I just got an electronic invitation for a program about "manifesting" things into ones life. It features a young woman who feels she has apparently solved the problem of how to create health, wellness and success in our lives without actually having to do anything. In a video, she appears with a guitar in her lap and asks the viewer to imagine that our lives are like the "C" string on the guitar (there actually isn't a C string on a guitar...) and that when we strike it, it vibrates. Yeah...so? So, she claims, we need to see everything in life as having a vibration, and every thought and action is either in tune with that vibration, or no, and that to have succcess, we need to vibrate correctly...or something like that.
The silliness of such claims should be obvious to anyone, and even a non-skeptic would have to come to the conclusion that life isn't a vibrating string, and that the things we want to achieve require something more from us than trying to...vibrate. Whatever it is that we want requires us to expend real energy to get it. That's why we eat things, to fuel our bodies so it has the energy to burn so we can do more things, and then eat again.
We experience energy in many ways, though for most of us it is a physical sensation, we feel good, we have a sense of joy, optimism, and we feel awake. There are people and circumstances where we find a spike in our energy, we have a noticeable, physical response to being in their presence. Sometimes, like the protests in Egypt, of even in Madison, we have a heightened sense of energy being around others that share a common goal or want. When we are fully engaged with another, or with others, this energy comes about naturally and without work, and there is no mystery to it, it's simply shared excitement.
But to create the things we want in life, whether that's a new car, a new job, or a new business, we have to burn energy, and sometimes that energy is being spent doing things we may not enjoy, things that don't inspire us, stuff that isn't "playful" in the real sense of play. Artists and writers know all too well that creating works of art is hard, often damned hard work. No amount of manifesting, or "C" string vibrations are going to make the sculpture, or that novel happen, it has to be written one damned word after another.
It's important, particularly with our economy where it is, as well as the state of the world in general, that we remember how creating things, like a new business, or a change in our business or personal environment, requires us to work at it, bust ass, sacrifice, stay focused and keep going even when we want to quit. Our thoughts don't create things directly, only our actions do, and ideas are a dime for 5 dozen. Without structure and effort, most ideas are petty and as worthless as a newly minted penny, or string on a guitar. If we want to manifest things into our lives and discover success for ourselves, we have to get over the idea that thinking makes things. After all, a half assed idea combined with action, is worth more than a thought of genius with no folllow through.
What is useful is to work with or hang out with people that energize us, that believe in us, that want us to succeed. When we write something that moves another, when we create something that someone wants to buy, when we have an idea that finds an audience, we are excited and hopeful about tomorrow, and from this excitement we can draw on our energy to keep moving.
If you want to create something, start hanging with good people who say smart things and love what you're up to, start believing it when someone tells you that you're talented, or that you have great ideas. Once you have some fuel in the fire, make sure you also have people that can help structure your life so that you can convert your ideas and projects into something that others will want. All of this, in turn, will make you feel energized..naturally..without any manifestation mumbo-jumbo.
The universe doesn't care what you want, but your friends and those that you find that believe in you do, and they can help keep you to remain energized as you do the day-to-day hard work of building the next big thing, minus the woogie woogie, of course.
