What is a wish?

Often it seems that “wishing” means “wanting the result without the work.” Before I knew how to work out and be fit, and before I learned the discipline to stick with it, I wished I was more fit. I was about 35 when I heard myself thinking, “I’d give anything to have such-and-such a waist size again.” And then I realized that the opposite was true: I wanted a certain waistline from my past, but I wasn’t (yet) willing to do anything to try to get there. I only wished for it.

More recently I’ve wished I could play the piano, or could sing better. And I’ve realized that the sensation of “wishing” was only a precursor to consideration of what was involved, and of whether I would make this desire a priority. A wish, in itself, has no power. It’s not yet an intention.

What else is a wish?

A reminder that I feel I lack something. So I can ask myself, is it attainable?

A prompt to ask: am I empowered to make this wish real?

A seed of inspiration to act, if the power and the intention to do so exists.

A wish doesn’t have power, but it should not make me feel powerless.

I don’t have a plan to learn piano, but both that and re-taking up the guitar are both attainable in my lifetime. And I’m empowered to work to attain them; they’re realistic. So the wish can sit in the back of my mind like a bookmark for the future, when I may or may not ever turn it into an intention.

What do I wish for that I don’t believe I’m empowered to attain? I’d like to be able to beam us to beautiful places in nature without the labor of traveling. That’s not realistic until the transporter is invented in real life.