Ask for what you want: lessons in communication

I used to have a health-conscious boyfriend who liked to have breakfast late morning. He’d spend 45 minutes making a highly nutritious porridge using pre-soaked nuts, quinoa, bran, stewed fruit, freshly-ground almond milk — that kind of stuff.
It is some understatement to say I did not dig his porridge. I also didn’t like eating late morning because I have a fast metabolism and generally feel faint if I don’t eat within an hour of waking.
Did I let the almond-milk-making boyfriend know this? I did not. I endured hunger pangs for hours and pretended to enjoy the funky-tasting gruel because I couldn’t ask for what I wanted.
I’ve come a long way since then, but I still sometimes struggle to ask for what I want.
I know I’m not alone in this. Many of us are in the habit of keeping quiet about things we would like, as well as staying silent about things that are troubling us. This is probably because at some point early on in our lives, we asked for what we wanted and were rejected, judged or disappointed.
To save ourselves from experiencing this pain again, we keep our mouths shut and hope that the people around us will intuit our wants. This hardly ever works, and often leads to everyone stoking unexpressed resentments.
It doesn’t have to be this way. We can, and should, ask for exactly what we want.
When I posted an advert with details about the type of dog I was looking for, I was uncharacteristically specific about what I wanted — so specific, in fact, I almost rewrote the advert because I thought I’d come across as a neurotic fusspot. Screw it, I decided. I am a neurotic fusspot. Why pretend otherwise?
I’d spent a long time browsing rescue shelters and websites for a dog that matched the spaniel of my imagination. That hadn’t worked, so I chose a new approach — telling the world precisely what I was looking for.
A few weeks after posting the ad, I got exactly what I had asked for: a young, black, female, health-checked show cocker spaniel who was ready for collection in mid-April (I even specified when I wanted to collect her).
After getting the call about Joy, I came off the phone marvelling at what had occurred. I had asked, and then I had received. Was getting what you wanted in life as easy as this? If so, what had I been doing all this time?
I actually don’t think ‘Ask and it shall be given you’ is as simple as it sounds (I’ll save my theory about why Joy arrived when she did for another post), but I do believe that asking for what you want is an excellent life strategy. We can’t always get what we want, but it’s usually advantageous for others to know what we’re looking for.
No-one illustrates this better for me than Joy. She is stunningly effective at getting what she wants, whether it’s a tummy rub, a piece of toast, or her breakfast (which she likes to have within minutes of rising). There’s a simple reason for this: she communicates what she wants immediately and unmistakably.
Joy can express herself directly because her thoughts don’t pass through a filter of self-consciousness. She doesn’t worry whether she’ll be judged for being hungry as soon as she wakes up. She doesn’t wonder whether I’ll think she’s being difficult when she barks furiously for her ball. She doesn’t feel like she has to justify wanting a nap.
I want to communicate as unselfconsciously as Joy.
I want to make directness into a habit.
I want to become the person who says: “I want to ask you about…”
I want to stop worrying about how others will respond to honesty.
I want the same for all the people pleasers of the world.

