Alan Watts _ Relax and You Will Get Everything You Desire

you relax, you will get what you want. Not because you fight, strive, or wrestle with life, but because you let go of the illusion that you must control everything in order to receive anything. You see, the game of existence is not one by pushing harder, but by understanding that the very act of striving too intensely for something often ensures it remains just out of reach.

When you plant a seed, you don't sit next to it all day screaming at it to grow. You water it, give it light, and then you wait. And what is waiting really?

It is a form of trust. A quiet knowing that life has its rhythm, its intelligence, and its timing. But we in our frantic little minds are taught to believe that unless we are constantly doing something, fixing, planning, adjusting, worrying, we will fall behind or worse, be forgotten.

But who exactly do you think is keeping score? There is no cosmic scoreboard tallying up your stress and awarding you points for suffering. The universe does not respond to how tightly you can clench your fists.

It listens to the frequency of your being. When you are relaxed, when you are at ease, when you are not desperately demanding, but softly expecting, you are in harmony with the very structure of life itself. Think of this.

The sun does not rise because it is ordered to. The birds do not sing because they are paid to. They simply do what they are, effortlessly.

And perhaps the greatest tragedy of our time is that we've forgotten how to be effortless. We have confused stillness with laziness, silence with weakness, and relaxation with giving up. But relaxation is not surrendering to defeat.

It is surrendering to wisdom. It is recognizing that your anxious need to control everything is precisely what blocks the very things you want from arriving. You don't need to chase love because love blooms where presence dwells.

You don't need to beg for abundance because abundance is attracted to peace. And you don't need to force success. Relaxation.

True. Success finds the one who is already aligned with their truth. It does not demand you kick it down.

It only asks you to turn the handle gently and step through. When you relax, your mind becomes open to inspiration rather than desperation. Your vision becomes clearer because it is no longer clouded by fear.

And your life becomes lighter, not because you carry less, but because you finally understand what is worth carrying. The irony is this. When you stop needing it so badly, that's when it shows up.

Not as a reward for your worry, but as a reflection of your trust to breathe. You're not behind. You're not late.

You're not forgotten. You're simply being reminded by life, by this moment, by the silence between your thoughts that your only real job is to return to the place within you that already believes you're worthy of having what you desire. And from there, all things unfold.

The more you chase, the more it runs. This is one of the strangest truths we often learn too late. Life seems to have a peculiar way of hiding what we desperately seek.

You run after love and it slips away. You reach for success and it evades you. You crave approval and yet it remains distant.

Why? Because the act of chasing is born out of lack. It carries the vibration of not having.

And when you declare through your actions and thoughts that you do not have something, the world around you simply echoes that belief back to you. We are told to go after our dreams, to grind, to hustle, to never stop. But rarely are we told to pause, to breathe, to trust.

We are conditioned to believe that effort equals result and that the harder we try, the faster we'll get there. But this is not how the deeper laws of reality function. The deeper truth is this.

The more frantic the chase, the more distance you create between yourself and the thing you desire. The very energy of chasing carries within it the message that what you want is not here. And so reality always listening, always reflecting gives you more of that distance.

Imagine running after a butterfly in a field. You charge at it, waving your arms, desperate to catch it. The butterfly, of course, flies further away.

But the moment you sit down quietly among the flowers, it may just come and rest upon your shoulder. The same is true for love, peace, success, and even money. When you act from a place of need, you unknowingly push what you want away.

You become a repellent, not a magnet. Chasing is born of fear. Fear that if you don't act, you won't receive.

But true receiving begins when fear dissolves and is replaced with calm expectation. There is a difference between inspired action and desperate striving. Inspired action flows.

It comes from a space within you that already feels whole, already believes in the outcome. Desperate striving, on the other hand, is noisy and anxious. It operates on timelines, pressure, and comparison.

And while it may produce some movement, it rarely brings the deep satisfaction you are seeking. It's like filling your lungs with shallow breaths. You are technically breathing, but you are not truly alive.

In the same way, your frantic efforts may give the illusion of progress, but the soul remains unsatisfied. You have to realize that the chase is often driven by a story. A story that says, "I am not enough without this.

" That story creates urgency and urgency creates resistance. When you're always running after something, you miss what is here. You miss the quiet beauty of becoming.

You forget that perhaps the real magic happens in the stillness, not the struggle. The flower does not chase the sun. It simply blooms and trusts that the sun will find it.

The river does not strive to reach the ocean. It just flows and the current takes it there. What if the very act of stopping is the secret?

What if peace is the magnet and the frantic noise in your mind is the block? When you are quiet inside, when your thoughts are not soaked in need, you become receptive. You create space for what you want to enter.

It is not that ambition is wrong. It is not that desire is evil. But when desire becomes obsession and obsession becomes noise, you become deaf to the signals life is sending.

And more importantly, you become blind to what is already working in your favor. Every time you chase from fear, you are telling the universe, "I do not trust you. " But life responds best to those who trust it.

It gives generously to the one who waits with faith, who walks slowly but steadily, who doesn't panic when things don't appear instantly. Timing, after all, is part of the design. You wouldn't force a caterpillar to turn into a butterfly before its time.

Yet, you constantly pressure your own dreams to bloom prematurely, and in doing so, you sometimes damage what was already forming perfectly beneath the surface. Chasing is exhausting. It drains the spirit and fills the mind with anxious questions.

What if I'm not enough? What if I don't make it? What if they never see my worth?

But notice the pattern. These thoughts are always rooted in the future. They pull you out of the present, out of the now where everything actually happens.

When you chase, you abandon this moment. You trade the richness of now for a fantasy of someday. And the tragedy is someday never arrives because you're always living in pursuit, never in presence.

You must understand that desire itself is not the issue. It is your relationship with desire that matters. When you want something from a state of inner calm, your desire becomes like a seed planted in rich soil.

It grows without your interference. But when you want something from desperation, your hands constantly dig up the soil to check if it's sprouting. And in that constant digging, the seed never gets a chance to take root.

Let it be. Let it grow. Let it come when it is ready.

Ironically, the moment you stop chasing is often the moment it arrives. This is not because you gave up, but because you shifted your energy from fear to faith. You stopped pushing and started trusting.

And in that shift, you aligned with the very nature of creation itself. You became the calm center instead of the desperate storm. And everything you were running after, peace, love, freedom, success began running toward you.

The more you chase, the more it runs. Not because you are unworthy, but because life is gently trying to teach you to stop, to pause, to breathe, to receive. And in the art of receiving, you discover that everything you ever wanted was never far.

It was simply waiting for you to stop running long enough to notice that it had been circling you all along. Stillness is alignment, not laziness. But we have been conditioned to believe otherwise.

From an early age, we're told to keep moving, to stay busy, to always be doing something. Productivity becomes a badge of honor, while stillness is looked upon with suspicion. If you're not hustling, grinding, climbing, or striving, people assume you're wasting your time.

But what if the most powerful transformation happens not when you're chasing life, but when you're sitting quietly with it? What if stillness is not the absence of action but the presence of awareness? You see, stillness is misunderstood.

It is not apathy. It is not resignation. It is not giving up.

It is entering into the rhythm of life without disturbing it. It is the quiet tuning of your being into harmony with what is. The world is noisy, but your soul is not.

The world shouts timelines, expectations, obligations, but your soul whispers, waits, and watches. And when you finally allow yourself to sit in that space of stillness, you stop acting from fear and begin acting from truth. In stillness, you are no longer reacting to life.

You are co-creating with it. You are not pushing against the current. You are flowing with it.

Most people are tired not because they do too much but because they do too much from misalignment. They do and do and do but none of it emerges from peace. Their actions come from panic from the belief that if I don't force it, it won't happen.

But that belief is an illusion. It is the root of exhaustion. Stillness on the other hand is powerful because it aligns you with the current of the universe.

It positions you to act only when action is necessary, only when it's inspired. There's no wasted movement, no wasted energy. You do less, but everything you do matters more.

The oak tree does not grow by effort. It grows by surrendering to its nature. Stillness allows you to remember your nature.

It peels away the layers of noise, doubt, and distraction and reveals the deep truth of who you are and what you're here to do. When you act from this clarity, life bends to meet you. Opportunities that felt far away begin to show up.

People begin to notice something different about you. Not your clothes, your skills, or your voice, but your presence. Stillness gives birth to presence and presence is magnetic.

There's a reason why the most powerful people in a room often say the least. They do not need to speak loudly to be heard. Their stillness carries weight.

It is the same with your energy. When you stop overexplaining, over apologizing, overperforming, when you simply exist in a state of peace, you invite people, situations, and blessings into your life that were repelled by your previous restlessness. Not because you tried harder, but because you stopped trying and started being.

Stillness is not waiting around doing nothing. It is a deeply active space where the inner world comes alive. It is in stillness that your intuition speaks.

It is in stillness that clarity finds you. It is in stillness that you discover whether what you're chasing even belongs to you. So many people run toward things they don't need, only to find emptiness at the end of their effort.

But the one who learns to sit in silence discovers richness before movement. They act only when the inner compass points true north. There's an intelligence in stillness, a wisdom that is easily drowned out by noise.

Most people live in reaction. They react to fear, to opinions, to news, to timelines. They are puppets pulled by the strings of panic.

But in stillness, you cut the strings. You move deliberately. You act with awareness.

There is no longer a need to prove or perform. You have nothing to chase because you have nothing to fear. And in that energy, you become a magnet for everything you once thought you had to beg for.

Stillness is also healing. It softens the mind and repairs the soul. When you are still, the pain you've been avoiding rises to the surface, and though it may feel uncomfortable, it is necessary.

In the space of silence, you begin to process, release, and transform. That's why so many people avoid stillness because it requires them to face themselves. But the only way to rise is to look inward.

The only way to evolve is to confront the noise within. Not with more noise, but with the silence that reveals truth. Look at nature.

The most profound events happen in quiet. The roots grow in silence. The seasons shift without announcement.

The stars move through the sky without a sound. So why do you believe your transformation must be loud, visible, and busy? Why do you think the path to your desire must be crowded with effort and urgency?

Real change is subtle. It happens in stillness. It takes root before it is seen.

You don't have to shout to be heard by the universe. A quiet belief deeply held is louder than a thousand declaration and stillness. You also become receptive.

Life becomes less about your plans and more about your openness. You begin to listen not just to others but to yourself. You realize that much of your suffering came from ignoring your inner voice.

And when you hear it again, when you feel that gentle nudge, you begin to trust it more than the outside noise. This trust becomes your guide. It tells you when to move and when to wait, when to speak, and when to remain silent.

Dillness is not absence, it is presence. Four, deep awakened presence. And presence is not passive.

It is attentive, alert, alive. In stillness, you become aware of the divine timing of all things. You stop demanding that life move at your pace and start flowing with the pace of life.

You stop measuring your worth by your productivity and start experiencing your power in your peace. You stop seeking and start allowing. There is nothing lazy about stillness.

In fact, it may be the most courageous act in a world that runs on fear to sit, to breathe, to trust, to wait. Not because you have no ambition, but because your ambition is no longer rooted in lack. This is strength.

This is alignment. And it is from this alignment that the universe delivers its most beautiful gifts. Not when you chase them, but when you become still enough to finally receive them.

Trust the natural rhythm of life. It has its own pulse, its own flow, its own wisdom that cannot be dictated by the urgency of your mind. The mind wants everything now.

It is impatient, restless, always seeking proof that it's not being left behind. But life does not work according to the frantic pace of human expectation. It unfolds like a wave, like a tree growing toward the sun, like the breath that rises and falls without your comp.

You don't force your heartbeat. You don't control your dreams. And yet you still live, still breathe, still wake up every morning under a sky you didn't build.

There is a greater rhythm guiding all things. And your task is not to fight it but to fall into it. It is so tempting to try and accelerate everything.

You set goals and deadlines. You compare timelines and you convince yourself that if things don't happen in a specific way or by a specific date, then something is wrong. You assume delay means denial.

You assume silence means abandonment. But what if it doesn't? What if delay is just timing in disguise?

What if silence is the space where life rearranges itself so it can meet you in a more perfect way? What if everything you thought was late, was actually early in a timeline you don't yet understand. There is a season to all things.

The earth teaches this in every rotation. There is a time to plant and a time to harvest. A time to be still and a time to move.

A time to let go and a time to receive. But we have been taught to reject the cycle. We want spring in the dead of winter.

We want blossoms without roots. But forcing a tree to bear fruit out of season does not make it stronger. It destroys it.

And the same is true for you. When you try to force life to deliver something before you are ready to receive it, you sabotage the very blessing you're asking for. There is a rhythm to your growth.

You may not see it, but it is happening. You are not the same person you were a year ago, not even the same person you were a week ago. And that subtle shift, though quiet, is a signal that the tide is turning.

But to witness the full transformation, you must be patient. You must resist the urge to dig up the seed just to check if it's growing. Trust that it is.

Trust that life knows what it's doing with you. That there's a reason things are taking the shape they're taking. The mind craves control.

It wants to know the plan, see the map, and predict the outcome. But the soul speaks and trust. It doesn't need to know where the road ends to enjoy the walk.

It simply breathes, listens, observes, and allows. It doesn't panic when things go quiet. It understands that some of the most important changes happen in silence.

In fact, silence is often the birthplace of transformation. Just as the cocoon seems lifeless before the butterfly emerges, so too your life may appear still just before it begins to bloom. When you trust the rhythm of life, you begin to let go of comparison.

You stop looking at others and wondering why they have what you don't. You stop asking why your journey looks different. You understand that every soul is moving through its own unique song.

No two melodies are the same. You wouldn't rush a symphony just to reach the final note. The beauty is in the unfolding.

And your life too is a composition full of highs and lows. quiet pauses and loud crescendos. Every moment matters.

Every note has a purpose. It is in trusting this rhythm that peace returns. You don't need to force doors open when they are not meant for you.

You don't need to chase things that belong to someone else. You only need to listen to the beat of your own power. That rhythm will tell you when to act and when to wait.

It will tell you when to speak and when to stay silent, when to leap and when to ground yourself. But you can't hear that rhythm when your life is full of noise, external demands, internal doubts, distractions that pull you away from your own inner knowing. The reason so many people feel lost is not because they've lost their path, but because they've stopped listening.

They've tuned out the rhythm. They've abandoned their intuition for the approval of the crowd. But your rhythm doesn't come from the crowd.

It doesn't come from the world. It comes from within. And it is always there waiting to be felt again, waiting for you to slow down, to breathe, to tune in.

And when you do, everything begins to make sense. Not all at once, but in the quiet way that dawn makes sense to the night. There is a strange paradox in trusting life.

You have to be active yet surrendered. You have to dream boldly yet let go of how it will happen. You have to walk forward but also know when to pause.

And that balance cannot be taught by books or gurus. It can only be felt. It can only be lived.

It is an art, not a science. And like all art, it requires your full presence. Just the willingness to show up and say, "I trust that even when I don't understand, something beautiful is forming.

" Sometimes the rhythm of life asks you to rest, to be still, to do nothing for a while, not because you failed, but because something inside you is being rebuilt. And other times, it calls you into motion. Even when you feel afraid, it nudges you to step forward without knowing what's next.

That's the rhythm at work. It guides, it pulls, it rearranges, but it never leaves you, not once. And when you begin to trust it, truly trust it.

You'll find a calm beneath the surface of your being that no circumstance can shake. Trusting the rhythm of life is not about becoming passive. It's about becoming attuned.

It's not about waiting around hoping for miracles. It's about recognizing that every breath, every pause, every quiet moment is part of the miracle already underway. You don't need to panic to prove that you care.

You don't need to fight to show that you're committed. Sometimes the greatest act of faith is simply to wait. Not with frustration but with quiet assurance.

But because you listened, it depends at the very oity. You know what to do. Not with frustration, but because you listen.

Let go of control to let in what you desire. This is perhaps one of the most difficult truths to embrace, especially in a world that worships certainty, dominance, and direction. You're told from the earliest days that you must take control of your life, steer the wheel, map every turn, plan every step.

And so you do. You tighten your grip. You hold on to expectations, to outcomes, to timelines.

You believe that if you just try harder, push more, and worry long enough, you will bend reality into submission. But what actually happens is the opposite. The tighter you grip, the more things slip through your fingers, the more you try to force life to behave, the more chaotic it becomes.

You see, control is rooted in fear. It is the mind's way of protecting itself against the unknown. And yet the unknown is not the enemy.

It is the space where all new things are born. You cannot manifest something truly meaningful while fearing the very uncertainty in which that manifestation must form. Letting go of control is not giving up.

It is giving permission to life, to the flow, to the rhythm of your being. It is saying, "I trust you. I don't need to orchestrate every moment, every detail, every outcome.

I am willing to receive something greater than what I could have ever planned. The paradox is that the more you try to control the outcome, the more resistance you create. Imagine water.

You don't command it to move. It simply flows. But place your hand in a rushing stream and try to hold onto the water and it escapes you.

Yet if you cup your hands loosely, gently, the water rests within them. That is the posture of allowing, of trust, of surrender. And that is how your desires want to enter your life.

Not under pressure, not under force, but through openness. Most people do not realize how much they are blocking what they want by trying to control how it comes. They say they want love, but they cling to old stories, timelines, or types of people.

They say they want success, but they demand it looks exactly like someone else's journey. They say they want peace, but they micromanage every detail of their day, suffocating the very stillness they seek. To let go of control means to release the how and the when, and stay focused on the what and the why.

It means trusting that if a desire has been planted in your heart, then life has also designed a way for it to be fulfilled, just not necessarily through your current understanding. Control feels safe. It gives you the illusion that you are protected from disappointment.

But it's only an illusion. In truth, control creates more stress than safety. It demands constant vigilance, endless planning and rigid thinking.

And what happens when something unexpected enters? Panic, fear, resistance. But when you let go, when you embrace uncertainty with grace, the unknown becomes your ally.

You begin to recognize that what you thought was a detour is actually direction. What you thought was loss is actually realignment. What you thought was a delay is actually divine preparation.

Letting go is not something you do once. It is a daily practice, an ongoing unbburdening of the need to know everything. It's waking up and saying, "I don't need all the answers today.

I just need to be present, open, and willing. " It is the decision to trade anxiety for peace, chaos for clarity, resistance for trust. And in that space of surrender, the things you were chasing often find their way to you.

Not because you stopped caring, but because you stopped interfering. You stop blocking the flow with your fear, and you allowed life to show up with its own wisdom. There is something profoundly humbling about letting go.

It is a reminder that you are not the sole architect of your life. Yes, you have power. Yes, your thoughts and beliefs shape your experience.

But there is also something greater at work. A mystery, a rhythm, a pulse that weaves through all things. And sometimes the best thing you can do is get out of the way.

Stop trying to fix what isn't broken. Stop trying to rush what needs time. Stop trying to force a door that was never meant for you.

When you release your grip, your hands are finally free to receive what was always meant to come. Letting go also requires trust. Not blind optimism, but deep inner knowing.

A trust that says even if I can't see it now, something good is unfolding. That doesn't mean everything will be easy or painless, but it does mean that you will not have to carry the unbearable weight of constant control. It means that when things shift or fall apart, you won't crumble with them.

You'll bend but not break because you'll know that the falling away is part of the process. That what is removed makes room for what is meant. When you let go of control, you begin to live more in the present.

You stop postponing your peace until something happens. You stop delaying your happiness until conditions are met. You realize that life is happening now.

Not in your plans, not in your memories, but in this very breath. And in this breath, you are safe. In this breath, you are connected to everything you need.

And if you can find peace here even before your desires have arrived, then you are already living the life you were chasing. It is not about abandoning dreams or giving up desires. It is about trusting the intelligence that placed those desires within you in the first place.

You don't need to control the journey. You just need to stay aligned with the feeling of what you want and allow that feeling to guide your actions. Not from desperation but from inspiration.

You don't need to grasp, cling, or prove. You just need to remain receptive. You just need to keep your heart soft, your mind open, and your spirit awake.

And as you do, you will see everything you ever tried to force, everything you once held on to so tightly begins to arrive with an ease and grace that control could never offer. You attract what you are, not what you beg for. This is not a lesson taught through repetition, but through the gentle, often unnoticed rhythm of experience.

You can say all the right affirmations, write down your goals 10 times a day, visualize the life you want in vivid detail, but if your inner state contradicts your outer intentions, you create friction. If your energy is one of desperation, lack, and fear, then no matter how loudly you speak your desires, the frequency you're sending into the universe whispers, "I don't have it, and I need it to feel whole. " And that whisper is far more powerful than all the shouting.

Everything in this universe responds to frequency, not words, not surface level rituals. frequency, the vibration of your being, your thoughts, your emotions, your assumptions. All of these create a field of energy around you.

And that field communicates far more than your actions do. When you walk into a room, people feel your presence before you say a single word. In the same way, life feels the energy you embody long before any manifestation arrives.

If you carry the energy of lack, life reflects more lack. If you carry the energy of wholeness, life meets you with more wholeness. You can't behave them.

Just give yourself leeway. I mess up lots of them. I live have a lovely life.

Smoke a bouncy laugh. Sleep a kind of laugh. This is why begging doesn't work.

When you beg, whether silently or aloud, you declare your dependence on something outside of yourself to complete you. You place your power in something distant, elusive, and separate. You become a seeker, always reaching but never finding, always asking, but never receiving.

The truth is, life does not respond to begging. It responds to being, to who you are, to what you embody, to the silent language of your inner state. And if you can become the version of you who already has what you seek, if only within, then you have changed the frequency of your signal.

People often misunderstand this principle. They assume they must be perfect, peaceful, and positive at all times to attract what they want. But that's not the case.

What matters is not perfection, but alignment. Are your thoughts, emotions, and expectations in harmony with the reality you desire? Or are you fighting yourself, saying one thing and feeling another?

You don't have to pretend. You don't have to force good feelings, but you do have to observe your state honestly, not to judge. But to understand what are you actually telling life through your energy.

If you feel unworthy, life will mirror situations that reinforce that belief. Not because life is cruel, but because it is obedient. It delivers what you assume, what you expect, what you believe.

If you want love but deep down believe you're not lovable, you'll attract people who confirm that story. If you want abundance but fear not having enough, you'll find yourself in cycles of scarcity. But if you begin to shift your state, not just your thoughts but your felt sense of reality, then the world starts to respond differently.

This is not a call to fake it. It's an invitation to tune in, to explore what it feels like to be in the state of already having, not pretending with forced smiles, but genuinely sitting in the inner feeling of wholeness. What would change if you knew you were already worthy, already chosen, already supported by something greater than you?

When you live from that space, your energy becomes magnetic. You're not chasing, you're not convincing. You're simply being.

And that being draws things in with ease. Think of the people who seem to receive effortlessly. They move through life with a calm confidence, a quiet knowing that things work out for them.

That knowing is not arrogance. It is alignment. They have settled into the frequency of their desires.

And that frequency makes them open, receptive, ready. You don't need to be loud to be powerful. You just need to be coherent, internally congruent.

Your thoughts, feelings, and beliefs flowing in the same direction. This principle also teaches you to take responsibility. Not blame, not shame, but ownership.

If you are the magnet then you are not a victim of random forces. You are a participant in creation. And that realization is deeply liberating.

It means you can shift. You can evolve. You can become the version of yourself who no longer waits for the world to change but who changes their world by changing their energy.

And that change begins not with what you do, but with who you are willing to be. Everything you want is seeking you too. But it cannot find you if you are disguised as someone who doesn't believe it's possible.

Your desires are not random. They are echoes of your potential. They are invitations not from outside of you, but from the deepest parts of you.

And to answer that call, you don't need to beg. You don't need to chase. You need only to embody, to align, to gently but firmly return to the state where you feel, know, and trust that it is already done.

When you wake up each day, you are broadcasting with your energy, your focus, your assumptions. You are sending a message to life. The question is not will I get what I want.

The question is am I in tune with it or intention against it. Because if you are constantly affirming the distance between where you are and what you want, you are rehearsing the feeling of not having. But if you begin to close that gap within, if you feel yourself already having it, already being it, then you collapse the distance.

You remove the resistance. You become a mirror to your desire. And your desire begins to see itself in you.

You attract what you are, not what you beg for. Not because life is cruel, but because life is honest. It reflects back to you the truth of your vibration.

You are not being punished when things don't arrive. You are being informed. Informed of where your state is, of what you are really broadcasting.

And when you receive that information with humility, not guilt, you empower yourself to shift, to move, to elevate, to uh align. No more begging, no more pleading, no more trying to convince the universe that you are ready. Simply be ready, be willing, be in tune.

Because when your frequency matches your desire, reality has no choice but to respond. Not as a favor, but as a mirror. And the mirror never lies.

[Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat.

Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat.

[Music] Heat. [Music] [Applause] Heat. [Music] [Applause] Heat.

Heat.