45: Desire is embarrassing

I am embarrassed by my desire

Desire is embarrassing, I know. But we have to want. We want to want. Wanting love, wanting a job, wanting people to watch our YouTube videos, read our stories, see us, acknowledge us. And worse, making this want known. It’s embarrassing. Almost demeaning.

No wonder people feign nonchalance. I don’t care if people read my poems or not. I am writing for me. I don’t care if people think my dressing is cute or not. I’m dressing for me. Maybe that’s true. Maybe sometimes we really do exist outside external validation. But often, it’s just a shield, a way to protect ourselves from the shame of desire. Because wanting and not getting is one of the most humiliating things. And yet, what is life without want?

For example, if you want someone, you’re not supposed to show it. You’re not supposed to express desire, not supposed to try too much—because if you do, you’re a simp, a cheap babe, or just a loser. And if you do express desire and you’re met with a brick wall, it’s even worse. You’re told, Well, if only you didn’t want so bad.

To desire is to expect, and to expect is to invite disappointment. So the solution, they say, is simple: Just don’t want. Manage your expectations. Keep your emotions in check. Don’t invest too much thought or energy into the things you vividly long for. Mask desire with nonchalance. Act indifferent. Convince yourself that not caring is strength so that when you don’t get what you want, you can say, Oh, I never really wanted it anyway.

But surely, this can’t be the way to live. A life spent pretending, suppressing, avoiding. A life where wanting is shameful, where passion is seen as weakness. What kind of life is that?

We are constantly told that it is cooler, safer, wiser to not care. To act like you don’t need anything from anyone. Like you are self-sufficient in all things, completely untouched by longing. But deep down, we all want something. We all crave. We all dream of people seeing our work and thinking, this is good. Of someone choosing us, choosing to stay. Of winning, in whatever way winning looks like to us.

The truth is, desire is humiliating because it puts us in a position of vulnerability. It lays us bare. It says: Here I am, open, asking, wanting. And sometimes the world answers. Sometimes it doesn’t. And when it doesn’t? It feels like rejection. It feels like shame. It makes you want to retreat, to go back inside yourself, to say, I didn’t really want it anyway. But you did. And you still do.

That’s why people who go after what they want so openly without shame are fascinating. The ones who ask, who knock on doors, who say, Hey, I made this—come see it. They are brave, even if they don’t always feel like it. Because it takes courage to risk being ignored, to risk being told no.

But the thing about want is that it builds things. It creates. It moves the world forward. If no one wanted, nothing would exist. No books, no art, no love stories, no businesses, no music. Every single thing we enjoy was once someone’s embarrassing desire. Someone wanting so badly they ignored the fear of looking stupid and tried anyway.

And that’s the secret to getting things: to keep wanting, even when it’s humiliating. To keep asking, even when silence is the answer. To let yourself dream, even when dreams feel ridiculous. And to understand that the real shame isn’t in wanting, the real shame is in pretending you don’t.

Cheers to desire, to wanting!

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Speaking of desires: I’ve spent the past week traveling from Kent to London to Manchester speaking with friends. As a result, I have a chat with my friend Phoebe on my YouTube channel as episode two of my Home Away From Home series. I want you to watch. Watch here. Thanks.