FREEDOM

“One of the many things I love about Tom's thinking and writing is that it's very conversational and collaborative. He doesn't lecture (nor does he ever claim to have all the answers), but he is always asking great questions and then exploring them with his readers.

His new book is no exception; in fact, I think it builds on a lifetime of seeing and wondering...or wondering and seeing.

The case he makes for personal fulfillment is powerful and I think he has successfully unwound the many difficult and often conflicting ideas for how to achieve it, thereby revealing the central challenge and opportunity: know thyself, and then act on it (my words...his are far more nuanced and meaningful).

There's so much in this book that you'll want to consider, reconsider, and then experiment with in your life. Do yourself a favor and read it.”

— Jonathan Baskin

“To read this book is to have the courage to seize your life, to discover YOUR WANT.

If you cherish your life, living it fully and vibrantly without the shackles that society and our conditioning has programmed into us, you will devour Unwinding Want.

Layer by layer, page by page, this book helps us peel under our thinking mind to release the feeling intuitive side of us that we’ve held back. That has been hidden from us.

This small brilliant book is the product of a lifetime of work. In all its wisdom, Asacker has outdone himself this time.

What’s shining through loud and clear is Tom’s deep desire for individuals to wake up to the life that is waiting for them and each of us. To uncover and unwind our want is to discover the fullness of our life.”

— Suzanne Daigle

“This exhilarating read may be pocket-sized but it's not without seismic impact. There is an urgency to its poetic style which appeals to the dormant parts of us aching for awakening.

Tom Asacker invites us to bring wonder, curiosity and discernment to habitual mind patterns and to question the validity of invisible yet pervasive conditioning that has us sleepwalking through life.

'Unwinding Want' is an invigorating read which challenges, confronts and relentlessly points to an unnameable truth within. Brimming with paradox, it is both startlingly direct and deeply compassionate.”

— Natalie Nuttall

“Tom has a friendly style that forces us to come to terms with our own (often outdated and unnecessary) desires. Filled with provocative questions and insights!”

— Roger von Oech

“I read something that suggested letting a book go through you rather than you going through a book. This book went through me. ‘Unwinding Want’ is important work about the importance of self-awareness.”

— Dan H. Vollink

"As a meditation teacher, I find one of the hardest things for people to grasp is that we tend to live in our thinking about the world vs. living in the world itself. But there's nothing more futile than trying to 'figure it out,' by thinking about what you'll do or have done, (or worse - what you must do or had to do) and constantly trying to arrange those thoughts in a pattern that adds up to more happiness. What you think you want and what you truly want to do — are meant to do, in flow and joy — are typically two different things. But it doesn't have to be that way. Asacker makes a brilliant case for unwinding want — the whys and the hows — in such a simple and clear manner that you'll want to keep a copy of this book handy as you move out of a state of thinkingness and into a state of beingness."

— Trudi Roth

"Where can we ask questions to expand our perspective without being over-run with ‘helpers’ who want to TELL us how to see our world? Unwinding Want is like a little travel guide to explore the part of us that’s been buried under conditioning and conformity. Tom uses colorful and inviting words that engage our feelings, so we can observe how thinking can inhibit our vibrancy and our potential. Asacker’s compact book is also like a bouillon cube. It’s small, concentrated, and versatile. When we add our experiences, questions and reflections to Tom’s supportive guidance, we create a life-affirming feast that improves with time."

— Sue Kastensen

"'We've become hardened to repetition and routine,' Tom writes. 'The regrets of dying are the result of a delusion...' the confusion between what we feel we 'have' to do and what we really want to do. The inherent need to stay safe and secure pushes us along familiar and accepted paths. But are these the paths we WANT or only the ones that our 'thinking brain' THINKS we want? And when we recognize the delusion - the fact that there is no Great and Powerful Oz, but only a timid man behind the curtain - doesn't that remove this illusion of its power?

When dying people regret that they didn't live a more authentic life while they had the time, they are wishing for wants that were always within reach and never more of what they 'had' to do.

Tom unwinds want and reveals that, whatever your wants happen to be, they are there within your grasp all along, just like Dorothy's power to return home from Oz.

Our attention is our intention. So what are you attending to? And is it really what you want?

Years ago, I was working on a podcast project and I had a contract in front of me that was a pretty bad deal on every level. It would be my very first deal. My attorney advised me to reject it. I shared this with Tom. 'Do you WANT to do it?' he asked. 'Yes,' I said. And so I did, with all the limitations of the deal. That first deal led to many others and a satisfying side-gig working with actors and authors and movie/TV industry folks I never could have imagined. It didn't make me rich, just more happy.

Thank you, Tom, for that question.

And thank you, Tom, for this book. It's the one you were born to write."

— Mark Ramsey