The common difference between what most really believe and what they say they believe stems from a lack of honesty. The reason so many struggle to align the two is because they try to exercise honesty unevenly, and this works about as well as trying to be healthier only when you get sick. You grow more honest through being honest all the time, just as you grow healthier by being healthy all the time.
Be honest about what you desire and how much you desire it. Do not ignore how you feel. Do not ignore what you desire. You need to recognize and acknowledge desires in order to find a sufficient source for what you seek and to have a willingness to pay the adequate price to obtain it.
You have to deeply care about your life in order to be willing to invest what it takes to make it worth living. If you ignore your desires, you’ll never be willing to do what it takes to fulfill them. Pretending to want what you don’t actually want will result in failing to obtain anything better than what you already have. You won’t try very hard to obtain what you don’t really want, and few things worth having are easy to get.
Instead of suppressing your feelings and desires, direct them toward what has the greatest worth using your capacity for reason. Better choices come from better thinking, and elevating your mind from the default animalistic emotional baseline into intentional thinking requires explicit effort. It can be done, but it takes practice and dedication. The results are well worth it.