wild and crazy! What could you ask for that is unthinkably outrageous?
Let your imagination run wild and think the unthinkable for yourself, then ask for those things.
Be a Nudge
How often do you ask for something, the person says “Yes,” but you don’t get it? Or they say “No” and you let it drop? This week, persist in your requests. Ask and ask and ask again—and see what happens! You may get what you want, you may get an in-depth interaction, you may get a glass of water in your face...experiment!
Get Things
Play this game: How many things can you get by asking for them? How many kinds of things can you get? How many ways of asking can you try?
It is one thing to ask for something, but it is another to have a real commitment to getting it. Imagine you are at a party, and you see someone with a tie or a scarf you really like. Now imagine that person giving it to you. Go get it! Notice the thoughts and feelings that come up over the idea. Now imagine what your life would be like if you operated with the level of commitment that would get that person to give you their tie or scarf simply because of the powerful way you asked for it!
It’s Better to Receive Than Not to Ask
Now, imagine being at that party and having that person give you that tie or scarf without you even asking for it! We have now jumped to an even higher level of intention: to communicate your desire for what you want so strongly and, in such rapport, that the person offers it to you without your asking!
Be Aware of Your Rules, Myths, and Beliefs About Asking for Things
What rules, myths, or beliefs do you have that limit you in asking for things? For example: Do you see the universe as an abundant place that wants the best for you? Or a place of danger or scarcity? Do you believe that people want to help each other or hurt each other? Do you have rules and beliefs that asking for things means that you are being greedy? Or that you should be self-reliant and not ask for things?
Do your rules and beliefs serve you? If not, you may want to start replacing them with beliefs that help you achieve your heart’s desires and fulfill your vision. List the injunctions that you have about asking for things. Then write some more positive statements that you could adopt instead.
Watch TED Talk “The Art of Asking” by Amanda Palmer
Watch the video “The Art of Asking,” a TED talk by Amanda Palmer. How intentional are you when you ask for things? What does it mean to you to ask people to help you—how does trust factor in to asking people for things? Do you feel uncomfortable, vulnerable, or guilty when you ask for things? Explore the idea that true power lies in asking people for things rather than making people do things. Share this video with your friends and family and start a conversation about the risks and rewards of being vulnerable and asking for things. Use this video as an excuse to ask for more connection!
Let yourself enjoy the adventure of wanting and asking for things this week.
Ask for Things That Meet Your Yearnings
Be aware of what you yearn for—and ask for things to meet your yearnings. Think about what you yearn for and what you could ask for to meet that yearning. List your yearnings and brainstorm as many things as you can think of that would tend to that yearning—and then Ask!
Act on Your Yearnings and Urges—Ask for Things
Use the chart below to track what you asked for. Be aware of the level of risk, as well as the feelings/reactions/beliefs/rules you challenged to ask. Also track the financial value, and whether you got what you asked for! Keep this worksheet handy for next class; we will have a contest!
Rules, Myths, and Beliefs About Asking for Things
What rules, myths, or beliefs do you have that might limit you in asking for things? For example: Do you see the universe as an abundant place that wants the best for you? Or a place of danger or scarcity? Do you believe that people want to help each other or hurt each other? Do you have rules and beliefs that asking for things means that you are being greedy? Or that you should be self-reliant and not ask for things? Do your rules and beliefs serve you? If not, you may want to start replacing them with beliefs that help you achieve your heart’s desires and fulfill your vision. List the injunctions that you have about asking for things. Then write some more positive statements that you could adopt instead.