the lie of attraction

[jek2sv]

Does anyone even read Steves blog?

Because in one of his articles on Subjective Reality he actually tells you the answer. LoA is nothing but wishful, new agey rubbish in an objective reality framework. In a subjective Reality Framework its the logical solution.

Yes, I remembered the same when I was reading this topic

[moonrambler]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

I already responded to Moonrambler's questions of this sort, in another recent thread. Pointed her to specific passages in certain LOA books as well.

Point is, it's not as if the answers have not already been given .... I just don't feel inclined to keep typing them out again and again.

Whether you agree with the answers is one thing. But before that, you must know that there have been answers. Many of the "not-quite" believers have not even bothered to find out what answers have been given - they simply take the view that their questions are unanswerable and therefore the LOA must be false.

One response you gave me was the link to how you unintentionally manifested your daughter's illness and she wound up in the hospital. You, and everyone else involved, unintentionally manifested it so that everybody got what they wanted.

I understand how that works. But that situation was not a tragedy. And so it doesn't answer the question of how people manifest situations that are tragedies and do not give them anything they want.

The problem with this discussion is, I think, disagreements in fundamental beliefs. I think the person who completely believes in LoA as creating all reality, are going to say that somehow people did get what they wanted in a tragedy, or they created it by being afraid of it, and if they deny that, then they created it subconsciously without even knowing they were being negative or afraid and so on.

I simply don't see the evidence to support that in reality other than some anecdotal stories and quotes, and I don't know how we can ever be sure if somebody created something subconsciously, because how can that be proven, especially if it's something which is so non-personal as weather?

[Bradshaw]

These discussions always make little sense to me but i still do read through them to see some of the more experienced forumers post.

My thoughts create my reality for me and i have proven to myself over a period of two years that this is certainly true. There are only so many coincidences you can take before you realize something funny is going in the background.

Oh well, my only guess about these topics is that some people simply cannot use their thoughts to create their own reality, either because they don't actually give it a good try, or because they really can't, or they have a severe lack of skill/talent in manifesting, who knows.

And stop getting so entangled in the actually terms people. Law, whatever. You think, you head towards it. That is all.

[WealthyAndContent]

If you're pushing The Secret or LOA seminars, coaching, DVD's - you're a genius.
Think about it:
All you have to do is say "You manifested it by doing x,y,z."
If what you wanted didn't happen as planned then you go to the next sequence in the flowchart and say: "You did not mainfest it.....blah, blah, blah."
Excuse me for being a bit harsh but as someone who has all the time and financial freedom one could ever hope for - I am doing not talking.
All the dreamers watching this stuff and buyng the products don't do anything, they are professional seminar attendees.

And the ones pushing this crap - all they have to say to these schleps is : "You didn't manifest it or dream about it the right way..."
What an awesome (but sad) business to be in, you can't lose!
What's the ticker symbol for this stock? I'm buying!

Am I the only one who thinks of P.T. Barnum when hearing about LOA?



Phil

[Acting Like Godot]

Phil:

One day, you might come to understand that there are many kinds of thought. And that action is just one kind of thought.

Action is a very powerful kind of thought, especially if the individual's consciousness is at that stage when he identifies very, very strongly with his body.

So certainly action is not to be discouraged -

in fact, action can be the most effective way to manifest an intention, and furthermore action can be very joyous and pleasant, and even an end in itself (think of anything that you do for fun).

Action has its drawbacks though - for example, too much of it may make you feel exhausted, worn out and unhappy. There can also be situations when you are simply not able to take any action; and situations where you feel unsure as to what are the best actions to take.

The problem is when you assume that it is only through your own deliberate actions that you can ever have an effect on reality. That is rather self-limiting, but of course, the paradigm that many members of the human race still live with.

In fact your thoughts, in themselves, cannot stop affecting reality. I refer you again to my 10 recent examples.

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by moonrambler

I understand how that works. But that situation was not a tragedy. And so it doesn't answer the question of how people manifest situations that are tragedies and do not give them anything they want.

What you seem to be saying is:

- If the situation is positive, the persons involved have manifested it.
- If the situation is neutral, the people involved have manifested it.
- But if the situation is negative, the people involved did not manifest it.

This looks quite untenable to me, but today what I will explore is another angle. Consider your proposition:

"Tragedies are not manifested by their victims."

Entirely leaving aside the question of whether this proposition is actually "true" or not ..... I will warn you that it is potentially a very disempowering belief to hold.

From:

""Tragedies are not manifested by their victims."

... it is very easy to move to:

"Very negative circumstances are not caused by the victim."

... and then it's a quick step to:

"I am not responsible for the very bad things in my life. They were caused by forces beyond my control."

.... and then to:

"My life is rotten. I blame:

[my childhood] / [the economy] / [the government] / [my spouse] / [this society]/ [God] / [my lousy luck] / [my ugly appearance] / [my unhealthy genes] / [the fact that I was born in this lousy country] / [the weather] / [the colour of my skin] /[______ insert other excuse ________]

and there is nothing I can do about it - it's all beyond my control."

And then you become quite extremely disempowered by your own beliefs.

In contrast, the belief that with your own thoughts, you create everything in your own life, whether good or bad, is extremely empowering. Because as long as you can still think, you have the opportunity to develop, evolve and improve the way you think. Faced with the most negative events in your life, your instinct would be find the most positive response to it possible.

And while, as Freud might say, most of your mind will always be unknown to you, you can work on discovering more and more of it ....

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by WealthyAndContent

If you're pushing The Secret or LOA seminars, coaching, DVD's - you're a genius.
Think about it:
All you have to do is say "You manifested it by doing x,y,z."
If what you wanted didn't happen as planned then you go to the next sequence in the flowchart and say: "You did not mainfest it.....blah, blah, blah."

What you object to is the apparent non-falsifiability of the LOA concept, and the issue you raise is structurally the same issue as with any other non-falsifiable concept, such as God.

So similarly God may irritate you for being non-falsifiable, but then this does not prove that God does not exist.

Your mother's love for you is non-falsifiable - you may be convinced that it is real, yet it cannot be scientifically proven. Perhaps that should irritate you as well.

[WealthyAndContent]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

What you object to is the apparent non-falsifiability of the LOA concept, and the issue you raise is structurally the same issue as with any other non-falsifiable concept, such as God.

So similarly God may irritate you for being non-falsifiable, but then this does not prove that God does not exist.

Your mother's love for you is non-falsifiable - you may be convinced that it is real, yet it cannot be scientifically proven. Perhaps that should irritate you as well.

Remove God and my mom
Insert Sasquatch
See - it works for everything, just plug and play!

ALG, you may very well enjoy the time and financial freedom most crave.
My beef is with the phonies pushing LOA that can't get out of their own way on the way to their job everyday.
They can stand in front of a jewelry store all day long.
The necklace is not on its way anytime soon.

Phil

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by WealthyAndContent

ALG, you may very well enjoy the time and financial freedom most crave.
My beef is with the phonies pushing LOA that can't get out of their own way on the way to their job everyday.

Oh, LOA can have a lot to do with time and financial freedom. That has been my personal experience anyway.

In 2004 (my pre-LOA days), I was earning a salary of $84,000 per year (or $7,000 a month). This, by the standards in my country (Singapore), is by no means a small sum, but I had to work very long hours to earn it. In that year, I also received a bonus of $32,001:



Then in mid 2006, I began to experiment with the LOA. Naturally, I was a beginner and I didn't know much, but I constantly practised my LOA, visualising etc etc. And I've been getting better and better at it.

Now I work much less hard than in 2004. Not only have my official working hours shortened, but in the office, I work much less hard too. (The secret here is that I constantly manifest for magical solutions at work, and yes, they do appear, much to the constant surprise of my bosses and colleagues. But more on that, another day).

Anyway, by 2007, my salary had grown to $222,000 per year (or $18,500 per month). In this year, I also received a bonus of $244,200:



As you can see, mainly with the help of LOA, my salary has increased more than 2.5 times, and my annual bonus has multiplied almost eight times. So, please do not tell me that people who do not have time and financial freedom should not bother to learn the LOA.

By the way, here's an example on how to create more personal time for yourself.

On 2 November 2007, I simply manifested for more personal time. Not knowing how this would happen, but that doesn't matter. At all.

See what happened just five days later, on 7 November 2007.

WealthyandContent, I know it sounds crazy. But it works, and that is all there is to say about it. You screw yourself in the arse, by refusing to believe in LOA.

[Acting Like Godot]

Sorry, the scanned images of my bonus / salary letters are too small to read. You can come here:

IMG.jpg (image) (2004 letter)

and

IMG_0002.jpg (image) (2008 letter)

to see the enlarged versions.

And at the risk of being tedious and repetitive, let me tell the story again, about my quarter-of-a-million dollars bonus this year. Only two months earlier, I had been officially told at my performance appraisal that I would receive zero bonuses, come february 2008 (due to the fact that business profits had been very poor).

But nevertheless I manifested, again and again (see Point 2) and ..... well, against all odds and rational expectations, it happened.

[Akashic_Librarian]

Thanks ALG, that was a wonderful description, and congrats on earning a nice bit of cash eh!

You see, ALG is a perfect example, apart from Steve of course, about how the LoA actually works, and you can try and argue science, note that if it worked, everyone would be millionaires, but the simple fact is...

it works.

[moonrambler]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

What you seem to be saying is:

- If the situation is positive, the persons involved have manifested it.
- If the situation is neutral, the people involved have manifested it.
- But if the situation is negative, the people involved did not manifest it.

This looks quite untenable to me, but today what I will explore is another angle. Consider your proposition:

"Tragedies are not manifested by their victims."

Entirely leaving aside the question of whether this proposition is actually "true" or not ..... I will warn you that it is potentially a very disempowering belief to hold.

I'm not saying it is a definite that if the situation is negative, the people involved did not manifest it. I see plenty of negative situations that have occurred in my own life that I figure came about because they fulfilled some other intention I had going. And it gets complicated to explain because everything is connected, and around here I might not have to explain but to skeptics I would. Like in my initial postings, where I was aggravated and disturbed because that week I had started manifesting for an extra $1,000, and my furnace self-destructed and I was able to get a no-interest loan that gave me an extra $1,000 that I didn't have to spend on a new furnace. And I was saying, here on the board: this is powerful magic and I have to learn to rein it in so it doesn't fly around destroying things to fulfill my intentions.

A skeptic would say, look: your furnace was 15 years old and it needed replacing. And I would say, yeah, but funny coincidence it happened exactly at that particular moment.

One day a couple friends and I were roaming around in my car, and they wanted to go to a bar about 10 miles out of town and I didn't. They really wanted to go, and I really didn't, because I knew we would sit there for hours and it would be boring as hell, and they really like going there and I really don't, so we sat there in line at a Jo To Go bickering about it, and my car stopped running.

Now, the skeptic will say, look: your car had 150,000 miles on it, and something was bound to go out. And I would say, but you don't get it. My car and I have a relationship. My car is a sentient being, and we are partners. And this may sound wack to most people, but Richard Bach talks about this in regard to his airplanes too. And I already knew the car needed about $1,000 worth of maintenance, and unknown to me the fuel pump was shot, and we are all sitting here in line at the Jo To Go bickering about whether to go to this country bar, and the car spies an auto repair shop about 500 feet away and figures, well, this is as good a time as any, and stops running because the fuel pump is shot.

So we push the car over to the repair shop and call for somebody to pick us up, and I don't have to go to the bar, and the car needed all this work done on it anyways so this was as good a time as any. Heck, we didn't even have to get it towed. The shop was right there.

You see -- I do get how we manifest negative situations.

However: I see other events that do not bring anybody anything they want, and as has been said, we can't get into someone else's mind to know all their fears and subconscious processes, and yes, it is not empowering to believe that sometimes events are brought down upon us out of nowhere, either because **** happens or because there is some divine purpose, but I have trouble coming up with any other answer.

I have a friend whose mother was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in her early 60s. His father had passed away many years before. This m.s. problem did not bring anybody anything they wanted. It was at first a moderate annoyance and later became a truly distressing problem and later became debilitating enough that she had to go live in a nursing home, and it was stressful and awful and she spent her three years in the nursing home working on being able to walk again so she could get the hell out of there, and one day she woke up and one arm was so weak she couldn't even get out of bed by herself, and a couple days later she had a massive heart attack and died. So I actually have considered she may have brought on that heart attack because she may have been thinking: "Enough already."

The m.s.? I don't see any way she would have manifested that on her own, nor her son or daughter either, as the whole experience was entirely awful.

But as you say, it's non-falsifiable, if you're going to claim that she brought it on by some subconscious prior programming, or some unknown fear of being helpless, or something like that. And I don't know how in the world my friend would have manifested this situation for himself either. Again, non-falsifiable.

I might say maybe we are presented with a tough situation in order to learn something. Maybe you would say we present ourselves with that situation because we know we need to learn something. Does that ring true?

On the other hand, I don't know what anybody was supposed to learn from this older woman getting m.s. Except that we really should find a cure or prevention for m.s. because it sucks.

[cylon]

ALG I think the difference between you and some others here is you seem to have bypassed the inner resistance to abundance, having all the right answers isn't as important to you as experiencing what actually works in your day to day life.

I've been getting into eliminating resistance, and think I'm at the point where I can be more comfortable with abundance in my life, since I've been working on my personal issues etc. I hope to have the same sort of success, in my own way.

What I have noticed (or perceived maybe) is the difference that makes a difference is the images, or stories you have in your mind. Like, say you don't like your job or the people there. So, when you're not there, your mind may wander off and you're imagining you and your co-workers arguing, or something else unpleasant happening, yet you're at home on the couch watching tv. You've given a command to have more arguments at work, right? Even though it's not what you WANT, that's where your focus is.

Much better to see what you WANT to be happening. But sometimes it's like those "mental movies" have a life of their own, takes some efforts to consciously control the images and scenes in your mind.

But I think it's purely habit, and those habitual thoughts can be changed. Just like, if you were getting interested in LOA and starting to have some good experiences, they could stop if all you did was focus on people being murdered and famine. If LOA brigns us more of what we focus on, then we are going to get more famine, murder, etc. And if that's where your focus is, I don't see how you could also have abundance flowing in your life.

It's tricky.

[Rockchick26]

Hypothetical question here...lets say that you are unhappy in your job so you are always in a state of daydreaming there,about a job you DO want. Say your mind isnt even AT work while you're there. Now,since you are focusing only on what you DO want,then why wouldn't it appear?! I like what someone said earlier,that it should be called the law of action because action creates a result. Like someone else said,you can stand in front of a jewelry store all day but the necklace is not going to jump out the window and onto your neck.

Ok now to another part of my hypothetical. Lets say that you get a disease,even though you had no idea that this disease even existed,but you got it. How can you get something you never focused on,and can't get something you are always focusing on!? If it comes down to the whole resistance thing,in these two situations i don't think that applies,because obviously if you are unaware of a certain disease,how can you be resisting it? And if you are always focusing on the kind of job you want,you are not resisting it. The whole resistance thing just seems like a cop out to me,like 'oh,if this isnt working for you then THATS always why.'

My point is,in a nutshell,why is it so easy to manifest bad things (by not even thinking about them!) yet good things take thinking AND actively going after what you want. If it's so easy in some situations,it should be just as easy in others. And lets say you ARE focusing on this bad thing happening that you're afraid of,yet that NEVER happens,but something else completely different does? Shouldn't you manifest whatever it is you're afraid of happening,if you think about it a lot? There are just too many inconsistencies in all this. I did believe in this at first until i researched more about it. I also started doing some of the 22 processes out of Ask And It Is Given,to attract money,and then i lost $150 at the casino and my job started sending us home with no pay. It just seems to me,the more you try,the more it backfires on you.

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by moonrambler

A skeptic would say, look: your furnace was 15 years old and it needed replacing.

......... Now, the skeptic will say, look: your car had 150,000 miles on it, and something was bound to go out.

Yeah ...... Here I'll just digress a little and touch on a point which I think that many people (skeptics + semi-believers) don't really get. Suppose you manifest for X. Then X really happens.

Now, X will almost invariably happen in a way that's reasonably consistent & compatible with your idea of what "normal" reality is. In other words, there will almost invariably be room for a line of reasoning like:

"Oh, come on, your furnace was 15 years old and it needed replacing. It is just coincidence that it broke down then."

or:

"Oh come on, your car had 150,000 miles on it, and something was bound to go out, it is just coincidence that it broke down then."

or:

"Oh come on, X didn't happen because you visualised it to happen. X happened merely because of the following conventional, sensible, commonsensical reasons, A, B, C."

In other words, X will almost invariably be explainable as a mere "coincidence".

Now the point that people don't get is this. Your "normal" reality is constructed entirely by your thoughts. In this "normal" reality, your thoughts have constructed numerous "rules" about how events, circumstances, people and things are supposed to behave. And you started constructing this reality with your thoughts, from the moment you were born. Many of these rules are very powerful simply because you've sustained them for so long. For example, one of the rules that you have constructed for your reality is that "all old things, like furnaces and cars, wil eventually break down".

Now when you start experimenting with LOA, your reality definitely will not dismantle or entirely collapse (unless you totally dismantle or collapse your old way of thinking). Instead what's typically happening is that you continue to sustain and interact with your current reality, while fiddling with just a couple of new thoughts, like "I am very, very healthy" or "Money is coming to me out of the blue".

These new thoughts do have effect. But they have to emerge in a way consistent with the rest of your reality (which is also created by your thoughts). So for instance, let's say you manifest for money, but your current reality cannot accommodate an event like, say, a little green man from outer space suddenly appearing and giving you $1,000. Therefore such an event won't happen.

But your current reality may accomodate an event like your furnace breaking down, and you having to get a loan in relation to the furnace, and in the process of applying for the loan, getting an extra $1,000 etc. To you, such an event seems believable, possible, plausible, normal, and overall, quite consistent with reality as you know it. Therefore money, if it comes to you, will come to you in such a manner - such that it's consistent with the rest of your reality.

Of course, your reality as a whole, can change gradually over time. (In fact, nothing is permanent, because thought is always in flux). But at any given time, what you strongly expect to exist, will tend to strongly exist in your reality. What you consider to be rather unlikely, will tend to be rather unlikely to appear in your reality. What you consider to be impossible, will just about never happen. (Meanwhile random, unpredictable events may occur in your reality, to the extent that you have random, unpredictable thoughts).

What we want to do, as LOA practitioners, is to expand our beliefs about what is possible and what is believable. If you can believe that the bizarre and the amazing can really happen to you regularly, then it becomes possible to manifest bizarrely and amazingly positive things for yourself on a regular basis. (Of course, by then, what you consider "bizarre" or "amazing" will have changed as well).

If you read through my blogs in a chronological order, you'll see that in the past, I would be terribly excited if I manifested something, and it came true within two or three weeks. Over time, this no longer amazed me (although it continues to be very pleasing to me, to see this happening). Now, as far as time frames are concerned, two or three weeks for a manifestation to come true is no longer amazing to me. And that's simply because I'm increasingly succeeding with manifesting things within a few days, or overnight, or even within hours. These impress me a lot (currently).

It's a matter of altering your beliefs, you see? Not just about the subject-matter of your intentions (eg money, health, family etc). But about what is possible with the LOA. You just have to keep pushing those boundaries.

[Soony]

The author is a very negative person. Just reading a few sentences of his article tells me that. I think he needs to ask himself why does he react so strongly to the law of attraction. Reading his antedote did nothing for me except being thankful for my state of mind.

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by moonrambler

I might say maybe we are presented with a tough situation in order to learn something. Maybe you would say we present ourselves with that situation because we know we need to learn something. Does that ring true?

Why, yes. It is merely the angle you wish to bring to it.

Before The Secret, and before Abraham Hicks, there was Gary Zukav, and what did Gary Zukav tell us?

These are the key words in his terminology - "decisions", "conscious choices" and "lessons".

In Zukav's model of reality, our "decisions" attract consequences. All consequences are "lessons". As long as we keep making the same kinds of "decisions", we keep attracting the same "consequences" into our reality. To improve our decision-making, we must learn to make "conscious choices". Through learning to make better decisions, the lesson is learned, the old "consequences" disappear and we graduate to newer, more advanced lessons. Furthermore, there is no end to the lessons. We just keep getting new, more advanced lessons as we progress along. Also, we make numerous choices every day. Each choice we make opens a new door, and attracts a new lesson.

Immediately you will see the parallel with Abraham Hicks' model of reality. The differences are not so much to the substance, but in the philosophy. In Zukav's model, the theme is learning; in Hicks' model, the theme is the joy of creating, but both models are based on the fundamental idea that your own thoughts, and your own thoughts alone, create your reality.

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by WealthyAndContent

Remove God and my mom
Insert Sasquatch
See - it works for everything, just plug and play!

Personally it would hardly be shocking to me, if one day it is proven that the sasquatch, or the yeti, or whatever, is proven to exist. It simply means that there is some very rare ape species in the wild which, up to that point in time, had escaped human detection.

Is that particularly surprising? Not to me. I mean, just last year, scientists discovered a new species of cobra. For goodness sakes, this wasn't some teeny-weeny, almost-invisible worm, it's the world's largest cobra species - and they only found it in 2007.

But ANYWAY, your counter-example (of the sasquatch) is a rather lousy counter-example. For the simple reason that the LOA can be tested - by yourself. Just like your mother's love for you can be felt, even if it cannot be scientifically proven.

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by cylon

ALG I think the difference between you and some others here is you seem to have bypassed the inner resistance to abundance, having all the right answers isn't as important to you as experiencing what actually works in your day to day life.

Ahem, everyone has resistance, me included. It's just about the degree of resistance, and what you're resistant to. A skilled LOA'er just has a better grip on figuring out:

(1) what the current limiting beliefs are;
(2) how to reduce, replace, eliminate or just work around those limiting beliefs.