As so often, I’d like to jump back to that time in my life when I was alone. I was alone, and it didn’t feel good. I wanted so badly to have someone.

Alright, let’s find someone. Time to make a plan: where to meet people, how to scope out the “options,” how to quickly turn things into a win-win situation. I needed this. But somehow, the stronger this desire grew, the harder it got. My attempts became forced and awkward. A friend, noticing my struggles, simply said: “You want it too much—it’s getting uncomfortable. Stop wanting it, and then it’ll happen.”

Great. Another wise, Zen-like guru.

Lying on the carpet, alone, in the bachelor pad I had optimized perfectly for dating, I found myself wondering: how can I stop wanting something that I want so badly? And I realized that maybe I wasn’t wanting the right thing. What I wanted was actually the outcome of something else—not something I could want directly.

What Can You Want?

According to Feldmár, you can only want something that your muscles can actively do. (His example: can a man want to have an erection? Sure, he can want it, but that doesn’t mean it will happen…) It’s like happiness in life or sales in business.

How can I be happy? What do I need to do to be happy?
How can I get rich? What should I do to become rich?

At the time, I wasn’t happy, so I let go of that thread quickly—because if I approached dating like that, it wasn’t going to end well. 😅

Business, on the other hand, was going well.

So, I tried to recall situations where I wanted something, but instead of directly pursuing it, I focused on doing what was necessary to create the conditions for it to happen. Money in my business life was a great example. I never considered myself a great salesperson (hmm, looking at the parallel, maybe I wasn’t great at dating either?), but during the Games for Business days, results came relatively easily. Why?

Because I didn’t want to sell.

My goal wasn’t to rack up projects. I wanted good projects—projects with continuity, with internationally known clients, with tasks so interesting that even the process of solving them would be exciting, not just the results. So, when I was in meetings, I wasn’t focused on making a sale. I was interested in understanding the client—what they wanted, what their problem was, and how much it intrigued me. I knew I didn’t need a lot of projects. Just a few each year to meet my business goals.

I didn’t feel like a failure if a meeting didn’t move forward. I wasn’t discouraged if someone said, “This is nonsense.” I was well aware that what we were doing was very different from the norm. I didn’t expect anyone to like what I liked. And because I wasn’t driven by the urge to close every deal at all costs, the tension in those meetings dropped.

Less Tension

At least on my end. I wasn’t constantly thinking, “I have to nail this! This is my only shot at making it work.” Sometimes, I even turned down projects or recommended other suppliers instead of myself. Weeks later, I’d get a call: they wanted to work with me after all.

The same happened when I sold my company. After 7-8 months of negotiations, the contract was in front of me. And I said no. I didn’t sign it. I don’t need the money, not at any cost.

I’m not a commodity—I have value.

And at that point, the other party wanted it more. No matter how much money you have, you can’t buy something if the other person doesn’t want to sell. So, I wasn’t selling money in those meetings. I wanted something meaningful, something the other party could believe in too. I didn’t sell my company. I didn’t sell projects. What I sold was hope—the hope that something great could be created together.

But How?

I remembered a physics experiment I once saw in a Facebook video. A physics teacher held a tuning fork, struck it, and brought it close to another tuning fork. Nothing happened. But when he moved it closer to a different one, that second fork started vibrating. Why? Because they were on the same frequency.

That’s why I talked to so many clients—because I was looking for those who were on the same frequency as me. No matter how hard I tried, if we weren’t resonating, it wasn’t going to work. I could tap, knock, and push, but while that might eventually produce a sound, it would never have the same harmony.

Back to the Wanting

Wanting, in a conversation, feels like gripping the tuning fork too tightly. Sure, it won’t fall out of your hand, but it also won’t resonate as it should. If I finally found a client who was on the same frequency as me, my intense grip—my wanting—would disrupt that resonance. They’d feel it: Here’s another one who just wants something. Another person who just wants money. And that changes everything.

If the focus shifts to money being more important than the task, the dynamic of the conversation changes. By giving you money, the client is helping you. But do they want to help you? Do you interest them enough for them to want to help? Do you want them to want this?

Don’t Want It. At Least, Not That.

Instead of wanting money, if you just want to talk, to understand the other person, to get to know their desires and problems, while also showing who you are—then you create an openness between you. The lack of wanting eases the tension, allowing you to be fully present for each other. And that’s a great feeling—a good space to be in. It’s what opens the doors for whatever might come next, whether in business or in life.

This is how I approach things today too. Although it’s still hard to grasp sometimes: for any desired goal, there’s something to actively want and something you don’t have to want—something you just need to recognize, step into, and let it create the circumstances for you to…

…receive what you initially wanted to take.

The article was originally published on the vendler.hu blog.