How Do I Figure Out What I Really Want?

By Dawn Lefevre, Transition Coach | LLECoach.com

I turn 65 soon.

And I can tell you, with some authority, that this question does not retire when you do. I asked it in my thirties. I asked it in my forties. I asked it again this year, sitting with a cup of coffee and a birthday on the calendar that felt like it belonged to someone older than me.

Every version of the question came wrapped in a different decision. Do I stay in this marriage? Do I leave this state? Do I start a new business or continue the one I'm in? Do I let this person all the way in? Each time I wanted someone to hand me the answer, and each time nobody did.

The advice that stuck

In my early thirties, in the middle of one of those seasons, a therapist gave me three words I've carried ever since. "Follow your warm."

She explained it simply. When you're thinking about something, or doing something, and it makes you feel warm and comfortable inside — that's not random. That's your inner self telling you which way to go. And when something makes you go tight, cold, small, or vaguely sick to your stomach, that's information too.

I have tested that advice for more than thirty years now, across every major crossroads I've faced. It has never once failed me. It has, more than once, told me something I didn't want to hear.

Warm is not the same as easy

This is the part people get wrong, so let me say it plainly.

Leaving my marriage was not easy. Packing up a life in one state and rebuilding it in another was not easy. Starting a business at an age when other people were talking about slowing down was not easy.

But under the fear, there was warmth. A quiet, steady yes that didn't need to argue with me. Meanwhile, the "safe" choice — the one that looked sensible on paper, the one everyone would have nodded at — kept making my chest tighten every time I imagined actually living it.

Your warm is not the absence of fear. It's what's underneath the fear. Learn to tell them apart and you'll stop mistaking anxiety for a stop sign.

Three ways to find your warm

If you're standing at your own crossroads right now, try this before you make another pros-and-cons list.

Notice your body before your brain catches up. Say the option out loud — "I'm going to take the job," "I'm going to end this," "I'm going to move." Then pause for ten seconds and check what happened in your chest, your shoulders, your stomach. Your body answers faster and more honestly than your reasoning does.

Watch what you keep circling back to. The thing you research at eleven at night. The idea you bring up to your friend for the fourth time. The daydream that keeps showing up uninvited. You've already been telling yourself what you want. You just haven't been listening.

Ask who the choice is for. Some of my coldest options were the ones I was choosing to keep someone else comfortable. That's worth knowing before you sign anything.

What I know at 65

I used to think the goal was to finally arrive at a place where I knew what I wanted and stayed there. I don't think that anymore.

What I want at 65 is not what I wanted at 35, and it shouldn't be. The question isn't a sign that you're lost or behind or doing life wrong. It's the sign of a person still paying attention to their own life. Asking it again just means you've grown enough that the old answer no longer fits.

You don't need certainty. You need a direction and the willingness to take the next honest step.

Follow your warm. It knows where it's going.

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Ready to figure out what's next?

Transitions are easier with someone in your corner. If you're navigating a career change, a move, the end or beginning of a relationship, or a chapter you can't quite name yet, I'd love to help you find your warm — and build a real plan around it.

Visit LLECoach.com to schedule your free consultation.

Dawn Lefevre is a certified life coach specializing in life transitions. She works with clients online, wherever they are.