It is often when we are down that we fail to appreciate, and sometimes even notice, the little gifts that life provides every day. This can be when we are hurting, when we are exhausted or in my case Monday mornings, when we are tired.
Most of you know already that going from being a DJ to my day job on Monday I get about 2 hours of sleep. It can be tough to look around and appreciate the Miracles of life when you are that tired. It is exactly that which will give us the energy and keep our vibration from slipping lower. Draining us physically, mentally and emotionally.
This past Monday serves as a good example. As I was driving to work, cursing the lack of sleep and energy I was feeling my favorite song came on the radio. Being it is not one of the 10 the are paid to play on repeat all day, in fact it is quite rare, made it stand out. I felt grateful.
It was also a wake up call to remind me to focus on what was working and good in my life instead of what was lacking. After over 20 years of working in self-improvement and with the law of attraction you would think I should know this. As stated earlier, being in a depleted state can make you forget what you know.
The great thing was after that initial noticing, I started to notice other things to appreciate. The great cup of coffee that not only tasted great but would help me wake up. The car that helped me get to work. Even the work I was going to as so many others are looking forwork. Make sure you are always on the lookout for the little Miracles life sends you.
The Law of Attraction, or LOA, has become one of those trending and hot button topics. There are books, YouTube videos and even entire channels dedicated to the subject. Since the movie The Secret came out, it has been a popular topic. It is also a very controversial and polarizing topic. Some people treat it like a religion, some people say it is just a bunch of new-age nonsense. Which is it? In my experience there is nothing magical about the law of attraction. It is a science based activity that focuses on using different parts of the brain to serve us. It is far from nonsense, but it also not a magical spell that will cure all of your ills in life. Let us look at exactly what the law of attraction is and how we can put it into use in our life.
I am currently in the market for a new car so this is an example that works really well for me. Have you noticed this? It really comes into play after you buy a new car, or outfit, or any other meaningful purchase. The greater amount of emotion attached to that purchase, the greater this seems to work. You bought a certain make or model of car and now you see that car everywhere. Did everyone else go out and buy the same car to be like you? Simple logic tells us this is not so. Then why does there seem to be more of them on the road? We will get to that answer, and why the word ‘seem’ was in italics, in just a second.
One more quick experiment you can do to show you how this works. It will only take roughly 60 seconds and can radically transform how you see, and can use, the law of attraction. You can do this right now, right where you are reading this. Get still and focused. Maybe take a deep breath or three. Now, pick a color. It doesn’t really matter which one. One of my favorites is blue, so we will use that for our example, but you can use whatever color you desire. You are going to do what I am going to suggest next before reading the following paragraph. If you really want to get the full effect and understanding you will try it out. After you do what I am about to tell you come back at read the following paragraph. Here is what you are going to do. Look around you and see every object that you can find that is blue. It can be any shade of blue. Note what the object is. Do this for roughly 30 seconds. Go ahead and do that now. Look for blue objects.
Now that you are focused back on what we are learning, let me ask you a question. Without looking up, how many red objects can you name that you saw? You are probably saying, “I wasn’t looking for red. I don’t know.” Now look up and notice the red objects. Were they just put there? Of course not. No more than everyone bought the same car as you. What happened was the part of your brain that filters what is and is not important to you determined what you saw. In the case of the car, it brought to your attention a certain item. That is the make or model of car that matches your own. In the case of the blue objects, it blocked out any objects that were not of importance. This could be brown, red or any other color object. This part of the brain is called the reticular activating system. It is the bridge between your senses and awareness. We used visual examples because they are the most poignant. It works the same for any of the other senses as well.
Just like cars and blue objects, the law of attraction works for business opportunities, meeting the ideal lover, or a million other things. If we were to create a list of traits we would enjoy in people and reviewed that list with emotion every day, we would begin to see people with these traits showing up in our life. Perhaps we might start to notice some of our friends and family developing these traits. They really didn’t develop themwe just placed an importance on noticing them and our brain followed suit. The tricky bit is that this filter in our brain works the same for positive and negative alike. If we are constantly telling others that we have no luck, or that life is out to get us, our brain will be like, “Wait! Let me show you an example of that!” Before you know it, it will seem that our life is full of negative situations. Of course our filter will be more likely to point them out and draw them to us.
Although the brain can bring things to our awareness through the filter of the reticular activating system, it is us to then take action on those things. If we are focused on noticing business opportunities but don’t act on them when we see them two things will happen. First, the results will not be forth-coming. We need inspired action once we tend to notice the new things. Second, if we continue not to act, the brain will decide this must not be that important after all and stop bringing these to our attention. The law of attraction is real. It is a scientific and conscious use of the mind. It also requires action on our end.
What an important lesson today is! Talk about the power of attraction, this is a great analogy! Many of us spend our entire lives chasing what we want. We chase the perfect relationship. We chase happiness. We chase inner peace. While pursuing all of these is certainly a noble end, it would be far better to attract them. If you think of the butterfly analogy the picture above offers, I hope you can see how this could transfer to other areas of our life.
Let us take a look at the few we have mentioned. Many people chase the perfect relationship. The perfect relationship is one that loves and learns from the imperfection. Instead of looking high and low for the ‘perfect partner’, it would be wise for us to take an attraction course of action. That would be to get clear on the what we are looking for in a partner, than working on ourselves and our own lives that they would be something that someone would want to be a part of. If you become the best version of yourself, that is what will make you irresistible.
How about chasing happiness? This is something I learned all about in writing my first two books, A Happy Life for Busy People, and Living the Dream. The more you chase happiness, the more it eludes you. Instead, work on creating an environment that allows happiness to grow and flourish. What kind of new age mumbo jumbo is this? It is common sense really. Start a ritual of gratitude. Maybe writing down three things you are grateful for that day and why. Begin each day reciting a positive affirmation that empowers you. Listen to something inspirational on the way to work. Give a genuine compliment to one person each day. Before long, happiness will fill every corner of your life. That does not mean there will not be tough times, but their frequency and duration will continue to diminish.
Chasing inner peace is much the same. If you create circumstances that will provide you inner peace, that peace will have a chance to flourish. It will be different for everyone. Some will set aside, and stick to, twenty minutes of mindful meditation a day. Some will need to drive around blasting their favorite 80’s hard rock. If you are like me, it could be a little bit of both. Reducing factors that cause you stress and increase factors that reduce stress will help you achieve inner peace.
Think of butterflies. You cannot chase them down. They will just fly away. If you focus of creating a beautiful garden the butterflies will love to come to, they will flock to you. How about in your life? What are we chasing when we should be attracting?
These days it seems everyone is working to get rich and famous. From side hustles, to an attempt to go viral, it would seem that we are all chasing the brass ring. To this end, many people wish to use the Law of Attraction, or as it has become known, the secret. One of the most important aspects of this law is that you must be what you wish to attract. This gives many people, including myself, a headache trying to figure out.
When thinking about gaining wealth and fame, the question becomes, “How can I be and/or feel wealthy, when my circumstances would have me feeling the opposite.” With the price of everything from heat to groceries going up, that is certainly understandable. The ‘secret’ is contained in something we touched on a few posts ago. Our control is not in bending outside circumstances to our will, but working on the circumstances that exist between our own ears.
How can you feel wealthy with all of the bills coming in and the paycheck not getting larger? By focusing on all that you do have. This may sound cliche or positive thinking to many of you. In a way I suppose it is. That does not change that fact that it works. A brief glance at the world around us will remind us of how much we all have to be thankful for. Take our health for example. Even if it is not perfect at the moment, it certainly could be worse. Our friends are another source of wealth. We may wish we had more, or saw the ones we have more often, but the fact is having friends is a great form of wealth.
There are a million things from a roof over our heads, running water to access to the internet to read something like this, that we should be grateful for. Our lives are filled with so many blessings that often go overlooked. Spending as little as five minutes a day focusing on all we have to be grateful for can transform our lives. It can take us to living a life of lack, to living one of abundance. Don’t trust me, prove it to yourself by trying this today.
Well, isn’t this a confusing title? I should certainly say so. Let us start with how you are, indeed, your past.Any of us who study the Law of Attraction know that a certain energy will attract to itself. This is one reason that it seems the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, as the saying goes. If you have only been exposed to poverty growing up, that is all you know. Your thoughts and actions leading up to this point have you in a state of poverty. Same holds true if you grew up rich. That is what you know. You take actions that will allow you and your money to remain lifelong friends. If you wake up and find that putting on that pair of jeans you bought last year seems like a bit more of a struggle, it is not because of the one doughnut you had for breakfast. No, it is years of eating poorly. You are, in fact, the result of the decisions you have made up to that point. In this way, you are your past. There is good news to be had, however.
You are also not your past. What? Let me explain. I hear a lot of people refer to themselves as something. It can be something positive, or something negative. “I am a procrastinator.” they say. “I am not a morning person.” is another great example. “No, that is what you have been.” What you are today can change in an instant. You can begin working towards creating a new you. Just as we discussed above how your present self is the result of the decisions you have made in the past, your future self will be the result of the decisions you make going forward.
Many people also choose to let past trauma define who they are. “I am a child of alcoholic parents.” or “I was in an abusive relationship.” Look, things may knock you down in life. Scratch that. Things will knock you down in life. That is not and will not be your fault. If, however, we come back years later and you are still on the ground, that is your fault. That is not to say that these things are not painful and do not leave emotional scars. They do and many of them may take years to recover from. We do not have to let them define us. It may take therapy. It will take confronting these issues and the fears and trauma they have created inside of us, but we do not have to be our past.
The same is true of others. In the past, people may have done us wrong. They may have not been people we would have liked to associate with. If that is not who they are today, and we are judging them, then we are convicting an innocent person. That is not to say you should be gullible and believe someone has changed just because they told you. We should not hold them prisoner for their past actions. Just as we can change, so can others. If you knew me a long time ago, you may think, “This guy is not someone I would want to be around.” You would have been right. Now, I can’t count how many people compliment the way I treat Margie. Many ask me to talk to their man and try to show them how to talk and act.
This change all came from the fact that I chose to no longer be my past. It didn’t hurt that I meant a lovely and spirited woman who held me accountable for my behavior. You can do the same. You are the result of the decisions and actions you have made up to this point. So, you are your past. You are not a prisoner of that past, however. Starting the very second you finish reading this blog, you can choose to no longer let your past define you. Changes occur in an instant. Commitment and follow through is what changes identity going forward.
In my second book, Living the Dream, there are several stories of people who prove that you do not have to be defined by your past. There is a woman who was abused as a child. She is now part of a group that helps abused children. There is a man who saw his family get killed. He moved to a different country and started a family. A gentleman who grew up in rural West Virginia, uneducated and with little prospects. He went on to become an accomplished musician and live the life of his dreams. Do they still have parts of their past that haunt them? I am sure they do. We all do. What is true about all of them is they did not let those circumstances define them. Their future was not dictated by their past.
Artificial Intelligence can be a rather scary thing. Elon Musk was asked what was the one thing that scared him about the future and he said it was the application of AI. Now, if something scares old Elon, that is something. He is not what I would consider a very emotional fellow. Many people think that AI is some crazy futuristic aspect that is years away. It isn’t. Have you ever used your phone to look up a certain topic and suddenly you are seeing ads for that topic popping up all over your social media? One evening Margie and I were having a conversation about a certain article of clothing I was looking at purchasing. Minutes later, as she was playing a game online, an ad for that very product popped up. This can seem creepy, and I guess it kind of is. It can also teach us about an aspect of our own intelligence and how we can make the most of it.
Let us kind of switch gears for a second and talk about the Law of Attraction. What is the Law of Attraction? Many people mistakenly think it is the theory that you think of something and it pops in your life. Not quite. Good thing too, because the majority of anyone’s thoughts tend to be negative. A quick definition I heard is that the Law of Attraction is the philosophy that energy precedes manifestation. It may sound like just another way of saying what we put forth earlier, but there is an important difference. One of the great tools and strategies to use in manifesting and attracting what we want in life is focus and attention. When we practice focusing on the positive things in our life and what is going right, say through gratitude, that tends to be what we notice. The more we do it, the more we notice it. That is not to say that we do not have, or notice, the negative aspects of life, we just do not focus on them. When you shift your focus, you shift what you feel. When it comes right down to it, what you feel is what you are living. This attraction thing works both ways, so be careful. What does any of this have to do with AI? Let us take a look.
There is a different type of AI to be found. Actual Intelligence. It can be found in a part of the brain called the reticular activating system, or RAS. Remember our crazy examples about the ads for things we were talking about suddenly popping up everywhere? That is kind of how the RAS works. It acts as a filter to bring to light what we focus on. If we are always telling people that our life is difficult and that things never go our way, our RAS is listening. The same way our smart phone listens to, and pays note of the things we search and do online.
I always use the example of when you buy a new car or outfit and you suddenly start seeing that car and outfit everywhere. The cars and outfits were always there, but they were not a priority to you or to your brain. Suddenly, your RAS realized that this was a priority. It was something that was ‘like’ something you now have. In the case of a new car or outfit, something we are usually emotionally charged about having. Fast forward a year. We don’t see that outfit or car as much. Why? It has become less emotionally important to us. Here is what is really important and worth considering. In both cases, reality itself did not change, but our reality changed. Again, everybody did not go out and buy the same car or outfit, but we did start seeing more of them. Why? Because that is what we focused on.
Remember, Artificial Intelligence will show us ads for want we are paying attention to, whether that is ‘good’ or ‘bad’. We can be shown ads for gym equipment and fitness routines, or candy and drug paraphernalia. Whatever we are looking up, thinking about and giving our attention to. Actual Intelligence and our Reticular Activating System will do the same thing in our life. Whether we are focused on how miserable our life is and how terrible we are being treated, or how much opportunities we have and how much we have to be grateful for.
If you think ads popping up for what you are talking about or searching online is scary, just remember the same thing is happening in your life. Both AIs are using the same principles. For reasons I cannot comprehend, it is easier for people to agree with the fact that big brother and the internet algorithm control what shows up in our life than the fact that our built in filter in our brain is doing the exact same thing. You are attracting the ads and content you see online. You are also attracting the people, circumstances, opportunities and feelings you are experiencing in life. Use the AI you have control of to create a better life for you and those you love.
In my first two books, A Happy Life for Busy People and Living the Dream, we discussed how our inner world affects our outer world. Your mind can either be your biggest obstacle, or done right, your biggest ally. Anyone interested in the law of attraction, has heard this countless times. It is true. What we think determines what actions we will take. The actions we take, in turn, will determine, to a great extent, the quality of life we live. If our minds are positive and encouraging, we will take actions that will lead to a positive and fulfilling life. If our heads are filled with self-doubt and negative thinking, we are unlikely to put ourselves out there and take many, if any, actions at all.
Like many self-improvement actions, this is simple, but not easy. Improving your inner dialogue and thoughts is a lifetime endeavor. It is an investment that is worth its weight in gold. The time you invest on improving what happens inside your head will manifest itself as a greater sense of well-being, inner peace and increased opportunities and accomplished goals. I recommend beginning this journey right now. You can pick up either of my first two books mentioned earlier, or even search “Improving my inner dialogue on YouTube or Google. There are so many resources available.
Working on improving the workings of your mind may seem like just one more thing you do not have time for. Let me assure you that it will be the most profitable investment you make. It will also be one you cannot lose. What you gain in knowledge and confidence will be with you the rest of your life and positively impact every area of your life. As Earl Nightingale once said, “Never give up on a dreamjust because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway.” If you know of a resource that you have found especially helpful with helping you get control of your mind and thinking, please share it with the rest of us.
Today is Friday, the end of the week! Let us go into the weekend strong. What I mean by that is to really appreciate the now. How can we accomplish this? Today, let us focus on one thing we are grateful 🙏 for this week.
What happened that you are thankful for? Did you reach a goal you have been chasing? Did you get closer to accomplishing something you have been working on? Did you brighten someone’s day? Maybe you are just grateful to have made it through the week?
Now, let us add one thing you are grateful for this weekend in advance (this is also known as looking forward to using the law of attraction) It could be time with your spouse or family. Perhaps working on that passion project? Enjoying some peace and reflection while enjoying a good book?
Personally, I am grateful for completing a 5k with the love of my life, enjoying a dinner with a good friend and accomplishingsome things at work. This weekend I am going to have coffee ☕️ with a good friend. Looking forward to the conversation there. Margie and I have some relaxing plans.How about you? What are you grateful for this week and what are you thankful for in advance this weekend? Share your joy with us!😃
It is a new month and we are going to take a step back and refocus so we can accomplish great things this month. How many of you have heard of the Law of Attraction? I am assuming if you absorb any sort of social media, or enjoy any self-improvement material, the answer would be a resounding “Yes”. Asked what the Law of Attraction (LOA) is, many people give a version of this answer – it is thinking positive to attract positive things. This is only one piece of the puzzle. Just like any puzzle, if you do not have all of the pieces, you will never get the whole picture.
There are actually three pieces to the puzzle of the Law of Attraction. Two very important pieces of the puzzle many of us miss. These two pieces are feeling (or vibration) and action. Many people watch movies, or read books, about the law of attraction and think it is just about thinking things into existence. That is not how the law works. It is a piece of the puzzle, but just one. You must accompany these thoughts with the corresponding emotion. Think of how you will feel when what you are picturing becomes reality. How will you feel when you get that new high-paying job? How about wrapping your arms around that special someone? How do you feel when a burning desire is finally realized? You feel so full of joy that you feel you are almost buzzing. Like electricity is flowing through your veins. That is called ‘vibration’. These have become such buzz words, they have lost some of their power. Is your vibration really that important? Let us look at what one of the smartest people in science had to say about it.
Understanding the secrets of the universe? That is pretty powerful stuff. Mr. Tesla was one smart individual. Did you happen to notice the other word he used in this quote? Energy. Have you ever met someone and just thought, “I love their energy!” That is actually what first attracted me to Margie. Your vibration is your energy. Having a positive energy can help you not only land an amazing partner, but jobs, friends and a million other things. How about the reverse? Have you ever run across someone with a negative vibration? Bob Marley used to call them emotional vampires. Why? They literally suck the emotional life out of you. Have you ever had a day where your vibration or energy was negative or low? We all have. What is that like? It usually causes us to be lethargic. We tend not to feel like socializing with friends. We trade healthy eating and the gym for junk food on the couch binge-watching our favorite reality show. Persisted in long enough, this will leave us with physical challenges as well.
I love this diagram because it shows how the 3 pieces of the puzzle feed off each other. This leads us to the final piece – action. As we showed in the negative example above, having a low vibration can lead us to taking negative actions. This will undoubtedly lead to a negative outcome. We can use this to our advantage. If we turn it around and focus on what we want to accomplish and accompany that with the feeling or vibration/energy we will have when it is accomplished, we will take far more constructive action. If you think of how much you desire to be a better golfer, you imagine yourself as a championship golfer, maybe even that you are on television with the world watching. Are you going to take your time lining up your shot or just swing away and hope for the best.
This is one of those quotes that used to drive me crazy. How the hell can I be something before doing it? Now, considering all of the pieces of the puzzle we discussed, it makes sense. If you picture yourself being something, feel how it will feel when you are it, you are going to take actions that person would take. In the end, that will end up with you becoming it. For those of you playing along at home, that does indeed mean we have to be something in or to…well…be something. Sounds very counterintuitive, but it actually makes perfect sense.
If you are looking to put the law of attraction to work for you, remember to include all of the puzzle pieces. Thinking about something is only one third of the puzzle. Seeing one third of any puzzle will never give you a clear picture. Just like using one third of the Law of Attraction will never give you any results. Remember to use your thoughts, your emotions and action to attract what you want into your life!
In the self-improvement field, you often hear that you should “trust the process”. This loosely means that you should somehow believe that everything is going right, when it appears everything is going wrong. There is both a right way and a wrong way to do this.
Trusting the process does not mean ignoring what is going wrong. Just assuming everything is going right to the detriment of learning from what is wrong is a recipe for disaster. The right way to trust the process involves the conviction that the end result will be positive and the current challenges are there to teach and strengthen us, not to stop us.
This is also what happens when people study the Law of Attraction. I have heard people watch the movie The Secret, and walk away thinking all they have to do is wish for something and it will happen. First, that is not what the movie, or the law of attraction, says. Second, that is not how to put your mind, and the laws of the universe to work for you.
Trusting the process, especially while using the law of attraction, involves visualizing your specific goal, feeling and knowing it will be reached (Trusting the process) And looking for inspired actions you should take. It is having that faith that things will turn out OK, as you work towards making them so.
Some great ways to increase that faith, and the ability to trust the process, are seen in the first picture. I would love to hear some of your methods for trusting the process.
SECRET 2 AN AMAZING LIFE 