What Do You Want?

I stopped letting myself want, and I didn't notice until a question found me in the shower.

Dear Human,

When was the last time someone asked you what you actually want?

Not what you need, or what makes sense, or what’s realistic. What you want?

And when was the last time you let yourself answer honestly?

I had woken up frustrated two mornings in a row, and it was a new kind of frustration, the energy stuck in every vein pulsing like a whistling tea kettle announcing water is ready but not being poured out.

I didn’t like the feeling.

I didn’t like feeling something pressing against my chest from the inside, trying to get out but was trapped, and I didn’t know what to do.

That’s what was causing the frustration, why I was snappy and irritable and on the tip of exploding.

So I hopped into the shower, letting hot water run to melt off the discomfort, steam build and wrap me like a hug, and the sound of rushing water to drown out my cries so I didn’t fear disturbing anyone.

Soon words began to form in my mind, maybe a prayer, maybe a lament, but before I could get a sentence out, a question interrupted my thoughts.

“What do you want?”

It was a very disarming question, what did I want? Why would anyone ask what I wanted?

It turns out I wasn’t letting myself want and that was building up inner turmoil. I was scared that what I wanted was impossible or would be horribly difficult to get. I was scared of the wait and I didn’t want to sound so materialistic.

As the water hit the ground and my tears hit my face, I repeated these words, “Holy Spirit, I need your help. Holy Spirit, I need your help. This is really hard. I feel stuck and I don’t know what to do.”

And slowly and surely, He showed up.

He showed up as a thought, a thought of me as a small child, presenting a request before someone I loved and watching them go quiet.

Their face changed, and they said okay, and I went to my room, and then a little later I came back out to grab a glass of water and heard them sigh, and I thought they were sighing because I had asked for something, and I interpreted that to mean that when you ask for something, you have stressed somebody out.

That thought imprinted on my heart and created this resistance towards wanting, because if I don’t want, then I don’t have to ask, and if I don’t ask, then nobody has to sigh, and if they don’t sigh, then their lives are easy, and I don’t want to make anybody’s life hard.

I was small, and how I had come to this conclusion is a whole other conversation, but that was where I was.

And the Holy Spirit began to nicely unravel the idea, and to help me see it from a different perspective. You were a child, He said, so you didn’t understand that the sigh, the change in their face, was not because you were doing something wrong.

That was their way of processing, a quiet I need to meet this need for someone I love. It had no negative connotation to you whatsoever, but somewhere in your mind you believed you had done something wrong. And for 17 years you held on to that, and it stopped you from wanting things, because you were so scared that when you wanted something it would be a huge burden to someone.

He invited me to want, and to share my wants. He asked me again, “What do you want?”

With tears streaming down my face, I began to respond, and as the words tumbled out of my lips I was surprised at how much joy and excitement came with wants directed at Jesus.

Once I got it all out the inner turmoil dissipated and excitement bubbled slowly.

Excitement over past experiences of God’s faithfulness and how He orchestrates things so whimsically. I moved from frustrated to anticipating.

The timeline I’d been gripping so tightly slowly shifted and all I wanted was to see and experience fully how He’d do it, because it sounded more like His desire than mine and when that happens I know He moves mountains to make the thing come true.

And even if He doesn’t, the sheer excitement over the possibility of watching Him do the miraculous is enough for me for today.

Maybe no one has asked you in a long time, or maybe you just haven’t let yourself answer.

I wonder what would happen if you did.

What do you want?

If someone came to mind while you were reading this, send it to them. Art is meant to be shared.

With love, Oibiee