Doubts About The Law Of Attraction?

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The Law of Attraction (LOA) –

Despite the fact that it is based on a fairly simple concept, this universal law is the one that people seem to struggle with the most, out of all the spiritual laws.

I understand this, it took me a while to grasp it too!

Simply put the LOA states that what you think about and focus on grows, and you get more of it, whether it is good or bad. You literally attract in more of whatever it is you are thinking about, feeling and giving energy to. All these elements together (thoughts, feelings and focus) make up ‘your vibration’.

Some of the difficulty people have when they first learn about this law stems from questions like:

‘Well how about children who are ill, did they attract this in to themselves?’

or

‘What about world hunger, starvation and poverty’.

These questions can feel a little uncomfortable when applied to LOA. Esther (Abraham) Hicks explain it really well, basically indicating that the way we view things, from our limited human perspective where we always label things as good or bad, means that we view them differently from how the Source/God/The Universe experiences them, and that we cannot comprehend these issues fully with our human minds, perspectives and senses. In reality they are just experiences, neither good nor bad. It is we who give meaning to them, and that is as it should be on this physical, earthly plane.

There is the idea that each being here on earth chose exactly what they wanted to experience on this physical plane, because it was the perfect experience that would allow that celestial being to develop in the way it required and desired to develop. There is also the theory that parents can attract in for their children. ‘A Course In Miracles’ also helps us to understand these concepts better.

So should we simply not care about the people going hungry? Or the sick children? No, we must always care. However we can learn to judge the situation less and focus on the positive. Asking – what can be done to help? What is the SOLUTION? And what is the silver lining? This is how we help because it moves the focus forward into a more positive light whilst still acknowledging the problem.

This video from Oprah can really help you to understand LOA, if you are struggling with it or having doubts.

Enjoy – and remember – it is all a big game – the game of life!

 

How To Allow Happiness

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Do You Know How To Be Happy?

We all say that we want happiness, and many of us have done the work and written out detailed lists of our desires and plans for the months and years ahead, especially if you are working with the VIBE system tools, so what about when those  desires come true? What about when you finally get what you want, are you really ready to receive it?

Often, when our desires manifest they are not quite what we expected, and for many of us we are ‘trained’ not to feel happy and content, no matter how good things get in our lives. We learned to believe in lack and fear from when we were very young and most of our adult lives. Many people have a pattern of focusing on the negative, and it is an internal pattern that keeps us from experiencing joy. Most of us are so ‘programmed’ to experience misery and struggle that it has become normality for us. And so we will experience it no matter what is going on around us, and also we will continue to create circumstances that support those underlying negative beliefs.

Many people they will say what they want, and then they will say that they will be happy once they achieve that specific thing. However they reach their goal and they are still not happy (because it is not about ‘saying‘ it is about ‘being‘). So then they make a new goal… and on and on. This can go on for a lifetime in many cases unless the individual wakes up to what is happening. The reason they are not happy is because they are attaching their happiness to an external thing, rather than working on their internal state.

Happiness is not an external circumstance, it is an internal state.

So I say to you BE HAPPY NOW, regardless of whether you have achieved that goal or whether your external circumstances are perfect. Work on feeling good in the moment and doing the internal work to continue to move towards joy. Don’t be thrown when any ‘negative’ emotions that come up, they are part of the deal too, and are not to be taken too seriously. You can choose to accept and  acknowledge them and then move onto joy and happiness quickly, so that you end up spending more time in ‘joy’.

What can you do or say to make yourself feel happy now? What affirmations can you use? What ‘stories’ do you need to tell yourself? What loving words do you need to say to yourself in the mirror? What have you got already to feel appreciative of?

When you have done the work and manifested your desires now is the time to learn to hold still and ‘receive’ gratefully. This can take practice too.

How much happiness will you allow in your life today?

 

Field of Dreams

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Probably the most iconic line in Kevin Costner’s elegy to baseball, salvation and to magical manifestation is “Build it, and they will come.”

In fact, it’s become so iconic, it’s become ironic–an overused punchline that turns up mostly these days in stand-up routines and TV commercials.

But let’s try to see the belief anew, with fresh eyes and an open mind, as if we were seeing that movie and watching those ghostly baseball players emerge from the lush Iowa cornfields for the first time. Build it, and they will come. A gorgeous example of “acting as if”–behaving as if we already have what we want, and in doing so, raising our vibration until what we want is inevitably attracted to us.

The thing is, “act as if” runs both ways. Yes, grasshopper. You can use your powers for good–or evil.

Ever think or believe that if you wash your car, it will rain?  That if you take an umbrella, it won’t?  For years, one of us suffered from the absolute belief that if she washed and changed the sheets on the guestroom bed in expectation of company, that company wouldn’t materialize. You know what? That was the end result, more often than not.

So which came first?  The result or the belief?

This is where superstition comes from. If you see a black cat or walk under a ladder, you’ll have bad luck. The number 13 is evil, and the number 666 is satanic. Step on a crack and you’ll break your mother’s back.

True? Maybe. But only because of people who embrace these ideas believe they are.

If you believe in superstition, you believe you have the power to influence your reality with your thoughts and actions–yep, you’re a manifester in action!

So if your thoughts and actions are gonna turn up in your reality, why not choose the good ones instead?

Making money is easy.

Eating healthily comes naturally.

And, yes: build it, and they will come.

 

 

Believe It or Not

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Overheard in a coffeehouse:

Woman:  I had all of these beliefs about what love was supposed to look like, and it took me years to get past that. I believe differently now.

Man:  But how did you change your beliefs?

Woman:  I just stopped believing them and decided to believe in something else.

The man looked shocked, as if the woman had just announced that she had woken up one day and decided to swap out her entire head for a new model.

For many of us, our beliefs seem not just integral to who we are, they appear to BE who we are:  I am a Christian, someone might say. I am a Democrat. I am a hopeless romantic.

The above aren’t who we are. They’re not even fact. They are beliefs, and beliefs can be picked up and put down, in any moment, at any given time.

Some of you may be challenged by reading this. You feel your faith is important to you, and perhaps even defines you. You may feel threatened by the suggestion that your beliefs—ANY belief–is optional.

So let’s take it to a less volatile level.  Ask a child what they believe, and you’ll get a host of fascinating answers. They believe in Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny. They believe they have the power to make their parents sick or well, or possibly, in the case of children who’ve lost a parent, the power to kill them entirely, just by being angry one day and wishing them dead. Depending on their age, children may believe that they can fly, that there are monsters under the bed, that chocolate milk comes from brown cows, that tiny people live inside the TV and make all the shows.

They believe these beliefs as fervently as you believe yours. Are they “wrong?” In the context of what they know and what works for them? Nnot really. They, like all of us, choose their beliefs based upon observation, their imagination, their past experiences, and, most importantly, based on what serves them. Most of them will eventually replace these beliefs with different ones. And they won’t think a thing of it.

So why do we grown-ups feel all wobbly and even angry at the thought of questioning our beliefs, no matter how gently? A belief is simply a story. It may or may not be factually, observably true. And whether or not it’s universally true isn’t really the point, anyway.

Here’s where the real gold is:

What do you believe about yourself, about others, about life, about the world?

Does it serve you to hold those beliefs?

If it doesn’t, isn’t it worth questioning those beliefs that aren’t working and considering finding different beliefs that do?

Henry Ford, a brilliant entrepreneur and apparently something of a jerk (brilliant people, sadly, often are), is famous for having said, “Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.”

Whatever you believe? Yep, you’re right.

But are you sure you want to be?

 

The Power of Allowing

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If you’re at all self-aware (or even if you just glance at magazine covers in waiting rooms), you’ve seen tons of articles about the power of positive thinking, the importance of acting as if you already have/are what you want, the science of happiness, and the Tao of Pooh. If you’re like us, you live it, mostly, and you believe in it, too. You’ve seen the magic that results from gratitude, intentional living, affirmations and remembering that your thoughts become things.

What doesn’t get talked about anywhere near as much, however–probably because it simply isn’t as much fun–is that no human being, no matter how evolved, goes around being positive 24/7. Bad stuff happens, from small annoyances and irritations to massive tragedy, and pretty much none of us reacts to it, at least initially, by jumping up and down and saying, “Yay! Death and illness and poverty and despair! What amazing learning opportunities!”

Even when they are. Learning opportunities, that is.

But let’s set that to one side, for a moment, because we’re not ready to talk about that. Let’s talk about the crap. The person or thing or job you lost. The scary diagnosis. The mean girls who hurt you. The intimate who betrayed you. The accident that cost you something important to you. The depression, the fear, the doubt.

What should you be feeling about all that?

Simple: exactly what you feel.

But won’t that screw everything up?  If “acting as if” you have the things you want works, then won’t acting as if your life sucks make your life, well, suck more?

No. Well, yes, a little. But mostly no.

Let’s pick an example. Let’s say your house and everything in it burns down tomorrow. Unless you’re scamming your insurance company (and you are among the half a dozen people on the planet who know how to set a fire that can’t be traced to the point of origin), there is no way you are going to feel happy or joyful or positive about this. It’s huge, this loss, even if no one was hurt and you’re all lucky to be alive. You just lost everything you own.

Whenever there’s loss, there’s grief. Because in every loss, big and small, there’s a small death of something, even if it’s the death of a dream or the death of how you thought your life was going to be. Maybe it’s the loss of the illusion of invulnerability. Maybe it’s the loss of your kids’ baby pictures. Maybe it’s the loss of an irreplaceable, one-of-a-kind artwork or antique.

When you can get to a place where you can feel the good that can come out of this tragedy, acknowledging that positivity will be powerful indeed. But for most of us, the only way to get to that point is through the muck and the yuck. The surreal disbelief and denial. The anger and feelings of unfairness. The self-pity and depression.

And an interesting thing happens, when you allow yourself to feel what you’re feeling, without judgment, without rushing it, without making things feel even worse by telling yourself that whatever it is you’re grieving “shouldn’t” matter.

You make it past the pain faster. That’s worth repeating: by allowing yourself to actually feel every inch and every minute of the pain that’s coming up for you, you create the space to honor those feelings and to make room for what comes next.

And what comes next is usually recovery, which will look as unique to you as your pain did. Maybe at first, you’ll find gratitude in all the things/people you didn’t lose. Maybe you’ll realize that some of that “stuff” wasn’t as important to you as you thought it was. Maybe you’ll realize that within this pit of sour pain is also opportunity: who will you be, what will you become, as a result of this tragedy? How can it serve you, better you, strengthen you, even allow you to serve others?

If you feel like you haven’t got time for the pain, I urge you, gently, to make some. Because pain denied is simply pain deferred, not pain avoided, and it will come squishing out at some future point when I absolutely guarantee you’re not expecting it, aren’t ready for it, and will likely splash your wounds all over innocent bystanders. It will last–and this is a very scientific calculation–about 15 billion times longer than if you had just allowed yourself to feel it and process it in the first place.

Allow all of your feelings, including the yucky uncomfortable ones. Because when we allow ourselves to feel all that we feel, we make room for the natural flow, for the tides to wax and wane, for the good times and feelings to come around and gently cradle us once again.
 

How to Get Lucky

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Now just stop that. This is a PG-rated blog.

Are some people just born lucky? Don’t you believe it. While someone may be born into favorable circumstance, the real truth is that wealth, brilliance, good looks and fame have never been indicators in and of themselves of true happiness. Just read the nearest celebrity tabloid if you need proof.

We believe people make their own luck. How? By visualizing the life of their dreams. By setting the intention to create it. By taking inspired actions in the direction of those dreams. And by believing, without question, that what they want is on its way to them.

An example:  Bob Bobman (cleverly made-up name) is an accountant with a mid-sized firm downtown. He dreams, however, of opening a “pay-what-you-can” restaurant in his community. Bob doesn’t know how to cook. Bob doesn’t know how to run a restaurant. Bob doesn’t actually know any homeless or disadvantaged people personally.

But Bob dreams his dream all the same. He imagines what his restaurant will look like, and what kind of food it will serve. He imagines what it feels like to be manning the counter, clearing tables, seeing the smiles of his customers, smelling the nourishing aromas in the air. He starts collecting pictures of interiors and other images that appeal to him: a plate of food here, a grouping of tables there. He writes about it in his journal, he makes a vision board, and he sets a date by which he wants his dream to come true.

Does Bob sit back at that point and wait for his luck to roll in?  No, Bob does not. Because Bob knows that while you can get in your car and program your GPS to take you anywhere you want to go, you’re not going anyplace until you put the car in gear and start driving.

So Bob starts telling people about his dream. He talks about it at work. He talks about it at social and business gatherings. He tells people in the restaurant community. He does some research about other similar operations in other towns.

Bob takes some cooking classes.  One of his fellow students turns out to have some experience in launching non-profits. He scans the real estate listings for commercial spaces with kitchens.

Little synchronicities start to happen.  A friend of a friend knows someone who works at a place JUST LIKE THAT two states over. An article about crowd-sourcing shows up on Bob’s laptop. An interesting space that was off the market for a while suddenly is up for rent.

And so it goes. Drip by drip and drop by drop, Bob’s dream starts to take shape, with the Universe tossing in a handful of sparkly magic here and there. It never crosses Bob’s mind that this isn’t going to happen.  Which is exactly how Bob “gets lucky” and his dream comes true.

So, how do you get lucky? Simple. Feel lucky. Act lucky. Expect lucky. Get focused on drawing the specific flavor of luck you want into your life, but don’t get hung up on exactly how it has to come about. Be open to what the Universe brings you in response to what you’re sending out.

Before you know it, you’re a walking, talking four-leaf clover, and luck isn’t some random something that the Universe bestows on the deserving or the charmed or the beautiful, it’s nothing less than your destiny.

Wanna get lucky?  It’s out there waiting for you. All you have to do is go get it.

 

 

 

 

Do You Believe in Spooks?

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The Cowardly Lion sure did. And look where it got him.

But jump ahead to the ending of The Wizard of Oz:  the Tin Man feels the power to love when he is given a mere trinket in which he has faith. The Scarecrow can suddenly parse geometry once he has a piece of paper labeled a “diploma.” The Cowardly Lion finds bravery inside a simple medal hung on a ribbon. And Dorothy learns that she has had the power to return “home”–to herself–inside all along.

We are what we believe we are. And so is the world as we perceive it.

Tell someone that “thoughts became things” (a phrase popularized by author Mike Dooley), and it may sound nonsensical to them. “If my thoughts become things,” they might say, “then how come I’m not rich? Because I’m thinking about a giant pile of gold bullion right now!”

It isn’t that simple. Mostly because of the collective belief of billions of humans that this kind of instant manifestation is impossible.

But even the most skeptical of people will admit to things like knowing who is calling without benefit of caller I.D., or wishing for a parking space and having one suddenly open up, or being able to scrape together just enough money when we really, really need it.

Our beliefs are the engine that drives our outcome. As Henry Ford, about as non-woo-woo a man as it’s possible to imagine, once said, “Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.”

So what do you find yourself thinking these days?

Imagine two people somehow having the exact same day: they go to their longtime place of employment, choose to work through lunch, and, at 1 p.m., are led into their supervisor’s office and told that they are being laid off.

Person One:  “This is the worst day of my life! After all the years I spent there, after all I did for them–the ingratitude just enrages me!  I even worked through lunch for those a-holes! What a disaster!”

Person Two: “Wow, I didn’t expect that. I mean, I was even working through lunch to get caught up. I guess things are tougher for the company than I thought. Well, I’ll have some unemployment coming while I figure out what I want to do next. Maybe this is the start of something even better for me.”

Okay, so the above is a pretty huge over-simplification, but only to prove a point: it doesn’t matter what happens to you. The story you tell and believe about what happens to you is what’s key.

So if you believe in spooks, or evil, or bad luck, or a cruel, indifferent world, that’s probably the exact experience you’re having.

On the other hand, if you believe in love, in learning, in bravery and in finding your way “home” to the best expression of yourself, that’s the experience you’ll have instead.

Flying freakin’ terrifying monkeys vs. control over your destiny. Hmmmmm.

Which Yellow Brick Road will you choose?

 

Help, It’s a Snake! No, Wait, It’s a Stick.

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Fear, believe it or not, can be a trusted adviser. When you’re about to be bitten by a rattlesnake, for example, that jolt of adrenaline and reflexive back-pedal can be a very good thing.

snake stickThe thing to remember is that fear is an instinctive, primal response. There’s not a lot of intellectualizing going on. In fact, the kind of fear that invokes a fight-or-flight response happens faster than we can form actual thought. Which is why fear absolutely deserves a seat on the bus–without fear, we’d probably all be dead.

At the same time, fear can also become a crippling limitation. If I step off a curb and hear a bus horn blaring, leaping back onto that curb was a smart move. But if I conclude from this incident that crossing streets is inherently unsafe and I will never, ever do it again, I have tipped over from fear into phobia. And I have limited myself unnecessarily, and pretty ridiculously.

Fear knows some stuff. When the hair rises on your arms, when a shiver goes down your spine, when your Spidey senses are on alert, it’s worth taking a listen and see what fear has to say.

But fear is just one of the advisers in your head, and fear, because it is so primitive and reflexive, can be absolutely off-base. It might help to think of fear as a small child. A child is capable of warning you when something threatening is about to happen. A child looks out for your well-being, because your well-being is intimately tied to hers. A child is worth listening to.

Except that fears, like children, can sometimes be over-the-top, silly, or just plain wrong. They don’t have all the information the rest of you does, so they process just one piece of the puzzle. Is that long thing on the path ahead of you a rattlesnake, or is it a stick? Only you–ALL of you–know for sure.

So keep fear in your corner. Notice it when it presses the alarm button. And then evaluate whether there’s really something to be afraid of, and, if so, what you’re going to do about it.

Fear makes a great passenger. But don’t let it drive your bus.

Raising your vibration is a great way to calm unreasonable or persistent fears. See how at https://raisedvibration.com.

Fear of Falling

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Last week, something horrible happened—the stuff of nightmares. 52-year-old Rosy Esparza was killed when she fell out of a roller coaster at Six Flags Over Texas.

Texas GiantNobody knows whether the locking bar that is supposed to hold riders in place failed, whether it wasn’t closed correctly in the first place–apparently Esparza questioned one of the ride operators and was told that as long as she had heard it “click” into place that it was okay, but no one double-checked–or whether the ride itself is inherently unsafe. It was revamped recently to make for an even steeper, thrill-producing experience. It is, of course, now closed and under heavy inspection.

Certainly no one at Six Flags or at the company who manufactured the roller coaster held the intention of someone losing their life.

So what’s the takeaway here? Is this particular roller coaster lethal? Is every roller coaster unsafe, even if just a little? Are all amusement park rides suspect?

Around the same time that Esparza died, a friend’s daughter lost her life at the camp where she was a counselor when a tree unexpectedly fell over onto her, a 3-year-old boy sleeping outside was run over by a truck making a U-turn, and a Las Vegas Cirque de Soleil performer fell 90 feet to her death at the end of a performance.

These are all tragedies. But while there may be cautionary lessons to be drawn from them, they are not warning signs to the rest of us to stop living our lives.

To live is to risk. We take a chance every time we step out of our house, even when we get out of bed. In fact, we’re not even “safe” in bed, considering the number of fatal heart attacks that happen during the small hours of the morning.

So what do we do? We take a deep breath. We grieve and honor the fallen. We keep going. And we don’t let fear–a useful adviser and not one we should categorically ignore–take over and start driving our bus.

Ride on, friends. Ride on.

What in the World Are You Thinking???

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What we focus on expands. Or, as neuroscientists prefer to say, “what’s fired gets wired.”

But are you really aware of just what’s going down in  your mind?

(image courtesy of Dominique - http://sexandheart.com/happy-happy-happy-2)

(image courtesy of Dominique – http://sexandheart.com/happy-happy-happy-2)

Most of us are aware of our significant thoughts–but even here, we may not understand that we choose them.  Big thoughts like “nothing works out for me,” or “men are creeps” or “money is the root of all evil” go therefore unchallenged, and so they have the power to inform and influence every action we take.

Ick.

Do you want those kinds of thoughts driving you and creating your world?

And that’s just the big stuff.  What about the little nattering soundtrack most of us play all day in the background, the one that narrates our day? “You should have turned left at that light now you’re going to be late oh you forgot to stop at the bank you’re going to have to borrow money for lunch again no wonder no one from the office wants to go out with you maybe not even your boss oh what if I lose my job but I hate my job but I need the money what’s for dinner?”

Buried in that stream-of-consciousness babble are some really painful and limiting beliefs.  And there they are, thrashing around your brain virtually unchecked and perhaps even unnoticed.

Those thoughts impact your actions and create your reality to you.

Every thought, big or small, conscious or unconscious, is a choice.

Choose wisely.

Need help corralling your thoughts? Consider raising your vibration–and therefore the quality of your thoughts along with it–by joining us at https://raisedvibration.com.