The Secret to Succeeding at Everything
It’s simple, but not easy
As originally published in Change Your Mind Change Your Life on Medium.com.
Image: francescoch on iStock
I’ve been learning about ways to self-help and self-heal for five years now. There are an endless number of tools and teachers out there, but ultimately the core message is always the same. To create the reality we want, we must live as if it already is. It’s such a simple concept, yet the vast majority of people never manage to do it. Perhaps this article can help.
The Magic FormulaLife is full of contrast. That’s thanks to the universal law of opposites. It can be no other way.
We cannot know what we want without knowing what we don’t want. The very experience of something we don’t want launches our desire for what we do want.
And that’s just as it should be. Desire is how we evolve. Every invention and creation was borne out of a desire.
Therefore, desire is the first part of the formula to making our dreams come true. It’s also the part that comes easy to everyone.
The second part is about allowing that desire to come about. And this is where most of us fall short.
Allowing means knowing that it is done. And because it is done, we hold no resistance to it.
Desire + Non-resistance = Desired result
Why do we want anything in life? Because of how we believe it will make us feel.
If we know that what we desire is already done, then we can feel the way we want to feel now and act accordingly — and the outcome is no longer important. In other words, being indifferent towards the outcome creates the non-resistance. Easier said than done. I know.
We Are Always Manifesting Whether We Like It or NotMost people aren’t aware of this.
These days there is so much talk about manifesting our desires. But the truth is, we are always manifesting. It’s impossible not to. Unfortunately, it just isn’t always what we want. More often than not, it’s exactly what we don’t want.
Where we place our attention, we place our energy. So when we keep talking about how sick we are, how broke we are, how the last partner cheated, or anything else we don’t want, we are drawing more of it to us. That’s how the law of attraction works.
It’s why pregnant women all of a sudden see other pregnant women everywhere. Or why, when I got my Rhodesian Ridgeback, I all of a sudden saw Ridgebacks everywhere. Or why, in a big city, my client bumped into his ex-girlfriend right after he’d spent the entire session with his psychologist talking about her. What we focus on is drawn to us.
I know life can be tough. I’ve been through the ringer more than a few times. And when it is, it’s hard not to wallow in self-pity at times. In doing so, however, we hold resistance to what we desire and create more of the same instead. Because today’s reality is a result of yesterday’s thoughts and actions. So if we want a different tomorrow, our thoughts and actions must be different today.
Again, easier said than done when our experience has led us to think and feel a certain way. However, it’s not the events that matter, it’s the meaning we give to them. That’s why two people can experience the same event, but have two completely different responses to it. The way we respond is a reflection of what we believe about ourselves.
The bad stuff is often easier to believe because it’s what we think of ourselves.
The Law of NatureAs adults, 95% of who we are is a set of memorised behaviours, emotional reactions, beliefs, perceptions, and attitudes that function like a subconscious computer program below our conscious awareness.
This is why self-awareness is essential to becoming non-resistant to what we desire.
Similarly, the law of nature, or the law of gestation, tells us that 95% of our manifestations occur outside our conscious awareness. In other words, until it is manifested, we will not be able to observe any evidence thereof with our senses.
As such, the common saying “I’ll believe it when I see it” is practicing resistance to the very outcome we desire.
The creation of anything takes time — a gestation period. When we plant a rose seed, there is no visible evidence of a rose. After about six weeks, it will sprout, but still there will be no rose. Only after 1–2 years will a bud form and ultimately a rose bloom, yet all the while we never doubt that a rose is on its way. We don’t worry about it because we know that, as long as we keep watering it, a rose will appear.
This certainty is non-resistance. The fact that we see no buds or roses for the first 95% of the manifestation period does not matter. Because we know it’s on its way. And we feel and act accordingly.
Of course this is easy to do when the outcome doesn’t matter much, like a rose blooming or not. The more important the desired outcome is to us, the harder it is to practice indifference towards the result.
Like almost everything in life, I have found that the skill of being the desired version of ourselves takes practice. Lots of it.
Practicing and observing smaller, less important manifestations can help increase our self-awareness and focus.
For example, I live on the 6th floor and there is only one lift. I go in and out a lot because of my dog. I’m also a lover of efficiency. So, the other day I thought “I would love if the lift was always waiting for me on the 6th floor each time I need it.” Then, I forgot about the idea.
Lo and behold, the next day the lift was waiting for me every time I needed it. And since then, it’s been there far more often than not.
I manifested this almost instantly because I held no resistance to it. More importantly, I noticed it.
Signs of LandHowever long a manifestation takes, we know it is in the final stages when we can observe metaphorical signs of land.
Before Christopher Columbus reached the Americas, he was out at sea with no sight of land for weeks. He didn’t know how long this would last, and the easiest option would have been to turn back. But he chose to have faith instead. And eventually signs of land appeared — flocks of birds, driftwood, trees in the distance — the final 5% of his manifestation.
In the case of the roses, the signs of land are the buds.
As humans we experience the world through our senses, but this is what limits so many of us. 95% of everything we desire is created beyond our senses — the universe is endless and limitless — and this is where faith comes in.
Keep the FaithFaith isn’t believing you can achieve something you’ve done ten times before. It’s believing you can achieve something you’ve never done before.
Faith enables the allowing. Allowing means knowing that it is done. Knowing that it is done creates a state of non-resistance.
And faith is a choice. We either choose it or we don’t. There’s no “sometimes” in this equation.
We’re either sure we can achieve what we desire or we’re sure we can’t.
Just because we can’t see, hear, taste, touch or smell something doesn’t mean it’s not there. Our senses are so very limited.
Just compare our sense of smell to a dog’s. Dogs possess up to 300 million olfactory receptors in their noses, compared to about six million in us. And the part of a dog’s brain that is devoted to analysing smells is about 40 times greater than ours. So, just because we can’t smell something, doesn’t mean it’s not there.
But the more we doubt, the more resistance we hold, and the more we delay our desired outcomes.
Whatever we decide to believe, our mind will look for evidence of.
Desire + Non-resistance = Desired result
Crying helps to release resistance.
Wherever you are on your journey, always remember that YOU ARE ENOUGH.
