Law of Attraction Series: Introduction and Invitation

Law of Attraction Series

An Introduction and Invitation

Unless you've been living under the proverbial rock or in some biosphere deep beneath the Arctic Circle, you've undoubtedly heard and read a lot about the Law of Attraction. Since the release of the popular movie, DVD and book The Secret, there seems to be a genuine avalanche of information out there and in extremely diverse arenas. Quantum Physics and science has rejoined forces with religious faith. Psychology has merged with biochemistry and metaphysics has gone and started shacking up with naturalism. And, it doesn't stop there. Virtually every Best-Seller list on the planet has at least two or three titles pertaining to the subject, and a Google search will yield literally millions of hits for websites, articles, blogs and programs all dedicated to helping people better understand and appropriate the universal Law of Attraction. And then there's Oprah!

There's as much good information out there as there is bad. There are as many Shamans as there are charlatans; as many mentors as mental patients. And now, of course, there's me! Yes, I am intentionally adding my voice to the multitude. Why? Because I am a passionate philosopher and communicator who, over the past several years of study, research and experience with the Law of Attraction, have enjoyed a deep and profound transformation in my day to day living. And, naturally, I believe my approach and voice on the subject to be completely unique and needed at this time of information overload. Of course, you'd expect me to say that, which is why I did. Talk about the Law of Attraction.

I developed this series because I have long been concerned about our tendency to separate truth from meaning. I understand it, but it concerns me none-the-less. Let me explain. We receive a huge amount of information each and every day from a wide array of sources ranging from the people with whom we come in contact, to print and visual media, to the sheer observation of life all around us. But we don't always know what to do with all of this information. The pace of our lives sometimes precludes our ability to stop and ask ourselves the big "so what?" questions and allow this information to connect with meaning for us. This separation of truth and meaning has led to a tendency to compartmentalize our lives, dehumanize news, and has kept us, by and large, in a perpetual state of a detached observer of, and reactor to life instead of purposefully living. Although detachment can be seen as a positive attribute in some situations, when it becomes a detachment from our own core values, hopes and dreams, it also becomes an abdication of a meaningful life. The difference between truth and meaning is easier to describe than define. It's the difference between knowing and being able to recite all of the relevant statistics on cancer and cancer research, and actually attending the funeral of someone you loved. In many ways, it is our humanity itself that is sometimes at stake.

As we begin our journey into living well with the Law of Attraction it is important that we understand the nature and realm of this universal law. We call it a "law", not because it was voted on and enacted in any way, but because it describes an absolute "given" principle that governs our experience. In fact, the Law of Attraction is no different than the Law of Gravity, or any of the other universal laws, in kind or type, although it can feel that way simply because of the relative newness of our awareness and because of the field on which it plays out.

The Law of Gravity was a universally known fact of life long before the work of Sir Isaac Newton. Through experience, people already knew that they would not fall up, and that objects would not start floating off the planet indiscriminately. Each of us, long before we ever studied Newton or Gravity in school, understood the concept enough make a mess of our feeding times as infants, learn to walk as toddlers and initiate our first cafeteria food fight. What Newton gave us was not Gravity itself, but a way to better understand Gravity so that we could work with it and use its properties to enhance our lives and better get along in this world. Airplanes, lunar missions, Mars rovers, space shuttles and even the great feats of major league sports all trace their success to the better understanding of the Law of Gravity. Likewise, the Law of Attraction is not something new. It has been in effect from the very beginning. It is a universal and dependable fact of our existence. Not understanding it, won't make it not exist or stop functioning. The only thing affected by a lack of understanding on our part is our ability to fly.

There was a time when the ability to make fire was thought of only in terms of magic and miracle. There was a time when the blending of herbs, spices and minerals and their extracts for healing, were thought to be a mysterious, even religious function of witchcraft or sorcery. The list could go on and on. My point is that it was our deepening understanding of universal laws and their cause and effect relationships that moved so many things from the realm of magic, imagination and science fiction into the category of technology, science and ‘quality of life', readily available online, on our cell phones or downloadable to our iPods. The same is true with the Law of Attraction. We've all known people who seemed to have led a ‘charmed' life. Everything they touched seemed always to turn to gold. Everything they attempted seemed to succeed. They always landed on their feet and they always had the lucky number. We've also known people like Winnie-the-Poo's friend Eeyore. For them, nothing ever seemed to go right. They were always saying things like "It'll never work. We're doomed. We're all going to die." And, they always turned out to be right. They were like Pigpen from Peanuts with a constant cloud of misfortune hanging over their heads. With an ever deepening understanding of the Law of Attraction, these phenomena move from the category of chance, and, luck of the draw, to the arena of natural cause and effect, and, improve our capacity to ‘cause and effect' life experiences that are better aligned to our core values, desires and definitions of happiness and meaning.

Because the realm and nature of the Law of Attraction is that of thoughts, core values, feelings, beliefs and desires, you will not, in this series, find a once and for all roadmap or formula for success that will always work, for all people and in all circumstances. We are all amazingly unique. Our experiences, our interpretation of those experiences, our values, our hopes, our fears, our understanding of the world, our sense of purpose, our passions, our way of thinking, our way of reasoning, our sense of justice, the way we communicate to others as well as how we communicate within ourselves and so much more, are all incredibly individual to us. This is a good thing. (I mean that in the Martha Stewart way, not the Don Rickles way.) But because of this, each journey will be completely different from the next, and even the terrain upon which the journey is made will be unique. So, a roadmap will, ultimately, never be sufficient. Instead, I want us to use the metaphor of a compass. Regardless of where you are in relation to where you want to be, if you have a compass, you can always find true north and navigate accordingly. There may be many occasions that require course adjustments along the way. You may wake up and find yourself in completely uncharted territory from time to time, but with a compass, you can always set a course that will keep you going in the right direction.

The articles and written information in this series will certainly not be exhaustive. Although I will try to be comprehensive and inclusive, the information itself will only be one part of this series. Before moving on to each new section there will always be a guided experiential learning exercise to help connect this information meaningfully to your past history, your present realities and to your future hopes and dreams. It is in this second part that you will determine for yourself whether you learn to walk or fly, to make tea or cure disease, to continue to react to the ideas and dreams of others or to allow your ideas and dreams to create your future.

I am very glad you've chosen to begin this journey and am honored that you're allowing me to be a part of it. You may not have yet noticed (after all, it's only been five to ten minutes), but change has already begun. Already your mind (or whatever it is that is you beyond your anatomy) has begun to ask, and live with, an entirely new set of questions and thoughts and, before the day is over, this alone will bring to you something new in experience and/or feeling. (We'll talk a lot more about all of that later)

Before moving on to the next section, I'd like you spend some time thinking about, and writing down some answers to, the following question. It's a classic question with a slightly annoying, yet important twist.

If you had unlimited resources and unlimited support from the people you care about, what would you do? Who would you be? What would you have? What might your day have been like?

Take your time with this. There is no right or wrong, good or bad answers. There's no danger of locking yourself into something you may wish to change later because you are only answering this "here and now" for "here and now."

After you have some answers and thoughts written down for the different parts of the question, go back and ask yourself "why?"

After answering why, ask ‘why' again. And again. Become the annoying toddler with a, seemingly endless stream of ‘why' for just a few minutes longer than you wish.

Now try to capture this information in a sentence or paragraph "If I had unlimited resources and unlimited support from the people I care about, I would ________ (write as much of it down as you can) because ________ (again, write as much of it down as you can)." Now put it away somewhere safe or save it to a new folder.

Now you're ready to move on to the next section: The Law of Attraction You Already Know