The Law of Attraction: Desire

The Secret Message 9/20/07

The Law of Attraction is very clear about Desire: Desire is good. Wanting is good. Desire fuels our expansion and through our expansion the Universe expands. The Law of Attraction provides a wonderful balance and foil to the sometimes strict, ascetic principles of many spiritual teachings.

This is not to say that the Law of Attraction is not effective as a spiritual path. It absolutely is. But it does not present itself in those terms. In many spiritual circles, desire has gotten a bad rap. And the Law of Attraction, through encouraging an awakening of desire, is helping to release some of the pressure that has built up around desire.

What we resist persists. And for many who have focused on spiritual growth, a resistance to desire, either conscious or unconscious, has blocked the way to heightened awareness.

In many ways, I think of the Law of Attraction as the Bill Murray character in the movie Stripes, saying, "Lighten up Francis." We are being given a green light to lighten up, to not take ourselves so seriously. We are being given permission - not that we ever needed permission - to dream, to imagine, to envision. We are being given "free reign" to think big and have big desires.

Read what Raymond David Salas says about 'Desire":

Effortless Success

If you're like most people, you probably believe you are making things happen in your life by the actions you take. The underlying belief goes something like "If I don't do something, nothing will happen. I need to make it all happen."

I believe our lives, world, and reality is actually created by the desires, thoughts, intentions, and images we give our attention to.

Action is simply a way for us to enjoy what we've created.

With these beliefs in mind, I would like to offer you a model for creating your desires I call "effortless success." The basic steps are:

1. Decide what you want.
   
2. Act only from inspired action.

Let's explore these further:


Decide what you want.

This is the first step to create anything in your life. Some people don't even have an idea or clue what they want. You can ask them "What do you really, really, really want?" and they don't have an answer. Many people are so focused on day-to-day "survival", they have not stopped to consider an answer to this question, or even ask it to begin with. Or, others keep the majority of their focus and energy spent on what they don't want. Look around you. Are thoughts like "My relationship sucks", "I hate my job," "I feel fat," "Remember how terrible it was when" common in the minds, conversations, and daily interactions of your world?

We are each creating our lives and experiences by whatever we are choosing to focus on. "It is as easy to create a castle as a button. It's just a matter of whether you're focused on a castle or a button."

What are you focusing on throughout the majority of your day?

Here are some tools and practices I have found helpful for improving focus and giving desires a "turbo boost" of energy, power, and magnetism for attracting all of the things you actually do want in your life:

• Create a "Dream" Book.

Compile a book of pictures, images, and other visual representations of what you want to create and manifest in your life starting now. These can be collected from magazines, the internet, personal photographs, or anywhere else. The most important guideline is they truly represent what you desire. Visual images carry energy and will help trigger the intentions that you place behind them. Think of them as "buttons" for your desires that you "press" every time you look at them or picture them in any other way.

• Write it down.

Written words also carry energy. Write out what you desire for your life. Be as specific as possible and include as many details as are important to you. Assume the Universe does not know anything about your desires and will only get its information from you. Be very clear with this. It is the difference between "I want a car" and "I want a new, red Ford Mustang with chrome rims."

• Visualize.

After you have your "dream" book and written statements completed, practice visualizing yourself experiencing your desires in your mind's eye, including all of the related sights, sounds, emotions, feelings, and everything else involved. "See" yourself experiencing all of this in the present moment. Imagine it with as much feeling and as many details as possible. Your imagination is one of your most powerful tools available to you. Visualization will give you the opportunity to use and benefit from it.

• Review daily.

Review your "dream" book, written statements, and visualizations daily.

My recommendation is a minimum of twice daily, ideally upon awakening and before bedtime to help "install" them deeply into your subconscious mind with less resistance from your conscious mind and current belief system. In addition, you can also mentally review your statements and visualizations throughout your day for added benefit, such as while driving (keeping your eyes open and on the road, of course), while standing in line, or during any other break in your day.

"Get so fixated on what you want, that you drown out any vibration or reverberation that has anything to do with what you do not want."


Act only from inspired action.

After deciding what want, let the Universe take care of the rest. Your only job is the "what" of your desires, not the "how." If something does occur to you and it "feels" right, do it. Take it as guidance and inspiration from your higher self. Make a commitment to yourself to not do anything unless you are inspired to take action. The only guideline is whether it feels good. If it doesn't feel good, don't do it. For example, when looking at a list of tasks and possibilities from your "to do" list or some other personal planner, only select the most enjoyable items to take action on. If none of them appear enjoyable, disregard them until something does. Leave your logic out of it. There is nothing you need to do. It is only your belief that makes it so. Remember, you always have a choice.


Suggestions

Here are some further suggestions you may find helpful when applying this "Effortless Success" process:

• Keep it personal.

Your "dream" book, written statements, and visualizations are intended for your life experience only. It is helpful to keep them private and personal. This will help your energy to stay focused. Also, you won't need to defend or explain yourself to anyone. Sharing any part of this with others can actually slow down your results and process. Even if others only want the best for you, the greatest they can ever offer is only their version of what is the "best" for you, which will always be different than your own. Only you are the creator of your life. No one else can create into your experience without your consent. Keep your power.

• Don't keep score.

It may be tempting to monitor your progress to check to see how your desires are manifesting. I suggest you resist this temptation. When you "keep score" like this, your focus automatically shifts to the absence of your desires, not to their arrival and manifestation. Keep your mind off of thoughts like "Is it here yet?", "Is it ever going to happen?" etc. Shift your focus back to what you do want and practice feeling these thoughts instead. As a result, your mind and energy will remain focused and aligned with your desires.

• Enjoy the journey.

Relax. You will never be in a place where all of your desires are completely satisfied in all areas of your life. You will always be on your way towards some "yet-to-be-satisfied" desires. In the moment one desire is satisfied, a whole new set of desires is immediately launched. In the earlier example of the new, red Ford Mustang with chrome rims, once you have it, new desires will emerge, such as I want a garage to park it in, a car cover to park it outdoors, insurance coverage, cool music to play in it while driving, etc. The actual moment of completion is brief and fleeting. It is more satisfying to embrace the process and path to your desires because this is never ending. I have learned to enjoy it more and be thrilled by the challenge and opportunity of manifesting my desires, whatever they may be, and experiencing as much joy as possible in the present moment of my journey towards them. I would highly recommend this approach for greatest joy.

• Be patient.

How many of the things you wanted and desired for your life happened only after you had given up, surrendered, or let go of the outcome? Consistently, I have found results happen more quickly for me when I am not attached to the results. It's like hitting a baseball well. If you try too hard, it won't happen. However, if you're focused, but relaxed and flexible, success! The key is to be easy on yourself and patient with your process. You can't get it wrong and you never get it done, so relax.

"Infinite patience produces immediate results."

The Law of Attraction and how the Universe works

The Secret Message 9/13/07

I overheard recently, "Why is all this stuff coming into my life? I don't want any of this. And don't tell me I brought it on myself. Why would I do that? I don't want any of this in my life. I'd have to be crazy to want this."

Have you ever heard this conversation? Maybe you've had a similar dialogue with someone-perhaps with yourself. Sometimes the things that come into our lives seem the exact opposite of what we want. We feel powerless, and all the talk that we can create whatever we want sounds like rubbish. Is it?

It can be frustrating and painful to face a string of disappointing life circumstances. When you intend to create a certain life, it feels like failure when something else results. It's so much easier to blame someone or something else; then, at least, you're not a failure-a victim, but not a failure.

Let's go back to basics. The Law of Attraction states that like attracts like. There are many popular sayings reinforcing the Law of Attraction: birds of a feather flock together, what goes around comes around, do unto others as you would have them do unto you, the world is a mirror, and many more.

The attracting force is energy. Positive, high frequency energy attracts more of the same; likewise, negative, lower frequency energy attracts more energy that is negative. Emotion adds intensity to this energy; the stronger the emotion, the stronger the attraction. If I feel down in the dumps, depressed and blue, despite wishing to feel better, and thinking I'd like to feel better, the energy I give off will continue to attract more of the same-depressing, negative life results.

We've all seen the Law of Attraction in action; we know the world works this way because we can often see the results-in others. We cannot see it as easily for ourselves. A universal law doesn't just work some times; it works all the time. Gravity always works. Water always converts from ice to liquid to steam at appropriate temperatures. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, only altered in form-always.

Then why does it seem the Law of Attraction fails to work when you want to create a certain result in life? That's the question that baffles and frustrates. But it's the wrong question. If you assume the universal law isn't working for you, then it isn't a universal law. Instead, you should assume the opposite-the Law of Attraction is working perfectly. When you accept that the combination of your thoughts and beliefs, emotions and feelings, and subconscious intentions and yearnings are generating your life results, you gain the power and perspective to change.

Once you accept that your life is the result of your thoughts, beliefs, emotions, and actions, you are ready to take the 8 steps necessary to attract the life you do desire.

1. The first question to ask is this: do I really want different life results? Be sensitive to how you feel about the area of life you believe you want to change. Are there mixed feelings there? Do you wish for greater career success while simultaneously feeling terrified of making the changes required to attain it? Is career success even your desire? Or is it a success prescribed by others? The energy projected by a combination of conflicting thinking and feeling will continue to attract more of what you're now experiencing. Clearly confirming the life change as your true desire allows you to move on to the next seven important steps.

2. Clarify what you want. Visualize the thing you desire and-this is important-feel the resulting emotion. Emotion-a state of being-is what we really desire. The things we think we want are only a means to an end-the end being an emotion. We think we want money, but we really want the emotion of security, abundance, or some other emotion/state of being which money will bring. We think we want a life partner, but what we really want is to love and be loved, to be intimately connected to another.

3. Identify any negative emotions associated with what you want. We often fear some aspect of what we believe we desire. This fear will diminish our powers of attraction, probably resulting in more of what we now have. Pursue these negative emotions, what do they convey, what are you avoiding?

Do you desire to write a book, but fear it, too? The energy projected from your fear will offset the positive energy projected from your desire to complete the book-you'll continue to attract the inability to complete the book.

4. Identify what you don't want and why. Visualize what you don't want, and note associated emotions. List these emotions. Next to each negative emotion, ask yourself what belief you might hold, or what experiences you might have had that cause that emotion. A negative emotion is always associated with a fundamental belief, perhaps buried deep in the subconscious.

Taking the book example again, assume you realize what you don't want is to invest a huge amount of time and energy writing a book which few people read-a waste of your effort. As you think about this, you feel unimportant, insignificant, as if you've nothing to contribute. Insignificance is what you really fear, and this is what is preventing you from achieving the completed book.

A belief you hold is sponsoring this fear of insignificance. In plain, harsh words, you might believe the following: "I have nothing of value to offer the world." Perhaps you subconsciously hold this belief because of harsh criticism from parents, teachers, or employers. As long as you hold this belief, you will continue to attract life experiences directly or indirectly supporting the belief.

5. Carefully examine each belief you identified in step 4. Accept that each belief has been true for you up until now, but need not be true in your future. Decide to discard the belief, realizing that broad generalizations are oversimplifications. Look for exceptions to the belief. Look for examples in your life disproving the belief. Perhaps you find you enjoy writing, and others enjoy reading what you write; therefore, you do have something of significance to offer.

6. Convert each belief to a form that will help you. Start by writing each belief identified in step 4 on a new line. Now revise the belief to form a positive affirmation supporting forward movement. For example, assume you've identified the following belief as a source of your fear associated with writing a book: I am not a brilliant writer, so a book that I write may be laughable to others. This belief, if sustained, will continue to sabotage your authoring desire.

Make the following change to turn this into a belief that helps you: The book I write will be the best book I can write at this time, and my satisfaction and reward will come from doing my very best, rather than from the opinions of other people.

7. Transfer your list of modified beliefs-these are now positive, supportive affirmations-to a clean sheet of paper. Read each affirmation slowly and carefully twice each day, morning and evening. As you read each affirmation-each new belief-feel the emotion associated with it. Live within the reality of each affirmation, savoring your feelings and emotions.

8. Reinforce a positive orientation by calling forth other positive emotions each day. Make a habit of allowing only positive thoughts. A good way to do this is to think of three things you are grateful for having in your life. Hold each in your mind and feel the emotion of it. Do this upon waking each morning and before going to sleep each evening.

When something negative happens-as it will-look carefully for a positive aspect to hold in your mind. A traffic jam on your way home may slow you down, but also gives you an opportunity to relax and think of pleasant evening activities. A harsh critique of your book will sting, but may provide valuable information.

Will you always attract the life you desire by following these steps? I wish the answer were a resounding yes. For those who are life masters-or close to mastery-the answer is a consistent yes. Masters consciously create exactly what they desire. Unfortunately, most of us fall short of mastery, so the best we can do is strive for our life's desires using this process, accepting that we may fall short at times. The important thing is to continue to work through these eight steps, recognizing that today you are creating tomorrow, whether knowingly or not.