Is Belief Really Necessary?

[Jez]

Several people here have said that the LoA/IM model won't work if you don't believe it.

I wonder about this, because I seem to be having quite good success while remaining agnostic about whether I'm really 'manifesting' what I want or not. I've also never found that thinking or worrying about failure makes me more prone to fail-- in fact, as I mentioned on another thread, I'll often deliberately think about all the things that could go wrong because my experience has been that the things I worry about never happen.

Several years ago, after reading "The Six Figure Woman", I posted a monetary goal on my computer at work that seemed to me just miles beyond my ability to reach in my wildest dreams. Not much more than a year later we sold our house at a profit equal to just about exactly that amount. Maybe it was LoA, which I was actively trying to use, that did it. Maybe it was my interest in and study of market psychology that allowed me to recognize a point close to the 'peak' of the housing market. Maybe it was sheer, dumb luck.

I find good reason to use the Law of Attraction without passing judgment on how, why, or even if it works-- simply because it gives me another reason to focus on the things in life which give me the most pleasure and for which I'm grateful and not to get too perturbed over the occasional ripple in the waters.

Have other people here had good experiences with the LoA/IM model while suspending judgment on whether it's 'real' or not?

[daveangeles]

I personally think LoA is always at work, regardless of one's belief in it.

A level of belief in the Law is required if you are to begin intentionally manifesting certain things into your life... otherwise, you wouldn't bother in the first place, right?

And who is to say that your fascination with market psychology wasn't a part of LoA in action?

Some people on here seem to think that any kind of human, mortal action is a contradiction of LoA. In other words, if I intend $1 million and a guy offers me $10,000 to build a website for him I should turn that down because it'd be my own doing rather than LoA. Of course this isn't the case.

We have to do our own part, I think I read in one of Wayne Dyer's books he called it 'inspired' action or something like that.

Point is: I don't expect to wake up tomorrow morning with a duffel bag at my front door containing $1 million in fresh bills. Inspired action will probably be necessary most of the time.

Just my thoughts,
DA

[impaul99]

Originally Posted by Jez

Several people here have said that the LoA/IM model won't work if you don't believe it.

I wonder about this, because I seem to be having quite good success while remaining agnostic about whether I'm really 'manifesting' what I want or not. I've also never found that thinking or worrying about failure makes me more prone to fail-- in fact, as I mentioned on another thread, I'll often deliberately think about all the things that could go wrong because my experience has been that the things I worry about never happen.

Several years ago, after reading "The Six Figure Woman", I posted a monetary goal on my computer at work that seemed to me just miles beyond my ability to reach in my wildest dreams. Not much more than a year later we sold our house at a profit equal to just about exactly that amount. Maybe it was LoA, which I was actively trying to use, that did it. Maybe it was my interest in and study of market psychology that allowed me to recognize a point close to the 'peak' of the housing market. Maybe it was sheer, dumb luck.

I find good reason to use the Law of Attraction without passing judgment on how, why, or even if it works-- simply because it gives me another reason to focus on the things in life which give me the most pleasure and for which I'm grateful and not to get too perturbed over the occasional ripple in the waters.

Have other people here had good experiences with the LoA/IM model while suspending judgment on whether it's 'real' or not?

You are correct, you don't need to believe in the Law for it to work. It works without your belief, just like gravity works without your belief. However, you need to believe in it enough to do the action steps necessary to activate the law. Meaning, if you do the action steps without believing, just keeping neutral it will still work, but you have to do what's required.

The reason I think people say you need to believe it is that if you don't believe it you won't bother doing the action steps. Meaning, if you don't believe that you can manifest using IM or LoA and you want a car for example and I tell you to get a desktop picture for your computer of that car you might say "What's the point? I can't afford it anyways!"

If I tell you to close your eyes and visualize already owning the car, and to think about the smell of the leather etc. you might say "What is this crap? I don't have time for this! Tell me how to make money so I can afford this car! What stocks should I invest in? How do I make money? Tell me what I need to DO so I get the car, don't give me this visualization crap as I don't believe in magic!"

If you're so closed minded that you won't even try the techniques, then it won't work for you. Meaning, you will still manifest, just that you'll manifest subconsciously which means your life will probably be exactly like it is now and deteriorate at a slow rate.

If you're like "Uhhh...I have no opinion on this stuff, it might work, it might not, but I don't see how it can hurt so lets do it." then you'll be ok.

[wolfgang]

Originally Posted by Jez

Several people here have said that the LoA/IM model won't work if you don't believe it.

Have other people here had good experiences with the LoA/IM model while suspending judgment on whether it's 'real' or not?

Nice question. It seems to me that any belief is a form of attachment. I don't think one has to believe LoA for IM to "work". It sounds like a matter of getting aligned with your desires and reducing counter-intentions. Or what one can be aligned with is what will manifest. I keep going through observing LoA and not nessesacrily doing any delibrate IM work. It's an exercise in witnessing my experience and who and what comes and goes as a reflection of what I have going on inside. I have big things to change that has tons of counter-intentions so I'm letting myself be stuck for now - but can still realize LoA around me, as this stuckness is a result of a mix of what I think I want and all the flack about going for it and what it would mean to actually follow through.

[daveangeles]

wolfgang (and others)-
So, if I were to reduce my conscious counter-intentions to nearly zero and spend the rest of the evening focused and aligned with my desire to have $100,000 -- I should be able to wake up tomorrow morning and manifest that money somehow?

I'm really working with the idea of breaking down the time barrier. In Eckhart Tolle's A New Earth, and also in Power of Now, he talks about the 'illusion' of time -- how all powerful action is actually performed in the present moment.

I think if I can completely get rid of the imposed belief I have that it will 'take time to make that kind of money' I could technically manifest it within the next 48 hours. That'd be a great thing to do, it'd be fun, and it'd be a cool story to share with everyone on here.

[wolfgang]

Originally Posted by daveangeles

wolfgang (and others)-
So, if I were to reduce my conscious counter-intentions to nearly zero and spend the rest of the evening focused and aligned with my desire to have $100,000 -- I should be able to wake up tomorrow morning and manifest that money somehow?

I don't know. All I know is that my life looks like what all my intentions and counter-intentions are putting out. I'm not sure what it takes to move on from thoughts/feelings that will prevent a specific intention from happening faster. I'm sure it has something to do with the ego getting in the way too, though. The desire or wanting somthing that benifits the ego I think will backfire since the vibe that comes with really wanting something is a big counter-intention.

[Jez]

Originally Posted by wolfgang

Nice question. It seems to me that any belief is a form of attachment. I don't think one has to believe LoA for IM to "work". It sounds like a matter of getting aligned with your desires and reducing counter-intentions.

That makes sense to me. I, too, have the impression that the more I am able to just sit back and watch with interest as things unfold, the better it all goes. I've also found that it can be very revealing to ask myself if there's any reason why I might not want to get something I'm trying to manifest. Recently I realized that I'd thrown up an internal barrier against the life of travel I've had in the past and would like again because of a belief that my husband would not want to live that way. Once the thought was conscious I realized that a) he's often proved more flexible in the past than I thought he could be and b) even if it proves true I'd be equally happy-- perhaps even happier now that I'm older-- with a stable home base and frequent trips.

[Acting Like Godot]

I think that the answer is quite clear. LOA works whether you believe in it or not.

The difference between believing and not believing it in it is simply that if you don't believe it, you will not consciously seek to apply it.

Of course, that does not mean you will not have a great life anyway. It then depends on what kind of beliefs / thoughts you consistently hold in the course of your daily life.

[Jez]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

The difference between believing and not believing it in it is simply that if you don't believe it, you will not consciously seek to apply it.

Well, but I do consciously seek to apply it. I just keep an open mind about whether it's really LoA or something else at work. It seems to me, for instance, that considering how good our minds are at finding and reacting to patterns, you might say that concentrating on the idea that there was going to be an open parking space where you need it, or that the right metro train was going to pull into the station just as you got there (both things I've had positive experiences with) might, in some subtle way, sharpen your perceptions and align your timing so that you seemed to be attracting what you were looking for. Or some force or sense we have no conscious perception of might equally well explain it. Or it could all just be coincidence and focusing on it just magnifies the times when it seems to work in our minds.

I tend to agree with the attitude Steve seems to have towards it, which is it improves the quality of your life, why not use it?

[py7]

I think that neutral positions about anything (e.g. "does LoA work or not") are quite rare.
Most people in most cases have "yes"/"no" opinion, seems that for some reason "don't know" opinion is harder to hold.
So, in the case of LoA, if you don't believe it works, most likely you believe it doesn't. If you don't believe you can manifest $1M, most likely you believe you can't manifest $1M.

Personally i have no idea if LoA works or not .

PS: that's my first post here, hi to everyone .
PPS: english is very far from being my native language, so please excuse me for it.

[Jez]

Oops! Sorry DaveAngeles and Paul-- I didn't see your replies until just now.

Originally Posted by daveangeles

A level of belief in the Law is required if you are to begin intentionally manifesting certain things into your life... otherwise, you wouldn't bother in the first place, right?

Well, I would, out of curiosity, if nothing else-- but that's just me.

Originally Posted by daveangeles

And who is to say that your fascination with market psychology wasn't a part of LoA in action?

Yes, it could be. But if it wasn't I don't really understand why that would be a reason to stop the practices that I now think of as IM. It seems to me that visualization of the things you want and actively imagining how it will feel to have them are quite consistent with most belief systems -- and not really inconsistent with anything.

Originally Posted by impaul99

If I tell you to close your eyes and visualize already owning the car, and to think about the smell of the leather etc. you might say "What is this crap? I don't have time for this! Tell me how to make money so I can afford this car! What stocks should I invest in? How do I make money? Tell me what I need to DO so I get the car, don't give me this visualization crap as I don't believe in magic!"

Yes, I had an argument with a woman on another bulletin board on this subject. I suggested she spend as much time as she could immersing herself in things related to the country where she wanted to live and to try and save up for at least a brief trip there. Her response was that it was too painful, and she didn't want to go at all if she couldn't spend at least 4 months there. I kept urging her to at least try and get a little taste of the place she loved into her current life and she ended up getting really incensed with me. Ultimately I was probably wrong to have kept pressing her. The fact is I found it hard to understand her feelings, since I take great pleasure in imagining the things I want happening and immersing myself in the atmosphere of places I want to go to. But then, I'm someone with a great many interests-- in fact, I can almost always find something interesting in the things that go on around me so I've never suffered the kind of separation from the things I love that she seemed to be describing.

[Jez]

Originally Posted by py7

I think that neutral positions about anything (e.g. "does LoA work or not") are quite rare.
Most people in most cases have "yes"/"no" opinion, seems that for some reason "don't know" opinion is harder to hold.
So, in the case of LoA, if you don't believe it works, most likely you believe it doesn't. If you don't believe you can manifest $1M, most likely you believe you can't manifest $1M.

Personally i have no idea if LoA works or not .

PS: that's my first post here, hi to everyone .
PPS: english is very far from being my native language, so please excuse me for it.

Hi, py7! Yes, it certainly does seem hard for people to take neutral positions, doesn't it? But I sort of suspect, like Wolfgang, that it actually helps the process along if you can avoid getting hung up on the belief part of it.

I know I'd be reluctant to try and use LoA if I thought doing so meant I had to believe some of the things I've seen on other threads. I don't believe, for instance, that the victims of ugly crimes are in any way responsible for what happens to them.

And in my experience thinking about 'bad' things doesn't have any bad 'real life' effects-- at least not unless you get all worked up and guilty about having bad thoughts and spend a lot of energy trying to suppress them. I try to let any ugly, disturbing or embarassing thoughts I happen to have just roll right through. Sometimes I find them amusing, sometimes they'll even bring an 'ahah' moment.

I've always had a great interest in politics, international affairs, and human rights-- all of which mean I do quite a bit of reading about some pretty awful stuff. But my interest in politics makes me an informed voter, my fascination with other countries has contributed to my easy adaptation to other lands and cultures and my human rights activities set me on the path of learning another language and meeting exiles from that country, (one of whom many years later introduced me to my husband). And of course there's nothing like a little knowledge of the rest of the world to put my own occasional small set backs in perspective. It's pretty hard not to feel how exceptionally fortunate you are once you've met a few survivors of torture or gulags.

Sorry-- starting to ramble here. It's getting past my bedtime.

By the way, py7, your English is superb.

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by Jez

Hi, py7! Yes, it certainly does seem hard for people to take neutral positions, doesn't it?

Your description divides people into three categories:

1. "Yes, I believe that LOA is true."
2. "I'm ambivalent or undecided about it."
3. ""No, LOA is all nonsense."

But I think that the situation is much more complex than that. It really depends on what model of LOA we are talking about. Some people consistently and consciously apply certain models of LOA, without even having ever heard of the phrase "Law of Attraction".

Eg some people believe that if they have faith in "God", their prayers will be answered, that is, something will correspondingly change in external reality.

And what is prayer composed of, if not thoughts?

[Michael Chui]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

Your description divides people into three categories:

1. "Yes, I believe that LOA is true."
2. "I'm ambivalent or undecided about it."
3. ""No, LOA is all nonsense."

But I think that the situation is much more complex than that. It really depends on what model of LOA we are talking about. Some people consistently and consciously apply certain models of LOA, without even having ever heard of the phrase "Law of Attraction".

Eg some people believe that if they have faith in "God", their prayers will be answered, that is, something will correspondingly change in external reality.

And what is prayer composed of, if not thoughts?

I feel like I'm trolling, but what if God answers "No"?

[Acting Like Godot]

Originally Posted by Michael Chui

I feel like I'm trolling, but what if God answers "No"?

The answer, I think, depends on your version of God. A Jainist might reply: "You are God too, for God is everywhere, and everyone is part of God, therefore if God says no to you, then you are saying no to yourself." Why would you do that - well, you yourself would probably be the best person to ask.

Deepak Chopra in fact has an interesting book entitled 'How to Know God" which suggests that at any given time, different people perceive "God" differently, because they are all at different levels of spiritual development.

At one level, for instance, you may perceive "God" as a powerful, scary, external entity which will not hesitate to punish you if you should break his rules or commit sins.

At another level, you may perceive "God" as some powerful external entity that you can sometimes successfully communicate with and call upon for help / assistance / a miracle.

At yet another level, "God" ceases to be an external entity, but some deep internal part of you yourself. Therefore it is no longer quite necessary to seek to communicate with God as if he were an external person. You merely need to get in touch with yourself.

At yet another level, there is no longer "you". You are just part of everything else, and you come to realise that the self is just an illusion.

Etc etc.

[Jez]

Originally Posted by Acting Like Godot

Your description divides people into three categories:

1. "Yes, I believe that LOA is true."
2. "I'm ambivalent or undecided about it."
3. ""No, LOA is all nonsense."

But I think that the situation is much more complex than that. It really depends on what model of LOA we are talking about. Some people consistently and consciously apply certain models of LOA, without even having ever heard of the phrase "Law of Attraction".

Well, yes. And in speaking about neutral positions and the difficulty most people have with them I was really thinking more generally than just about LoA.

I find most belief systems interesting, and all of them I've looked into have some practices that I think are very useful. I have no problem adopting those practices while withholding judgment about the overall 'truth' of the matter. I guess one of the main tenants of whatever belief system I do have is that real spiritual truth is simply unknowable in any communicable way. Sort of like "Those who know Tao do not tell and those who tell do not know."

So often people who, I suspect, actually agree end up arguing furiously over what amounts to semantics, while those who have opposing opinions believe themselves in agreement because they use the same terminology for quite different things.

I think some of the arguments on this forum might die down if those who've used LoA simply said, "Here is a technique. We think it works. At least that's been our experience. We honestly don't know how it works-- and can't prove that it does-- but we'd be delighted if you'd join us in experimenting with it."