The Fifth Snarkiest Misconception about the Law of Attraction - Christine Kane

This is Part 5 in this series on the snarkiest (and most common) ways we misinterpret the Law of Attraction.

Click here for #1.

Click here for #2.

Click here for #3.

Click here for #4.

#5 – “I’ve been doing this for two weeks now and nothing’s happened…”

Maharishi Mahesh, the yogi who founded Transcendental Meditation, likened meditation practice to the process of dying cloth in the villages in India. The white cloth gets dipped into barrels of dye. Then it is hung to dry. Then it gets dipped in the barrels again. It keeps going through this process until it becomes the intended deep color.

He said that meditation is the same process. You have to keep “dipping” in to the meditation, and bringing a little bit more of that experience into the world with you. You go back into meditation, and bring more of that peace and knowingness out into your world. Each experience of meditation takes you deeper – until you are able to live more from the meditation place than the frantic place of the material world.

It is the same with the ideas in the Law of Attraction, as well as any other consciousness work.

Many people see a program like The Secret, or they read a book about the Law of Attraction, and they decide to change their thoughts. When they don’t see an immediate difference, they doubt it “works.” Or they just let their excitement drift away.

I have been one of those people. (Some days, I still am.)

This is all okay. This stuff takes time. It’s a process. It’s not about the endings anyway. It’s what you learn and who you become along the way.

And besides, it has taken you a long time to create these old thought patterns and beliefs – so it might take some time to change their direction and creative power.

Let’s do some math:

Scientists estimate that the human brain thinks about 70,000 thoughts a day.

If you multiply that by 365 days in a year, that’s 25,550,000 thoughts. (I did that in my head.)

That, by the way, is twenty-five million, five hundred and fifty thousand thoughts.

Now, I want you to take your age and multiply it by twenty-five million, five hundred and fifty thousand.

The resulting number is the approximate number of thoughts you’ve had in your mind so far in your life.

For example, if you’re 35, then you’ve had 894,250,000 thoughts. That’s over 894 MILLION thoughts. Most of them unconscious.

So, now, let’s say you decide in your 35th year, that you’re going to add, “I am peaceful and prosperous in every moment” to the mix.

This can be likened (to use the words of a colorful ex-military man to whom I once had the pleasure of living next door) to “farting at a hurricane.”

In other words, it might take longer than two weeks.

But again, it’s okay! It gets even more okay the more you work with it. The goal becomes more about not letting all those old tapes run the show, and about experiencing the actual feeling of knowing it is so. When you get that level of peace, the outcome doesn’t matter, detachment happens, and manifestation does too.

In the meantime, if you’ve spent your whole life going down a well-worn negative path, getting nervous about the same things, feeling mistrustful of the same situations, doubting your ability to make money, criticizing your creativity, being angry at the world at large, or feeling unworthy – then most likely, it’s going to take more than two weeks, or even one year to create major changes.

You will create some changes though. You will see some openings and opportunities come your way. And it’ll be up to you to recognize them for the manifestations they are, rather than dismissing them as a fluke. This all requires awareness and consciousness and commitment. And the more you focus on the good stuff – even the tiniest openings – the more you’ll keep creating and noticing more good stuff.

Most of the people who vehemently insist that the Law of Attraction is a load of hooey have never even tried it at all, much less put it into any form of practice.

Most of the people who are into the Law of Attraction have experienced the changes that come from taking it seriously – even if they only quit complaining or simply begin a gratitude journal. Most of them will say that it took some time to begin seeing the shifts.

Give it time. Keep holding the images in your mind. Keep watching your thoughts and your language. If nothing else, you will be a happier person with happier thoughts. The other option is to give up and never know for sure if it’s possible to consciously create your life!

14 COMMENTS ADD A COMMENT
  • Sunny

    Hi Christine. Great series!
    I wanted to mention that the Law of Attraction worked pretty powerfully for me when I ended up with Liz Strauss as a consultant. She told me about you and I’ve been enjoying your insights, music and sense of humor. I live in Sedona, Arizona for most of the year but in the summer come to Brevard, NC, right near you. I really love both of these places for the beauty and soul space they provide.

  • Paula G

    Love the math! And the “farting in the wind”. I never fail to get a full belly chuckle with your humor and real-ness.

    It is like trying to turn around a big boat…you can’t turn on a dime like you do in a whitewater kayak, you need to point it in a new direction (the idea that “I am now going to start implementing this new way of thinking and being”) and then slowly over time it’ll start to turn. The meditation is the best analogy. It is a process, it’ll go up and down and it is all about accepting and returning your focus to your breath.

  • fivecats

    and now for something completely different…

    i just read this and thought of you. what’s your take on it?

    http://www.boingboing.net/2008/03/04/howto-earn-an-artist.html

  • Joseph Bernard

    I am grateful for you insights about patience with the law of attraction. I keep getting guidance from some place greater then me, that my inner work will pay off soon. I have come to understand that soon, for beings that live for eternity, is longer than what us who feel time limited would think. Soon, the plants will come to the surface, soon they will bath in the sun, soon they will take shape and flower, soon they will fill my nose with a banquet of joyous noise, soon they will be ready to harvest, and soon they my swim in olive oil as a make a tasty treat for my love.

    Joseph
    http://www.ExploreLifeBlog.com
    http://www.Peace-Together.com

  • Michael Donlan

    You speak words of truth! I just got done writing about, how we need to relearn a few lessons in patience on my blog where I am writing about Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich.

  • Danny

    Christine, you wrote: “It’s a process. It’s not about the endings anyway. It’s what you learn and who you become along the way.”

    BINGO! Perhaps it is significant that I was listening to one of the Abraham workshops while driving home from work, yesterday. The particular passage in question talks bout how it is a process and WE NEVER GET IT DONE (sorry to yell, but it is an AHA! kind of revelation). It is important to enjoy the journey, because joy and the journey are what life is about.

    If I were to discover tomorrow that Law of Attraction is hooey, I would not change the way I live, because I know that it brings me joy to live and feel and approach life with expectant wonder and joy.

  • m

    yes all change takes TIME and we are impatient people. Thats why I like facilitating Artist Way groups I feel that 12 weeks there is a change of making change happen

  • Christine Kane

    Thanks everyone!

    Christi – I like that Deepak story. That’s a good reminder. As for the money thing – I recommend making wealth an intent. And really start to clean up the thoughts that come up to teach you about what blocks wealth! It can be an amazing journey!

  • Mark

    Hey Christine – Thanks for the reminder about the cloth and dye / meditation. It’s a lovely metaphor.

    Sometimes when I work a gig – a party – I escape the chaos, blaring DJ, etc., and step outside into the night for a break. I soak in the peaceful quiet, the sound of crickets, the silence… Then I do this weird thing – I ‘remember’ it. I keep it stored inside myself. I remember that the silence is what lies underneath the noisy surface at all times. Then I walk back into the party (the chaos) and bring that peace with me, and no matter what happens – if someone spills a drink near me, or a balloon pops, or whatever, I access that inner silence and I feel calm.

    Pretty cool.

  • joy gardner

    Steeping…yes, like a fine tea. I’ve found that I desire more than a weekend in silent retreat each year…I don’t “need” more, I want more. I want to linger in the great silence that gets down to the cellular level…this is not escapism as some might think…it’s transforming the interior world, where true vision becomes quite clear. The peace that results is attractive to others, I’ve seen it happen so often. They too need a balm for their chaos, but they’ll never find it “in” me per se, for the journey is their own…meditation is a life practice, ultimately selfless, not selfish. We’ll never get it wrapped up in thoughts of “me” and “mine” and “now”. What a wonderful process!

  • Christi

    Personally, I’ve had things take years. Often what happens is I forget about them, and then later, when the intended situation is in my life, I remember, ‘oh, yeah, I wrote down that thing a while back…’ Deepak Chopra said something about it being like a garden, that after planting the seed you don’t hover over it, you just kind of let it go and then later come back to see results.

    I’ve gotten really good at bringing healthy friendships into my life, and healing relationship issues, but I’m still wrapped up in knots over the whole money thing. I don’t know what to do about that…but as you’ve said, it’s all a process. Some of it is emotional ambivalence about money (I still somehow think of it as ‘bad’ and I’m not sure why) and some of it is uncertainty about what I want to do with my life (at 36 🙂 ).

  • Irene

    Thank you so much for all your wise words and knowledge….

  • Olivier – Law of attraction guy

    The math is indeed impressive. I guess that indeed all these contradicting thoughts ofter nullify the intended result.

  • Heather

    Ahh, the yellow cloth analogy, one of my favorites! (I don’t know why, whenever I heard it the color they were going for was always yellow). Also in the version I heard there was something about how the cloth fades a bit in the sun each time, but yes the process of dipping and drying the cloth over time is what creates the strong color. Can’t remember why the fading bit seemed important… hrm.

    And thanks for the other colorful yet effective metaphor. 😀