Utah Supreme Court Justice Dallin H. Oaks is quoted as saying, “Desires dictate our priorities, priorities shape our choices, and choices determine our actions. The desires we act on determine our changing, our achieving, and our becoming.”
What is desire?
Researchers named 16 basic desires all humans share: Acceptance, Curiosity, Food, Family, Honor, Idealism, Independence, Order, Physical Activity, Power, Romance, Saving, Social Contact, Status, Tranquility, and Vengeance. While I have reservations about several of these listed desires and being disabled, I would also add a couple to my own list. Regardless, these items form basic impetus towards motivation. For example, the desire for food will move a person from sitting to walking, running, preparing, and then finally to eating food! We all have heard the commercial for Klondike Bars and the question, “What would you do for a Klondike Bar?” (Admit it, you just sang the jingle.)
As a kid, I was regularly in charge of getting something ready to feed 8-16 people. In a cupboard bare of essential ingredients, imagination, and hunger invented recipes that I continue to use today. Hence, food is an intense desire that promotes actions; thus, establishing the pattern for living.
What is it about desires that are so powerful?
Niranjan Seshadri provides evocative imagery for describing desires: “Desire functions like the banks of a river, guiding mental energy along a specific path towards preset aspirations.” One might ask, is the journey along preset aspirations a voyage of discovery, or a trip along known paths to a predetermined destination? YES! Discovering what our desires are, is both a journey of discovery and a journey along known paths. The work is deciding whether to voyage and discover something new about yourself and your desires or remain in the safe, known waters and hope new desires are discovered. Both paths can open new doors, new adventures, and new discoveries.
But, is the power of desire found in traveling the known and familiar, sometimes. For example, I have one single burning desire. When I compare all other desires to this one burning desire, I found the others all lacking. My voyage of discovery to this one burning desire has had me travel paths in the unknown and the familiar. Evaluating the banks of the river, my mental and physical energy flows, to discover change, inspire decisions, and backtrack when a poor choice has led me away from my burning desire.
Rivers always follow the path of least resistance, even if this means doubling back on itself, carving new branches, exploring new potential ways, or pushing ahead along familiar routes. Our minds are the little boats on that river of energy, and our job individually is to inspect the banks, keeping an eye on our desires, and navigating through life to our desires.
Justice Dallin H. Oaks provides us the pattern for moving forward, “… Desires dictate our priorities, priorities shape our choices, and choices determine our actions. Our actions and our desires cause us to become something, whether a true friend, a gifted teacher or [anything else].” What is it about desires that are so powerful, they move us along!
How do I know my desires?
Funnily enough, religion has many answers to this question, and I would encourage you to embrace a faith mechanism that inspires you to self-discovery. However, religion is a tool in the path of self-discovery towards discovering and understanding your deepest desires. Some desires are easy to find; for example, as I type this, I am dreaming of food! Especially a maple-bacon cake, three layers, thick icing, bacon strips down the side.
How did I discover my deepest desire; much to my friends and acquaintances’ disbelief, my deepest desire is not food! My voyage of discovery towards my deepest desire was launched during some terrible trials, honed in the fires of adversity, and sharpened in the daily struggle. My deepest desire originates in two other connected desires, freedom and independence. While my deepest desire is mine to explore, the two supporting desires, freedom and independence, find me motivated to keep the liberties and freedoms I inherited and ensure their survival to my children’s grandchildren. Thus, I write imploring help in preserving the US Constitution and the Republic of the United States of America.
A question that helped me discover my desires, “What do I desire?” One of the reasons I like The Church of JESUS CHRIST of Latter-Day Saints is the belief in personal revelation that everyone has the power to access the heavens and gain knowledge. To know your personal and deepest desires is a path of individual revelation. Now, individual revelation is also called self-discovery, individual acknowledgment, and more, but always the approach to that information is the same. Examining the banks of our mental energy, exploring branches of possibilities, working towards a goal, and evaluating the consequences. When you discover your burning deepest desire, it will become fixed, like the northern star, for you to navigate the rivers of life through.
What does this have to do with NO MORE BS?
Do you realize how much stronger you are when surrounded by people as committed as you are towards a common goal? To fulfill my deepest desire, I must aid America’s survival, or I cannot be satisfied. Hence, my desire has everything to do with improving government functions, decreasing government size and injuries, and sundering, forever, the abuse of power witnessed in government at every level from the school board to the presidency!
Let us clarify our desires, band together against the tyranny for mutual support, and win the day freeing America from the bloated government’s tyranny and the bureaucratic stain that survives only in a bloated government. Let us know ourselves, be faithful to the heritage left us, and keep that heritage bright for future generations!
© 2021 M. Dave Salisbury
All Rights Reserved
The images used herein were obtained in the public domain; this author holds no copyright to the images displayed.
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