This past year brought a wave of interest in the "Law of Attraction" (which is really more like a Hypothesis of Attraction), due in large part to a DVD movie and its companion book, both called The Secret. After applying the techniques described in The Secret, some people experience amazing results while other people get few or no results, and there is a very simple reason for that.
The most important factor -- one that was ignored in the movie -- is that if you don't align your actions with your intent, you will never achieve what you are trying to manifest. Simply thinking about your goals and focusing your thoughts and emotions on your intention isn't enough. That is only half the "secret".
If your goal is to lose weight but you eat 5,000 calories worth of junk food every day and never exercise, you are not aligning your actions with your intent and therefore you won't lose weight, no matter how many hours you spend visualizing a slender, healthier version of your self.
If your goal is to get a terrific new job but you spend every day lounging on the sofa watching Law & Order reruns instead of filling out job applications and sending out resumes, you won't find a new job, even if you spend a full hour every day mentally projecting your intent out into the universe.
If your actions contradict your intent, guess which one will win out in the end?
Before you take any action, ask yourself, "Will this action bring me closer to achieving my goal?" If the answer is no, you will need to decide whether or not you truly want to take that action. If the answer is that not only will the action not bring you closer to your goal but instead will take you in the opposite direction, you will need to determine which is more important to you -- achieving your goal or taking that particular action instead.
Practicing that technique throughout each and every day will also help you learn how to differentiate between behavior that stems from a desire for instant gratification versus behavior that grows out of focusing on your true purpose and intent. If your goal is to lose weight and you have a sudden desire to eat a candy bar, focusing on your goal and asking yourself whether or not eating the candy bar will bring you closer to that goal or will drive you further away from it can help you find the willpower to overcome the urge. In overcoming that urge, you are aligning your actions with your intent. This principle can be applied to any area of your life.
Each morning, focus on your intent and decide on at least one action you will take today toward reaching your goal. It doesn't have to be something elaborate or dramatic. It may be as simple as placing a phone call, sending an email, or attending a class. Every step you take to align your actions with your intent will result in progress toward achieving your goal, while sitting in your living room just thinking about things you wish you had or things you'd like to do won't get you very far.
The self-help gurus involved in The Secret quickly realized they had failed to address this important point. In subsequent appearances on the Oprah Winfrey Show and Larry King Live, nearly every guest from The Secret made a deliberate attempt to emphasize that the Law of Attraction requires action, not just intent. If you doubt this, watch the episodes of those talk shows and count how many times the guests say "If you sit around and visualize, they’ll come take your furniture away!" That statement became their mantra, a way to address after-the-fact what they had neglected to mention in the film.
I firmly believe in the old adage "You get what you focus on", which is the basis for the Law of Attraction. Whether it has anything to do with your intent creating quantum vibrations that resonate throughout the universe, I have no idea. I'm not a quantum physicist. I think it has more to do with two other factors instead:
1. When you focus on something, you typically spend more time on actions related to whatever you're focusing on.
2. When you focus on something, you direct your subconscious to be on the lookout for anything related to that goal. As a result, you tend to notice things that otherwise would have slipped under your radar. You suddenly begin to experience synchronicities, events and opportunities that bring you closer to your goal, but is this happening because your intent is "vibrating outward into the universe at a certain frequency" or instead because you've programmed your subconscious mind to bring to your conscious attention anything specifically related to your goal? To me, the latter possibility is just as wondrous as the former, though it sounds far less magical to some people, probably because it doesn't involve the use of the ever popular words "quantum" and "vibration".
Another thing to keep in mind is that "the secret" was never a secret at all. Books like As a Man Thinketh by James Allen and The Master Key System by Charles F. Haanel covered the same ground (and covered it more thoroughly) long before The Secret became a self-help phenomenon. Rhonda Byrne, producer of The Secret, didn't hide the fact that the inspiration for the movie came from reading a book by Wallace D. Wattles called The Science of Getting Rich, which was first published in 1910. The so-called secret has been popular, well-known, and easily accessible to everyone for far longer than anyone reading this article has been alive.
If the techniques described in The Secret aren't working for you, I recommend reading the books mentioned above and applying the methods described in those books instead. Each of the books is a quick, easy read. They emphasize not only the need to direct your thoughts and emotions toward your goals but also the importance of fully embodying your intent through your actions as a way to bring about the results you desire, and they provide advice and techniques to help you align your day-to-day actions with your intent.
{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
What a nice blog you have. Lot’s of interesting posts. I am trying to build something myself and was wondering how broad I could go in my topics. I find your approach very interesting (especially the Lucid dreaming as I am interested in that too).
I will put you in my blog roll, if you do not mind.
Olivier.
Hi Olivier,
Thanks so much for the comment! I’m glad you’re enjoying the blog.
From my own experience, I think it’s best to pick a certain area of interest and blog about topics within that area. I’m interested in the mind and in personal development, so I write only about those subjects but that still gives me quite a broad range of topics to explore. It looks like you’ve chosen a great field to cover in your blog. You’ll have lots of topics to choose from.
~ Kris
You are absolutely right in everything you’re saying! I’ve seen the documentary, and it was very inspiring for me. But I never thought, at any point, that I don’t need to work actively in order to reach my goals.
Take that guy who envisioned $100.000 and got a check for that amount a month later. That check didn’t fall from the sky. It was an order for the book that the guy wrote. If that book would not have been there, that $100.000 check most likely wouldn’t have come either.
Alternatively, if he wouldn’t have envisioned those $100.000, he might never have gotten that order, even if he wrote the book.
I understand that this principle is not clear for everybody, but it makes a lot of sense!
Hi Kris,
yesterday, I found an angle to combine the topics: I found a book that uses visualization techniques during sleep time to enhance one well being.
May I give you an idea? You’re series on lucid dreaming is great and elaborate. Why not make a little ebook out of it and attract readers with: free ebook for download? Once they are on the site, they will want to stay …
Have fun.
Hi Olivier,
I’ve considered creating an e-book filled with all the lucid dreaming articles but I haven’t had a chance to do it yet. The articles were originally written for an e-book that was included in the Dreamwalk Program, but the e-book that was included on that CD-ROM is in an unusual format and the pages don’t look good when they’re printed. I’m thinking of putting all the articles together in a new e-book in PDF format instead.
~ Kris
And what people forget is that if your intention is at the cost of the happiness and well-being of others, eventually your wealth and success can become your own very illness. Our actions are causes that lead to effects. Since we are all interconnected, then the law of “what goes around comes around” will apply to you even when you are not totally conscious of it. We should be very careful with this “secret” thing. The law of karma in Buddhism also talks of the negative consequences of ill actions and intentions.