Polarization (Blog)

[Lauxa]

Wow, powerful post Steve, thanks!

It seems to me like people do switch sides. Like Bill Gates building up Microsoft by ethically questionable means and then retiring to administer a charitable endowment. Or maybe he is just paying his karmic debt...

It also seems like picking the "love" polarity would yeild more happiness, so I'm not sure why to pick the "fear" polarity. Maybe it would yeild more power.

Anyways, lots to think about here.

[impaul99]

Many people screw up their intentional energy flow by trying to use both polarities in the same circuit. You can’t do that and expect to get good results with the Law of Attraction. It just won’t work. You must use either one polarity or the other, and you must remain congruent in your usage.

So after reading all 3 articles, are you basically saying that the big reason LoA doesn't work for many people is because they apply both LOVE and FEAR energy to an intention? And if they applied only LOVE or only FEAR, it would come faster to them?

So, is the intention itself either fear based or love based, or the energy you feel about it? Would devoting your life towards helping raise money to cure cancer be considered a LOVING intention? If so, what if it's only because your child has cancer and you're AFRAID that they will die, then does the intention become FEAR based?

Who decides whether an intention is fear based or love based? Am I allowed to attract a car (a possession, which might be considered fear based to some), if I'm going to use that car to drive to/from work and work on helping raise money for charities?

I'm sorry, somewhere along the way you lost me Steve. I feel that this whole topic of polarization is just really about Judgement which I don't believe in. It also doesn't reconcile with your Subjective reality model.

I think someone who LOVES helping children should help children. Someone who LOVES collecting vintage cars should collect vintage cars. Someone who LOVES building wealth, should build wealth. Someone who LOVES writing articles, should write articles. As long as people do what THEY LOVE they will be successful, but I don't see that there is some form of universal directory of judgements which says that certain things are LOVE based and certain things are FEAR based.

Here's a direct quote of "INFLOW" intentions you listed. Keeping in mind your new label of "INFLOW" as "FEAR" you are saying these are specifically FEAR based intentions:

And here are some examples of intentions that align well with inflow (from the universe into your consciousness):

get a new car
attract a new relationship
receive a certain sum of money
get a new job
achieve a certain reputation
win a contest

How can you possibly make a statement like that? Are you saying getting a new job is FEAR based? Attracting a new relationship is FEAR based?

Imagine a world where everyone agrees with your phylosophy. Pretend that everyone on earth read your blog and starting tomorrow morning they agreed with your advice 100% and they ALL decided to act out of OUTFLOW/LOVE only. Who would RECEIVE everything that everyone is GIVING? When I make a donation to your website (OUTFLOW/LOVE) do you not accept that donation (INFLOW/FEAR)?

I would contest that energy flows from YOU > UNIVERSE > YOU > UNIVERSE > YOU > UNIVERSE and on and on forever. I don't think there is a direction, it's just an endless circle, you only need to keep the loop going. I wouldn't worry too much about the "polarity" of your intention. If the first thing you want to manifest is a CAR when you first learn about LoA, then go out and do it, and once you get that car you will feel really awesome and you will WANT to give back to the world, which will in turn give back to you and so on and so on and so on etc.

The only people who break the process are those who always TAKE TAKE TAKE TAKE TAKE or always GIVE GIVE GIVE GIVE GIVE. Either one is not healthy.

Just my 2 cents.

[goodstyles]

Originally Posted by impaul99

The only people who break the process are those who always TAKE TAKE TAKE TAKE TAKE or always GIVE GIVE GIVE GIVE GIVE. Either one is not healthy.

Your whole post makes a heap of sense, and I have very similar concerns about the whole Fear/Love Inflow/Outflow etc. As I understand life, it's partly about striking the balance between service and receiving. Someone that only gives, is not healthy (that I have ever met) and someone that only takes is certainly not healthy either.

If you take the 3 most recent LoA posts, it appears to me that Steve has (talking in the 3rd person is easiest here) developed his ideas on this topic further as he has written more and expanded upon what is there already. Hence the dichotomy you quote earlier Paul (I think)...

Isn't there the common case where someone gives and gives and gives that they are satisfying something within themselves where they don't feel comfortable (for whatever reason/conditioning) not doing so. But isn't that actually 'taking'?

It comes back to another topic, one that Steve has covered about giving and receiving and how they eternally loop back on each other. here?

Anyways, that my 2 cents like yourself...

P.

[magickmystik]

this is according to Chopra

""There are two kinds of self-power. The weaker of the two is not really
self-power at all; it's the power of agency, in which your strength is
derived from something out there in the world. It could be a famous name,
or a lot of money, or the fact that you've got a title that carries a lot
of power with it, whether it's President of the United States or
heavyweight-boxing champion of the world. You as an individual are the
agent for some external power source.
Agency power can certainly be formidable, but it's a kind of power that has
a beginning and a middle and an end. So, the President of the United
States is very powerful as long as he's in office, but after his term
expires, his agency power is diminished. Ten years later he may not be
powerful at all, if his entire strength was based on agency.
True self-power on the other hand, comes from within. Self-power has a
spiritual rather than a material foundation. Although agency power comes
and goes with the external source, self-power is permanent. It lasts as
long as you do. In fact, it lasts longer - because self-power is one with
spirit, and spirit lasts forever.
Secondly, self-power makes itself felt immediately. Its effect is
instantaneous. We've all had the experience of meeting someone who didn't
seem to be especially interesting or impressive, but then we find out that
they're powerful in some material way and suddenly we feel we have to take
them more seriously. This often happens with people who have agency power.
But when a person has true self-power, there's no way of being mistaken
about them. Their inner strength is obvious immediately, regardless if how
they're dressed or the kind of car they're driving or the type of
wristwatch they wear. Before they say anything, before they utter a single
word, before they do anything, this is the kind of person who will actually
draw your attention in a room; because their spirit is the source of their
strength. And it's the power that's associated with great leaders.
Self-power is like other great natural forces. It's like fire or
electricity. By itself, it's ethically neutral - it can be used for good
or bad. According to Vedic teachings, you don't necessarily have to be a
good person to have this kind of power. Bad people have it too, and they
can wreak havoc because they have such great ability to influence everyone
around them."""

[magickmystik]

Originally Posted by magickmystik

this is according to Chopra

""Bad people have it too, and they can wreak havoc because they have such great ability to influence everyone around them."""

and that is a SITH LORD

[Mr Brightside]

Guy's I think you are forgetting about the reverse flow here...

If your goals are just to get the best quality information to as many people as possible then the reverse flow of that would be a health income or a nice car - but the universe takes care of that side.

If your goal is to have a nice car or healthy income, then the universe takes care of the reverse flow by making sure it takes quality information from you.

If you find your self without the nice car or income then you have not allowed the universe to take its 'pound of flesh' or Karmic debt as of yet. Hence the reason you have not yet aquired the car or achived a heathy income.

In Steves second article he was very non judgmental about which was the right way to go about things. But as we see from article 3, in Steves attempt to make things clearer, he used emotive tearms in which we have already morally pre judged to be the 'right' way and the 'wrong' way.

What I see here is that peole are seeing the dark side and conflict within them selves and are uncomfortable with there own reflection. They then resort to attacking the analogy instead of seeing what is uncomfortable to look at.

This is the way I see Steve's explination.

[Practical Jess]

While the inlow/outflow fear/love model is generally clear to me and I do understand what Steve is getting at, I find myself gravitating more towards the issues raised by Impaul99 and then by Goodstyles in his follow up email.

First how do we decided if an intention is ultimately fear based, or love based? Can't it be both? And doesn't everything ultimately come back to our own personal satisfaction (hence fear)? A typical example would be a "Charity Marathon?" People spend hours/days/weeks/months training for these events. While they may raise a few dollars for their favorite charity, ultimately are they not doing this for themselves, even the slightest amount? (This is a personal example!)

Which brings me to the next question... If someone decides to poloraize with love, can that person never again hold intentions for personal desires? (the million dollar experiment for example....) Can that person no longer manifest good health, a nice vacation or a new car?

Wouldn't this line of thinking lead to the justification of intentions? (i.e., I really want that nice vacation so I can spend my money and HELP the local economy, rather than I want that vacation for MY OWN pleasure..)

I welcome any answers to this as I am really hoping for a loophole ;-)

[eternomi]

I think there are two concepts within these articles. There is the "+/- balances" concept (which Steve calls polarity), and the there is the concept of "direction" (which Steve calls polarization). If you are trying to go from point A to point B, polarity is the amount of distance you cover, and polarization is the direction of the distance you cover. The concept of a vector is an excellent analogy for this.

In different terms, your polarization is the intention which is guiding your moves and your polarity is how much energy, time, focus you are using to move in that particular direction.

It is easy to answer the polarity side of things.. How much energy you are using.. The direction portion is a little trickier, but I think the following questions help with figuring out your direction: Are you trying to take more than you give? Or are you giving more than you take? The first could be labeled as 'fear-based' while we can call the latter 'love-based'. Or call them good and evil, or up and down, or frog and chicken. Buying a car, looking for a relationship, building a business... Every activity could be done with one direction or the other.

I was listening to a podcast by Robert Kiyosaki (Rich Dad Poor Dad) the other day. He was saying that there are two kinds of salespeople: the takers and the givers. He explained the exact same concept in his podcast, saying that takers see everything as a single transaction and try to take as much from you as possible (since there won't be a second transaction once you are treated the way you were). The givers try to provide more value then they take.

Like Steve said, you pick a side and act consistently. As you keep acting in that direction, you build up momentum. Thus, it gets easier to move in that direction and it also gets easier to put more energy to move in that direction. However, I don't agree with his indifference to the two sides. Keep in mind that whichever side you pick, you will be surrounded with others who picked the same side! There is no separate, corporal God out there to judge you depending on which one you pick. The "Judgment Day" mentioned in religious scripture is just a metaphor. You knowingly or unknowingly pick a side and experience the consequences. What you experience and your reflections on the consequences is your own 'judgment day'. If you are aware of both sides, I'd say go with love. If you've lived within the fear side for a long time, the switch won't be easy or quick, but it will get easier.

[Jehosephat]

I feel polarity has a lot to with the non-IM definition of intent. The 'why' behind your actions. Why do you want a new car? Do you think that people will be more attracted to you? Do you get enjoyment from the car? Will a new car help you be more productive in a mission of charity? Each of these reasons might represent a different polarity. Do you fear that you are not attractive enough on your own? Is it negative or positive to enjoy a new car? Does your purchase help you acheive a higher good? With regard to whether an intention(IM-style) is negative or positive, I think we go back to Steve's breakdown of content versus energy. The content (car) is not as important as the energy (why) to determining the polarity. So, I don't think you can make a list of items that have naturally positive or negative polarity. Also, I think that a lot of what makes your polarity positive or negative is how you view what is positive in this world and what is negative. Steve's definition of positive energy and mine and yours are probably not exactly the same but they are probably close enough to agree on much of their merit.

[dsmoke]

I'm having trouble knowing how to categorize (in terms of polarities) intent based on simple enjoyment of an activity or thing.

It seems to me that it can't be wrong to want something because you enjoy it. Like, "I intend to have more lucid dreams because they are fun and lucid dreaming is a useful tool." Or, "I want a new vehicle because I want to be able to get to the mountains to do rock climbing, because I love to do it."

Nobody is benefitting from these things except me, but it's not like I'm harming anyone else or living in fear that I won't get these things. So it doesn't seem like either love-based or fear-based.

Help?

[Jeremy Bennett]

Originally Posted by sirkinm

I know what you mean. All jokes about wanting to become Darth Vader aside, I feel like I'm in a similar place. Even though it's hard to admit, I find my major goals centering around personal gain (more confidence, more exciting experiences, more money), or around protecting the people (and dog) that I love so I don't have to experience the pain of watching them suffer.

Seeing that I seem to be selfishly-oriented, I wonder if I'm destined for the dark side.

This is based on the assumption that more confidence, exciting experiences,
and having resources can't be manifested as a natural result of following (the path of light) remember mavlov's hierarchy of needs - you need to take care of yourself /your needs first, before you can be altruistic, etc. (read steve's article on that - I can't remember which one)

Power on! (via love and light)

Jeremy

[Eduardo César]

I perceive this subject of polarity and polarization as yet another model of reality. Like there are many different ways to describe and explain something, or just specific parts of that something. Some explanations are better suited for emphasizing determined aspect or have a more easy grasp of the idea that one wants to convey.

I also find this model somewhat incongruent with the subjective model of reality, but, for that matter, it is equally accurate in its own way. They just refer to other aspects of reality. A good analogy would be one person trying to put a rocket in orbit using quantum mechanics, when perhaps it could be easy(?) to do so using classic or relativistic mechanics.

I liked this post and will do some experiments in that matter. For now I just say that I'm on the edge of the choice, and the dark side sometimes knows how to show itself to be appealing ... but, then again, the light side too...

just my cents 2

[peacefulmind]

What would happen if I believed that if I put in fear energy and love energy into the manifestation of my goals then my intentions would manifest well and quickly? In this way I am using the subjective reality model in a way that eliminates polarization in a way that makes sense to me.

[tekart]

[quote=Steve Pavlina;44932]
If I consciously shifted to fear polarity, for example, and genuinely believed that my own personal gain was more important than helping people...
QUOTE]

Not slamming you here at all Steve, you do good work but... (you knew that was coming right?) aren't you gaining something for all of this effort? Testing your theories maybe, you are getting income from your ads and donations from your web site right? So you are getting "something" for your efforts.

If there was absolutley nothing in it for you, would you REALLY be doing it? Even if you are helping other you are ultimately getting something in return, even if it is just a good feelign that you are helping others.

[Akashic_Librarian]

Well I am convinced. One again steve you have cleared things up so much for me. Thank you!

[learningtogrow]

Dear Lord am I confused! All I'm trying to do in my life right now is manifest money so I can give back to the universe. After reading the first article I was confused b/c I assumed those are two different flows that were cancelling each other out. I'm trying to manifest $ from the universe (in flow) to give back (out flow), thus conflicting flows.
After several days, I got a grip on it and decided, they are two different polarities and I can't focus on both at the same time so I'll try to manifest money (inflow) first and then turn around and manifest goodnesss (outflow). 2 different intentions as someone pointed out in a post.
Now I'm hearing that inflow is used for power and greed! Am I confusing the overall picture. How does one manifest $ without "asking" for something from the universe and have it not be thought of as greedy. I truly do want to better my life (with money at the moment) so I can better others but which way is which at this point?

[RandomJohn]

I got the idea on polarization, and how a conscious choice leads to a positive feedback loop on capacity to use fear- or love-based energies. So, where does the higher-self figure into this? Does our higher-self guide us one direction or another, or is it possible to go in a direction opposite the higher self?

[TheColonel]

Originally Posted by Steve Pavlina

First, I'd kill off these forums because they aren't profitable enough, and I certainly wouldn't "waste" time participating here myself unless I was trying to upsell you on something. Then I'd recommend tons of lousy products that pay fat affiliate commissions, like a new product every other day. I'm confident I could at least double or triple my income in about 30 days if I did that. I'd turn my blog into a post farm and recruit other bloggers to crank out useless info crack in order to spam the search engines and generate more links, more page views, and therefore more ad clicks. I'd take all my best content, wrap it into high-priced products for sale, and every post would direct you to buy something. And so on...

Interesting. Several stars from a very famous (and currently popular) LoA movie have taken this approach.

[The Wise Turtle]

Perhaps there is some fundamental difference between the polarities of love vs. fear and the polarities of attraction vs. separation (or even the polarity of giving vs. recieving)? They seem like they might all be the same thing, but perhaps they are not?

For example, giving and recieving can both be elements of love, and they can also be elements of fear. Similarly, one can be alone (separation) and together (attraction) in a loving way or in a fearful way (flight and fight, respectively).

So maybe it would be clearer to say that it's good (effective) to alternate between the polarity of giving and recieving, and it's good to alternate between the polarity of attraction and separation, but it's not so good (effective) to alternate between the polarity of love and fear. (It may be clearer, but it's also more of a mouthful!)

Oh, and remember, the whole point of George Lucas's epic myth was to show that love wins out in the end! Luke and Vader's love for each other saves the Galaxy and Vader himself, and you'll note that only the ghosts of the guys who died while they were embracing the light side of the force got to stick around for the celebratory campfire...

Peace, Love, and Bicycles,
Turtle

[The Wise Turtle]

Originally Posted by learningtogrow

Dear Lord am I confused! All I'm trying to do in my life right now is manifest money so I can give back to the universe. ...How does one manifest $ without "asking" for something from the universe and have it not be thought of as greedy.

To me, it sounds like your need for money is coming from fear. Do you think that may be the case? Are you sure you need more money to "give back to the universe"? What would the universe do with more money? :-)

If you currently aren't able to take care of your own needs (food, water, shelter, etc.) that should be your priority right now. You will be helping the universe most by taking good care of yourself (lovingly).

As far as I can see, and from what I understand Steve believes, your best bet would be to take your skills, talents, and passions and apply them to some project/job/career/mission from which others are likely to benefit. If you do this effectively, you'll end up helping the world and the world will end up helping you take care of yourself. The work you do doesn't have to be anything extravagant, it just needs to be something you can do that feels healthy and rewarding to you. It also doesn't need to be long term, you can try doing temp work, or taking on contract work, or create a business for yourself either full time, or part time. As long as you are offering the world something that it can use, the world will offer you things that you can use, in return. Maybe you'll get money, or maybe you'll get housing, or food, or companionship, or education! As long as you are open to getting all of it (and not just the money), you'll find that the universe has a heck of a lot to offer you!

Peace, Love, and Bicycles,
Turtle

[Sunsingh]

Thanks Steve, I'm really grateful for this amazing post.

I was wondering, is wanting to conquer my own mind and to have self mastery love or fear based? it seems that self-mastery can be attained via either polarization.

What polarisation would someone like roman emperoror Marcus Aurelius have? He conquered and fended off opponents, he ran his country the way he saw best, but from reading his journal I've learned that it was all based on an intention to serve his people. What about the US general who conquered Japan in WW2? I remember that he had said "in all of my past lives, I was a conquerer and my objective was to bring civilisation to humanity." (paraphrase). I would think these would both be love based, but would still like to hear your opinion on them.

Thanks