The Law of Attraction Doesn’t Work, or Does It?

There are times when I have been skeptical about the Law of Attraction and whether it really works. First, I learned that the Law did not work on my timetable but that did not mean it didn’t work. I had to recognize that my focus on myself was getting in my way. Selfishly, I want what I want when I want it. The simple truth I have learned is that my selfishness (my ego) is the source of all my pain, frustration, anger, disappointment, and sorrow.
I had to adapt myself to the Law of Attraction; it was not going to adapt itself to me any more than was the Law of Gravity. The Law of Attraction works on its timetable not on mine. Miraculously there are times when I have been completely at one with what I wanted and it came to me immediately. Recently, for example, when I needed to understand more about the role of self and selfishness in my life the teacher came to me instantly and I ordered his book: James Allen’s Mind is the Master.
I learned that the Law did not work when I was vague or too general about what I wanted. If I decided that I wanted more prosperity in my life I had to be clear about the specifics: how did I want to be more prosperous and what did the image look like of it happening in my life?
I began by imaging more money coming to me. The first day I held that image I received a healthy check in the mail as a gift from my father. I held onto the image but more checks didn’t come. I grew skeptical. Eventually I became aware that my image of more wealth coming to me brought up a fear in me that it wouldn’t happen. I realized the Law is not partial; it brings to us whatever we dwell on. I was focusing as much on my fear of not receiving money as I was imaging myself receiving money.
Christ taught that a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways (James1:6). Painful as it was to admit it, I was a double-minded man causing the Law not to work. It was much easier to blame the Law for not working than to blame myself. Blaming the Law, however, got me nowhere. I knew I had to change myself in order to work with the Law. Once again my ego was getting in the way, wanting the Law to adapt to me instead of my adapting to the Law. Oh, what a problem is hubris! Next thing you know I’ll be telling God how to do his job!
I previously had not appreciated the importance of belief. I started out thinking the Law of Attraction would work if I just held in my mind the image of what I wanted coming to me. But thought without feeling is just an image, just thinking. To make something happen in life I knew it required feeling. Feeling is what makes us take action. Feeling expresses our passion, what we truly care about, what and who we love.
I realized that the most convincing example of the Law of Attraction in my life came from my falling in love. Love, and especially romantic love, is a high intensity vibration. Both my wife and I felt it. We acted like young people who couldn’t see enough of one another or be together enough. With our mutual high vibrations we resonated together as we fell in love. Romantic love is many peoples most memorable experience with the Law. Bonding between a mother and her newborn child is another powerful experience with the Law of Attraction. Mothers remember it well, but most of us as newborns do not.
If the Law of Attraction does exist, you might ask how strong or powerful is it?
Here’s what I’ve observed. The Law is so strong it forged a bond between my wife and me that made each of us the most important person in the others life. We fall in love and care so deeply about this person, who was once a stranger, that we make them more important than our parents and our siblings–the people who raised us and with whom we spent years growing up. We put this new person with whom we fall in love first in our valuing of people. If that isn’t powerful I don’t know what is. This power of the Law of Attraction and its consequences in my life made me a believer in the Law.
Just as I did not comprehend the power of the Law of Attraction I did not fully appreciate the power of faith either. Fear and doubt are two of our chief antagonists to living a calm and peaceful life. When we love someone fear and doubt can create problems for us. We may fear they don’t love us as much as we want, or as much as we love them. We may doubt whether anyone can love us enough. It is faith that can overcome fear and doubt. We need faith in those who love us. We need faith in the Law of Attraction. We need faith in ourselves most of all.
Faith gives us the power to hold fast to our beliefs until we get confirmation of them. When our beliefs are confirmed we have knowledge. Knowledge helps us triumph over ignorance. Ignorance is the most fundamental problem of mankind together with fear and doubt. Once we have the knowledge to know the Law of Attraction is truth we are free of fear and doubt, unless we are attracting them to us. And we have overcome our ignorance, unless we choose to relapse into it.
I had respected the Law of Cause and Effect because I accepted the truth stated by Paul in Galatians 6:7 when he wrote: “We reap what we sow.”
I now recognized the truth of the Law of Attraction which was properly stated in Proverbs 23:7: “As a man thinketh in his heart so is he.” In other words, a man is the sum total of his beliefs which manifest themselves through the life he lives. What a man thinks in his heart represents his beliefs. It has been observed that the longest distance in the world emotionally speaking is from a man’s head to his heart, from his thoughts to his beliefs. His thoughts are just his ideas, but his beliefs represent his truths whether they are factually true or not. These beliefs are his mindsets, like his idea of how to express his love or how to be a good spouse or parent.
From knowledge I now understand that the Law works from our beliefs, from the truths we embrace in our hearts, from the ideas and the mindsets we hold dear. The Law will act on these beliefs to bring them into our lives, to clothe them in physical form as rapidly as possible. Andrew Carnegie shared this profound truth with Napoleon Hill, who used it as the cornerstone in his classic book Think and Grow Rich.
It does not matter whether these beliefs are actually true, or whether they have positive or negative consequences on your life. The Law attracts to us what we embrace and believe regardless. Mark (11:24) stated the Law when he wrote: “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.” Matthew (7:7) stated the Law this way: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. In the Old Testament Psalm 37:4 said: “Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart.” Jeremiah 29:13 said: “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” Even a cynic’s version of the Law says: “Be careful what you say you want because you might just get it.”
Equipped with my knowledge of how the Law works and my growing awareness of how the self (ego) and the Truth are in conflict, I am embracing the beliefs that combat my natural man and my selfishness which will goad me to pursue power, money, and acclaim. Instead, my goal is to empty myself, to die to my self, in the process of fulfilling my greater good through serving others. In holding this belief in my heart, and pursuing it through the daily quieting of my selfish voice, I have found the prosperity I initially sought.
Prosperity is coming to me not through money but through people who seek my counsel. In the process of helping these people grow, giving them back to themselves, encouraging them to act so as to increase their self-respect not diminish it, I have found the greatest fulfillment and prosperity I could want. Prosperity is not about money or fame or power but about being the best person I can be. True wealth, health, and happiness come through dying to self and living through love. I lose my self through serving others.
In my vision I see myself coming home to God and living in Heaven where I am one with all creatures no matter how small, where all men are my brothers and all women my sisters, where I recognize the Christ in everyone I meet, and where I live through love and experience the peace that is beyond understanding.

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CD3: To Stay or Not to Stay: Considerations before Divorcing
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Doug Welpton, MD - Advice in Love Relationships

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