I am not sure about a difference between wishing and wanting but
there is a difference between wishing and willing.

But I think to get to the point of willing, really willing if one has ben through trauma requires a lot to be resolved before one gets to that point.
One has to get the old "I don't deserve anything" message we were given to a true sense of self-esteem ....
I read your post and I believe you are there....

I meant you are ready recovered enough to be willing to achieve what you want. :)

I can not say that for me. I have a long ways to go...

I believe there is as well and I think when it comes down to wanting we 'earn' by striving for with hard work we've then earned our reward and it sure feels good

I think if wishing as more something inside my head... I wish for a freebe

I suppose though linguistically we could use either in a sentence in the same way...lol

I really wish I for success after all the schooling... I really want to achieve success after all the schooling...Oy Vey...smile...x

I agree with SC and I also think that a wish is kind of like magic and want is something that is more achievable with hard work but the way we use them it is interchangeable. Ugh the English language is so confusing and yet it makes us ponder which can sometimes bring about great change.

What thinking about wishing and wanting led me to was another dichotomy, the one between wanting and needing. Sometimes I've convinced myself I needed something, when I only wanted it. Claiming to need it sometimes kept me from letting it go. When I did, I realized it was just a want, not a need for my survival like I'd claimed, and I was freed.

Like the Rolling Stones song, "you can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes, you might just find you get what you need."

To wish: a hope for a whimsical or unrealistic outcome. (If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.)

To want: a desire to fulfill what is lacking

To need: to require the fulfillment of what is lacking

May be nitpicky of me, but that's how I've come to see it, so I can watch my language when encountering a situation. (I wish I want I need)

And, to follow up on Tusi a little

To will: have the perseverance and commitment to attain the need/want.

I think you're doing great, Arfie:-)

I classify it for myself like this to keep those borders from blurring. Hard to do but coming out of some of the bad stuff, it got too easy to decide a might was a must, if that makes sense.

I wish I could be rid of PTSD with a magic wand.
I want to find a place of peace where my PTSD is not such a controlling factor in my life.
I need to deal with the causes of the PTSD.
I will do the work to achieve both need and want.

My head's up my butt today, so from A-hat central, I bid you adieu....

One of my mantras in pursuing my dreams is, "Let the dream motivate. Let reality dictate." Kinda wordy for my personal taste in mantras, but ? making dreams come true is the balancing of complex equations?

My wish of the day is learning to navigate rivers. That wish goes all the way back to my first exposures to Mark Twain. I could read long before I could talk. Mark Twain's river adventures were especially potent for me. Then came Audubon.

I have been updating the research. Feeling restless. I know better than to tackle sub-tropical swamps in the summer, buttttttttaaaa... Maybe time to let the wishing slide into wanting?

Why not? When we cease to dream, we cease to do, IMHO.

Someone said in another post once- wishing is wanting the intangible.

I agree that wanting is something we can get or do if we indeed want it bad enough. Wishing? Wanting something we know most likely will never come.

I think of wishing as somewhere between a pass-time and an exploration of possibilities. Sometimes the potentials are as possible as boat lessons in a neighboring state. (My current wishiest wash). I have pulled off less likely stunts. Other times the potentials are is improbable as the Moon Condo my 16 year old self expected to have by now.

I am not sure I can want my moon condo to get it in my current life time, but boat lessons in a neighborhood with five rivers dumping into it. . . Hm-m-m-m . . . The wish/want ratio might be transitioning. . .

Sometimes wishing can be envisioning which can be helpful to want and will through actions the vision into reality.
I think that is especially true when we are very clear on what we wish for.
I had always find the theory of Carl Jung to be true.
When he talks about the unconscious and being very self-aware of what motivates us and for what reason.