The fundamental mistake that causes you to lose heart, and how you can avoid it

There’s a Fundamental Mistake at the core of every loss of heart:

Believing that if you can’t see a way towards achieving your heart’s longing, it means that there is no way forward.

There you are, pursuing your heart’s longing. Perhaps it’s to find a great job, or to build a great relationship, or to lose weight and develop stellar fitness.

You’re buzzing along, but then something gets in the way.

What “gets in the way” will vary. It may be that you’ve tried everything you can think of, but still can’t seem to land the job you want. Or it may be that you’ve tried “spicing things up” with your spouse, but your spouse hasn’t responded. Or it may be you tried dieting, but diet food all tastes like sawdust and is flat-out boring to eat.

You hit a problem that is in the way, and you can’t seem to get past it.

In the face of that problem, you make the Fundamental Mistake: On a subconscious level you conclude, “I’ve tried everything, and nothing works to bring me closer to achieving my heart’s longing. Therefore, there must not be a way forward.”

And that’s the moment you lose heart.

From then on you are likely to head in the wrong direction

Once people have lost heart, they usually go into analysis mode. They ask, “Why didn’t it work? Why did I hit that problem?”

After they’ve figured out the “why,” they go into “fix-it” mode. They start taking action to fix their situation, to try to make it go the way they want it to.

For instance, a person might say, “The reason why I can’t achieve my heart’s longing is that I’m too lazy. I’ll fix it by making myself work harder.”

Or a person might say “The reason why I can’t achieve my heart’s longing is because my family isn’t supportive of me. I’ll fix it by confronting them and getting them to be more supportive.”

There are endless numbers of “whys” and “fix-its.” But the bottom line is this:

The “whys” and “fix-its” don’t help, because you haven’t cared for the state of your heart.

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You have to look at who you are being when you ask “why” and when you try to “fix it”

Once you’ve lost heart, you pursue your “whys” and your “fix its” as the person who has already accepted that there’s no way forward.

And that doesn’t work well.

You can verify this by answering these three simple questions:

• When you’ve already accepted that there’s no way forward, how good are you at taking truly inspired, innovative action? Probably not very good.
• When you’ve already accepted that there’s no way forward, how good are the decisions that you make? Probably pretty poor.
• When you’ve already accepted that there’s no way forward, how well are you able to analyze why something didn’t work, and what your next actions should be? Probably not very well.

Once you’ve accepted the idea that there’s no way forward, you’ve become a person who already knows that you are doomed. Yes, you can take action as that person, but those actions will be guided by your loss of heart, so they probably won’t work out very well.

You can’t just think your way out of it

Upon hearing this, many people say, “I’d better stop doing that! I’ll stop deciding that there’s no way forward!”

That doesn’t work, because losses of heart happen in the blink of an eye. You are pursuing what you long for, you hit a big enough problem, and you subconsciously accept that there’s no way forward. Subtly, something inside of you crumbles. The loss of heart occurs. It happens fast.

You can’t prevent loss of heart retroactively. You have to get good at noticing when it has happened, and at caring for yourself when it does.

Pretending that it doesn’t happen, or trying to police your every thought to keep it from happening, will only make you go nuts.

The good news: Just because you can’t see a way forward doesn’t mean you can’t be shown

Fortunately, just because you can’t see a way forward, doesn’t mean you can’t be shown one.

However, you can’t be shown a new way forward, unless you

• admit that you’ve lost heart, and
• are willing to open to the healing of your hurting heart.

Admitting you’ve lost heart. First, you have to admit that you’ve lost heart. For most people, the experience of accepting the idea that there’s no way forward is so painful that they don’t admit that it’s actually happened. They “double down” and try harder, acting with increasing force and desperation.

To be shown a new way, you have to be willing to admit that you’ve lost heart. You need to be willing to say, “Wow, when I’m pursuing my heart’s longing, and something gets in the way, I do lose heart. And the way I lose heart is I accept the idea that there’s no way forward. Wow, I really do that sometimes. Ow.”

That’s a fundamentally different approach than simply asking “Why didn’t it work?,” and trying to fix it, as a person who believes there’s no way forward. When you admit that you’ve lost heart, you are taking your healing process in an entirely different — and far more effective — direction.

Being open to the healing of your hurting heart. Second, if you want to be shown a new way forward, you have to be open to the healing of the hurt your heart experienced when you accepted the idea there’s no way forward.

I help people do this by guiding them to turn to their Source — by whatever name they have for it — and to bring their hurting heart with them to that Source.

This is where you use your compassion to “gather up” the part of you that has bought the idea that there’s no way forward. Then you turn, with expectation, to the Highest, Most Merciful Reality that you can imagine.

As you turn, you ask this question: “Is it really true that, just because I can’t see a way forward toward my heart’s longing, that there really isn’t one?”

You then bathe in the Light, until you experience some sort of transformational answer to that question.

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What sort of answer will you get?

I can’t tell you exactly what sort of answer you’ll get when you do this, because the thing about transformation is, it’s unpredictable.

When you open yourself to be transformed in the areas where you’ve accepted that there’s no way forward, you can’t know in advance what you’re going to be shown.

I have noticed, however, that transformation tends to fall into a couple of distinct categories:

The transformation of Insight. Sometimes when a person turns to Something Higher, they get a clear insight. They see something new, generally along the lines of, “Hey, it’s not true that I’m fated to never find a new way forward. In fact, I really could think about my problem this way: [New insight about a way forward, or a new way of thinking about the problem].” They feel charged up to take a new action and often have a clear direction.

The transformation of Assurance. Other times, a person gets a new sense of being loved and cared for even when they don’t see a way forward right away. They feel a new level of compassion for themselves, generally along the lines of, “Wow, I start to see that there is love for me, even when I’m having a hard time. Now that I see that, I may not know the exact route forward, but I know if I keep following this love, there’s a good chance I’ll be shown one.” They feel calm, warm, and able to “stick with it” in the pursuit of their longings.

And, of course, sometimes you get both.

Having told you these things, I feel I also should give you a warning: While it’s a good idea to turn with a sense of expectation, it’s always a bad idea to turn with a specific picture of what your transformation “ought to” look like. The key is that that you are opening to something beyond your own thoughts, in order to discover how transformation comes to you. It’s a process of discovery — don’t let your thoughts about what you “should” be receiving get in the way of what you are receiving.

What you can change, starting right now

To review:

You lose heart when you are pursuing something your heart longs for. Something gets in the way that you can’t seem to get past. And you accept the idea that, because you can’t see a path to what you long for, there is no way forward.

In the face of that happening, you are likely to try to figure out why you got stopped, and to go into “fix-it” mode.

That doesn’t work well, though, because when you take action as someone who’s accepted the idea that there’s no way forward, you’re actions aren’t going to be particularly innovative or inspired.

I’m suggesting that, from now on, you start to notice when you’ve accepted the idea that there’s no way forward. And I’m suggesting that, when that happens, you take the time to care for your heart that is hurting.

Rather than asking “Why did that happen, and how can I fix it,” try admitting that you’ve lost heart. Turn to your Source with the question, “Is it true I’m fated to not find a way forward toward my deepest longing?” Receive healing and insight, and bring that renewed energy and resource into your pursuit of the life you long for.

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It takes attentiveness and practice, but the result — being able to keep moving toward the life you really long for — is worth the effort. I’ve seen this happen with scores of people I’ve worked with, and experienced it myself.

If you’d like help with any part of this process, you can send me a private message with your question on my coaching page (link opens in a new window), or leave a comment here in the comments section below. Either way, I’d love to hear how this lands with you.

Related posts:

• Maybe you shouldn’t jump off a cliff
• Everything is personal
• Why can’t you just visualize a crosswalk, then step into traffic?
• Self-compassion: Healing’s secret ingredient