0:07

Hello and welcome to Being Well. I'm Forrest

0:09

Hanson. If you're new to the podcast,

0:11

thanks for listening today. And if you've listened before, welcome

0:14

back. If you're listening to

0:16

a podcast like ours, or if

0:18

you're interested in personal growth, psychology,

0:20

and self-help broadly, you've probably bumped

0:22

into the idea of manifesting, and

0:25

maybe even the law of attraction, which

0:27

was popularized by the book The Secret.

0:30

The basic idea behind manifesting is that

0:32

our thoughts impact the world around us,

0:34

and we attract to us things that

0:37

have a similar energy to the thoughts that we

0:39

think. So if we think positive thoughts, we

0:41

get positive things. And if we think negative thoughts, well,

0:44

not so much. This means that

0:46

just by changing how we think, we can change

0:48

our lives. And we've explored many

0:50

ideas that are similar to that here

0:53

on this podcast. For example, cognitive restructuring

0:55

is a process in cognitive behavioral therapy

0:57

where people work to challenge and

1:00

deconstruct unhelpful thoughts and replace them

1:02

with more useful ones. CBT is

1:04

pretty much the most research validated

1:06

approach to therapy out there. So

1:08

there has to be something useful

1:11

there. Talking about

1:13

manifesting is complicated because our thoughts

1:15

really do matter. And there's a

1:18

psychology behind the ideas that are

1:20

embedded in manifesting that is based

1:22

on some very useful and very,

1:25

very real stuff. And

1:27

it makes sense to explore that stuff on a

1:29

podcast like ours. But the problem, at least for

1:31

me, is that manifesting is

1:33

also closely tied to a bunch of ideas

1:36

that are the trifecta of

1:38

extremely popular, largely

1:40

disconnected from reality, and

1:42

at least in my opinion, kind of actively

1:44

harmful to people. So we're

1:47

going to be waiting through manifesting today.

1:49

And to help me do that, I

1:51

am joined by clinical psychologist, Dr. Rick

1:53

Hansen. So, Dad, how are you doing

1:55

today? I'm good. And I'm suddenly thinking

1:57

that podcast hosts Russia. in

2:00

where angels fear to tread. What's

2:05

the line? Abandon

2:07

hope, ye who enter here. That's

2:10

the catacombs of the holocaust. I'm feeling it before this

2:12

one. Something like

2:14

that. Okay,

2:16

we're going to be careful. Yeah,

2:18

yeah, for sure. And for those of you

2:20

watching on YouTube, Rick and I may have manifested

2:23

wearing essentially the same shirt today. So, you

2:25

know, deal with that what you will. But

2:28

okay, Dad, I want to start with you actually. It's a

2:30

quantum level for us. Yes,

2:32

we're connected at the quad, we're quantum

2:34

entanglement right here, Dad. That's superposition right

2:36

there. It's happening. Oh

2:38

my God, wow, wow, life imitating art.

2:41

Okay, I want to start with you, Dad,

2:44

because it would be really easy for me

2:46

to just like fly off the handle here

2:48

at the start. As I have done in

2:50

some of our pre-production meetings about this topic,

2:55

if you want to call them that, which is essentially

2:57

the two of us just sitting down and like bullshitting

2:59

about stuff, but in a great way, in a great

3:01

way. So I actually want to

3:03

start with you. Yep. As somebody for

3:05

starters who has been in the field for

3:07

a long time, we've talked about this, you

3:10

were there, Dad, in the primordial ooze of

3:12

the 60s and 70s when some of these

3:14

ideas were starting to kind of take

3:16

their first little steps onto land. When

3:19

you hear the word manifesting, what

3:22

does that mean to you, particularly

3:24

in your more kind of

3:26

practical, psychological approach to things?

3:29

Let's start with the way you put it, that

3:31

our thoughts make a difference. And

3:34

to understand manifesting, the

3:36

key question is how do they make

3:38

a difference? And

3:40

there are, in my

3:42

mind, four useful potential

3:45

mechanisms of action to

3:47

think about. And as long as

3:49

we're clear about the how that we're

3:51

talking about, then we're on at

3:54

least understandable ground. Okay? So

3:57

the first mechanism of action Is, I'll

3:59

just call it... Plain Vanilla A Big

4:01

bang reality. Would. You

4:03

cognitive restructuring. We wake

4:05

up in the morning and we think to ourselves,

4:08

you know it's been. Too long since

4:10

I went to the dentist for a

4:12

checkup. You know my mouth

4:14

will soar. I should make an appointment. And

4:17

we make an appointment. So our thoughts.

4:20

Affected. Reality in that

4:22

very straightforward, understandable common sense

4:24

way. That. Category is

4:26

crystal clear. There. Is no

4:28

dispute about that category. A. You.

4:31

Are. Very. Much centered

4:33

in that category. That's how I love

4:35

that category. alive for that category. And

4:37

and I think it's really important to

4:39

pick up a theme that will be

4:41

returning to again and again. It's really

4:43

good. Were however much you trust in

4:45

God, tie your camel. Can.

4:48

Don't forget this first category. And.

4:50

K. The second category.

4:53

Possibly. Would. Be mechanisms

4:55

of action that operate within

4:57

the natural Big Bang Universe

4:59

in ways that are not

5:01

yet understood by science. For.

5:04

Think about what's understood in

5:06

the domain of science to

5:08

gradually expanding circles. So we're

5:11

expanding what's known. It's. Not

5:13

yet established to science, but

5:15

it's still a natural phenomenon.

5:18

That's. The second category. Can

5:21

now. We're starting new

5:23

move out of the. Natural.

5:26

Phenomena into the third

5:29

purported category of causality

5:31

factors: mechanisms of action

5:33

that are supernatural. Clairvoyance.

5:36

In here. Tell it

5:39

can he says action at a distance.

5:42

Reincarnation. There.

5:44

Are people who believe that

5:47

there was some kind of

5:49

intercession on their part By

5:51

let's say, angels? Or.

5:54

spirit energies who are energies let's

5:56

say they went to a particular

5:58

sacred place the gonna touch with

6:00

the energies there and the experience to

6:02

kind of a healing. And they would

6:04

say that the mechanism of action is

6:07

a supernatural mechanism of action. Okay,

6:09

and I'm not arguing for the existence

6:11

of that, I'm just naming it. And

6:14

then the fourth potential mechanism of action

6:16

is a category

6:18

that for me is meaningfully distinct from

6:20

the supernatural and I'll call it the

6:22

transcendental, the divine. Some

6:26

process whereby through

6:29

opening to the divine, seeking

6:31

God's help, there's

6:33

a sense of divine intervention. Okay,

6:36

so these are the four categories and

6:38

I find it just helpful to be

6:40

clear about what we're naming. So

6:42

I just want to lay that map out and

6:44

if you I'm responding to your question, okay, how

6:46

do you think about it, pops? Well, I think

6:48

about it in terms of those four categories. In

6:50

terms of those four boxes, yeah. And so I

6:53

want to ask you about the

6:55

first of those boxes, because clearly,

6:58

we talk about on the show all

7:00

the time about how our beliefs about things matter. What

7:02

we believe about ourselves, what we believe about

7:04

the world around us, like that really affects

7:06

how we behave out in the world. And

7:09

manifesting to like really, really boil it down

7:11

is essentially what's bringing in our mind out

7:13

into reality, right? And those

7:16

beliefs, those thoughts play a really,

7:18

really big role in that process.

7:21

Now, obviously, believing that you can

7:23

accomplish something is going to

7:25

make it more likely that you do

7:27

accomplish it, but not believing that you

7:29

can accomplish something, right? And people coming

7:31

into a overall sense of their power

7:33

and capability as an individual is like

7:35

a very, very useful part of

7:38

that process. Now, I assume that

7:40

you put those kinds of psychological factors into

7:42

that first bucket, but I just wanted to

7:45

double check that with you. 100%.

7:48

And here's where, if

7:50

you'll indulge me, a very brief description

7:53

of the mind-body process.

7:56

So The body

7:58

is here. there is a body. The there

8:00

is a body with a nervous the

8:02

some a function of that nervous system

8:04

is a process Information. Information

8:07

is intangible. Bodies.

8:09

Are tangible. You. Cannot way

8:11

a signal. You. Cannot.

8:15

Hold a piece of data in

8:17

your hand like you could have

8:19

stone and yet information is. it

8:21

is a natural phenomena. So.

8:24

Our. Thoughts. As

8:27

experiences, the rise to

8:29

that level of consciousness

8:31

relies upon. At. Least

8:33

partially if not entirely, information

8:36

processing and the nervous system.

8:38

So we have a flow

8:40

of experiences that involves slow

8:42

says. Intangible information that

8:45

are represented by tangible

8:47

flows of neural activity.

8:50

Inside. Tangible structures in the

8:52

nervous system nested in the tangible

8:54

body altogether. So repeated

8:56

flows of mental activity and

8:58

involved repeated flows of neural

9:00

activity which leave lasting traced

9:02

his behind. And so when

9:04

we speak about him, the

9:06

first category. And even

9:09

potentially the second category, were

9:11

talking about flow of information.

9:13

Yes, his intangible and still

9:16

it exists. In. The Natural

9:18

universe. That's kind of

9:20

a framework here and some as

9:22

I think people get confused for

9:24

the is it because they think

9:26

oh my thoughts are somehow intangible.

9:28

Therefore, they must be supernatural in

9:30

some way in some way distinct

9:32

from the natural frames and actually

9:34

no information and information processing get

9:36

a natural phenomenon. So

9:38

dead to can sum up what was said so

9:41

far. In in my approach in

9:43

the kind of more material psychological frame which

9:45

is where I like to left personally for

9:47

a whole bunch of different reasons. They will

9:49

probably out about minute. I. Think

9:51

that manifesting gets down to. Serious.

9:54

And maybe like three or four tax. First.

9:57

self belief in south africa see which we

9:59

talk about on the podcast all the

10:01

time. If you don't believe that

10:03

you are capable of doing a thing, it

10:06

is going to be really, really hard for

10:08

you to accomplish that thing. So yes, a

10:10

form of manifesting is changing those beliefs, and

10:12

then we can bring those beliefs more into

10:15

reality. The second part of it I would

10:17

describe as like goal clarity. In order

10:19

to manifest something, like if you go

10:21

through even the more psycho-spiritual

10:24

versions of this, a big

10:27

part of them is visualizing the

10:30

thing that you want a lot

10:32

of the time. You need to

10:34

know what you want in order to

10:36

visualize what you want. One of the

10:38

things we also talk about on the

10:40

podcast regularly is how difficult it is

10:42

for many people to really identify what

10:44

they want from life. Having

10:46

that as a big part of this process, I think,

10:48

is immensely valuable for people. Then the

10:50

third piece of it that is

10:53

going to be a real topic for us here is

10:56

dedicated effort. You know

10:58

what you want, you believe that you can

11:00

do it, now what? And

11:02

the now what is discipline. It's applying

11:05

effort over time in order to get

11:07

the result that you really care

11:09

about. Cultivating the caring and

11:11

having the belief in yourself are like the

11:13

two required precursors to applying that effort in

11:16

a dedicated way over time. If you don't

11:18

have those, you're not going to apply the

11:20

effort. And then alongside those

11:22

three things, I would kind

11:24

of put another fourth bucket that has a lot of

11:26

little things in it that are all really important, but

11:29

they're a little fuzzier. I would describe

11:32

these as maybe more like mindset-based processes.

11:34

These are things like developing

11:36

psychological flexibility or rational

11:39

optimism, what Brad Stolberg, who I've talked to

11:41

on the podcast, refers to as tragic optimism,

11:44

like a search for meaning amid difficulty in

11:46

life and an acceptance of that. Alongside

11:49

that, maybe becoming more growth-oriented,

11:51

having a growth mindset. These

11:55

are all really important and

11:57

really valuable things. There's a

11:59

reason. that we spend a lot of time

12:01

talking about them on the podcast because they are so

12:04

essential for people. So in anything

12:06

that I say kind of from here on out, taking

12:09

some potshots of the more kind

12:11

of metaphysical versions of manifesting, I

12:13

don't want to lose the value

12:15

of those fundamental practices which I do

12:18

think are really tied to some of

12:20

the more psychologically inclined versions

12:22

of manifesting that you see out there. I'm

12:25

really glad we're talking about this

12:27

topic. We're going to spend

12:29

the bulk of our time focusing

12:32

on very practical how to's, but

12:34

the framing itself is really interesting

12:36

and it's relevant because I've seen

12:38

a lot of people for us

12:41

get into a lot of trouble

12:44

basically really investing

12:46

deeply in supernatural and even

12:48

transcendental mechanisms of action without

12:50

tying their camel, without really,

12:52

really taking care of the

12:54

first and even the second

12:56

categories here. And

12:59

I want to bring in, I think it's

13:01

relevant, the case of the Buddha. So

13:04

here's the Buddha, historic Buddha, 2500 years

13:06

ago, individual. He

13:09

did not claim any transcendental

13:12

or divine powers. He

13:16

lived at a time in which

13:18

he was taken for granted that

13:20

there were a transcendental and even

13:22

supernatural as well as supernatural mechanisms

13:24

of action. And

13:27

yet his focus was almost

13:29

entirely in the

13:31

first frame, in the first

13:33

category. We have the opening lines famously

13:35

of the Dhammapada, the mind is the

13:37

maker of all things. And

13:40

as basically the mind goes like

13:43

the oxen drawing the cart, so the cart

13:45

must follow. And he's

13:47

not talking there about the mind

13:49

somehow manifesting wealth out in

13:51

the world, he's talking about everything you've

13:53

talked about. While

13:56

also in his worldview, devas,

14:00

Discarnate entities, spirits,

14:04

cosmological realms, rebirth,

14:06

it was just taken for granted. There

14:08

was an appreciation of all that insofar

14:11

as it is of

14:13

use in that first

14:15

category, in down to earth,

14:17

every day, management of all the camels in

14:20

your own mind. And

14:22

I think, in a way, that's a good model for us. Like,

14:25

okay, if it's useful for you,

14:27

if those supernatural and even transcendental,

14:29

particularly with regard to timelessness

14:32

and unconditionality, if that's of use

14:35

to you, super-duper, but

14:37

don't forget, don't forget

14:39

what you do with each day and each breath. That's

14:43

great, Dad. And I do

14:45

want to take some time here to

14:47

contrast what we've been talking about so

14:49

far, the more psychologically inclined version of

14:51

this, with maybe the less

14:53

psychologically inclined version of this, the version that

14:56

exists in that second or third category, if

14:58

not the fourth category altogether. Because

15:01

I agree with almost everything that you're saying here, if

15:03

not everything, and the things that I have any disagreement

15:05

about, my disagreement is pretty mild, if it exists at

15:07

all. But I think

15:09

that you are describing a very

15:12

charitable interpretation of this in

15:15

my estimation, and so I think that it could be helpful.

15:17

That's why you agree with it. You would just, I agree

15:19

with it. You'd be very charitable, I

15:21

would say here. And so I

15:23

want to outline some of the aspects

15:26

of more kind of classic manifesting, to put it that way,

15:28

but I think people sometimes fall

15:30

into some holes here. And I want to describe

15:32

what the holes are, which can I, I think,

15:34

help us understand the thing as

15:36

a complete hole that we can then figure

15:38

out and hole with a W-H there. Yeah.

15:41

In other words, what bugs you so

15:43

much, how some people

15:45

say. Yes. Yes.

15:48

Okay. So I

15:51

think that uncertainty is where

15:53

charlatanism just picks

15:56

out. Charlatanism

15:58

loves some uncertainty. uncertainty because when

16:01

we say we're not sure yet,

16:04

wow, you can inject we're not sure

16:06

yet with all kinds

16:08

of stuff and that's historically where people have

16:10

been exploited by by people who

16:12

have ulterior motives. So let's go back to I

16:14

think it's 2006 this is

16:17

when the secret was published was published by a

16:19

TV writer named Rhonda Brian who I think was

16:21

Australian if I'm remembering correctly And

16:23

it expresses something called the law of attraction Which is

16:25

what a lot of this is based on now The

16:28

law of attraction is a very basic idea

16:30

that again has like aspects of it that

16:32

feel really true to us It's based on

16:34

three principles. The first one is that people

16:36

and their thoughts are made from pure energy

16:39

The second is like energy

16:41

attracts like energy and the

16:43

third one is thoughts become

16:45

things Now this

16:47

means that everything a person wants in life

16:49

can be attracted by believing in the outcome

16:52

the outcome the person wants Repeatedly thinking

16:54

about it and then maintaining

16:56

positive emotional states in order to attract it

16:59

Again, there are versions of this that

17:02

we can do psychologically that do have

17:04

some aspects of that The

17:06

problem for the law of attraction and

17:09

maybe the secret more broadly is

17:11

that how any of this works is? not

17:15

very well described ever there's generally a

17:17

lot of like hand waving in

17:19

the direction of quantum physics and this

17:22

is one of those situations where if

17:24

somebody just said I have

17:27

faith that this is the case I

17:30

would shrug say okay, man and Move

17:33

on with my life because that's a matter

17:35

of faith The whole idea of faith is that

17:37

it's it's not based on evidence

17:40

if you had evidence you wouldn't need to have

17:42

faith That's the whole idea here, right? And

17:44

I'm fine with that But I think where

17:46

we really get into problem is we get into

17:49

a lot of psychobabble and techno babble that

17:51

try to ascribe evidence to things that

17:53

really don't have a lot of it

17:55

and that's Historically where a lot of

17:58

problems have been created for people So

18:00

that to me is my like core gripe

18:03

with manifesting and the secret Where

18:06

there is kind of a lot of illusion

18:08

to physical mechanisms of action that as near

18:11

as we can tell it just do not

18:13

exist Maybe they're in that second category

18:15

where who knows a hundred years from now will

18:17

discover some mysterious way in

18:19

which our thoughts impact material

18:22

reality. I'm skeptical and You

18:25

know, I think that if that is happening that's

18:27

happening through those more psychological mechanisms But

18:29

I think to kind of sum it up. That's where I

18:31

think we really get into trouble here Reflecting

18:34

here. I Maybe

18:38

two points about what you're just saying

18:40

here. The first is Yes,

18:43

it is possible to Gussie

18:47

up Category

18:49

one or even category two

18:52

processes that are naturalistic to

18:56

gussy them up with metaphysical

18:58

supernatural explanations

19:01

that are popular

19:04

in some quarters and might sell

19:06

a lot of books and interest a lot of

19:08

people and For

19:11

me, there's something about that. That's I

19:13

won't say dishonest, but there's something about it that

19:15

distorts the truth. In other words takes

19:19

very very common sensical explanations

19:23

and Describes them in very supernatural

19:26

or exotic otherwise exotic ways I

19:29

am comfortable describing it as at least a little bit

19:31

dishonest, but I but I yes I do And

19:37

my squirm about that It

19:39

goes in two directions one for the record.

19:41

I really do think that in

19:43

my own Ontology structure there

19:46

really are third and fourth

19:48

category Factors and

19:50

I'm not gonna argue that point. I totally

19:52

understand that that's real for you and yeah

19:55

for me I'm yeah, very honest that you

19:57

feel that way. Yeah. Yeah, that's right and And

20:00

I'm A, I'm leery of,

20:03

I'll call it new agey type explanations

20:07

of what are actually

20:09

very common sense natural ways

20:11

of getting things done in your life. I

20:14

feel like that undervalues and

20:16

devalues that which is actually supernatural

20:19

or actually transcendental. It

20:21

cheapens that space on the one hand.

20:24

And on the other hand, it serves

20:26

the function often of diverting people

20:28

from taking care of

20:30

their camels in very down to earth

20:33

and common sense and immediately obvious ways

20:35

that are not glamorized to a lot

20:37

of quantum physics hand waving. Having

20:40

said all that and

20:43

established my leg in

20:46

category one and category two, okay good,

20:49

I want to also say on the other hand that

20:53

this process of creating

20:55

doubt is often

20:57

used in the natural frame as

20:59

well. Think about the doubts that

21:01

were cast on the health consequences

21:03

of cigarette smoking, for example, by

21:05

the tobacco industry or the

21:08

motivated doubts produced by the petrochemical

21:10

industry and their allies politically over

21:12

the last 30 years about the

21:15

ways in which greenhouse gases actually

21:17

do produce global warming inevitably. So

21:20

it's not just the airy, fairy, you

21:23

know, folks who are driving

21:26

a bus through that which

21:28

is not yet absolutely firmly known.

21:31

Part one. Part two, I think we

21:33

need to be careful about scientism, the

21:35

new secular religion of the age and

21:38

a fundamentally scientific attitude is

21:40

that the absence of evidence is

21:42

not itself evidence of absence. There

21:45

is much that's not yet known such

21:49

as in psychology. There's

21:51

a very strong critique that one of

21:53

the worst things that ever happened to

21:56

psychotherapy was the

21:58

injection of so-called evidence-based practices

22:00

into it that

22:02

have tended to have the effect of,

22:05

you know, turning psychotherapy as a kind

22:07

of a soulful, profound process for many

22:09

people into a fairly

22:12

narrow, prescriptive movement through a

22:14

series of manuals because those

22:17

can be structured and studied

22:19

easily, you know. Just because

22:21

something cannot be studied

22:23

easily doesn't mean that it's not important.

22:26

And it doesn't also mean that that which

22:28

can be studied should

22:30

be necessarily the basis

22:32

for how we help people who are suffering. So

22:34

I just want to kind of drop that in as

22:37

the other side of the story. Yeah, there are some

22:39

fair points, Dad. What I would say about a lot

22:41

of that is that another fundamental part

22:43

of the scientific method is that the

22:45

burden of proof is on the person

22:47

who has the hypothesis, bottom right. And

22:50

what I think you see in a lot of

22:53

the manifesting stuff is an inversion of that. There's

22:55

this, well, we don't know, so maybe it's true.

22:57

And then people take the, we don't know maybe

22:59

it's true and turn it into their whole modus

23:02

operandi for life, right? And

23:04

that's where I think like a lot of this stuff starts

23:07

to break down. I do want to spend

23:09

a very short period of time here talking

23:11

about some of the reasons

23:13

that having that more psycho-spiritual

23:16

approach and particularly the ways it's specifically

23:18

laid out in the Law of Attraction

23:20

and why I'm focusing on the Law

23:22

of Attraction is because it's incredibly popular.

23:25

And so that's why it's my current

23:27

pinata here. But you

23:29

can kind of break these issues into three different

23:31

categories. The first category is

23:34

that we're constructing an underlying model of

23:36

reality where the

23:38

world physically is fundamentally changed by our thoughts and

23:41

feelings. Now, this has a couple of big problems

23:43

with it. I'm going to set aside the first

23:45

big problem, which is that as near as we

23:47

can tell, it's just not true, like

23:50

on a physical kind of quantum basis, if

23:52

you will. The real

23:54

problems with it in my estimation is

23:56

that it reduces the

23:58

impact of luck. based factors in

24:01

people's lives and makes all of

24:03

their outcomes based on like whether

24:05

or not they manifested hard enough

24:07

essentially. So it's dressing up survivorship

24:09

bias in a really beautiful costume

24:11

and putting that person on stage

24:13

and saying, wow, they just manifested

24:15

harder than you did. This

24:17

stuff really starts to get messy when we

24:20

think about historical atrocities, or we think about

24:22

a lot of horrible stuff that's going on

24:24

in the world these days. Like did those

24:26

people call that into their lives? I don't

24:28

think a rational person would say that they

24:30

did. I think a rational person would say

24:33

that there are incredibly powerful and fairly dark

24:35

forces at work here in the physical minds

24:37

of men that are causing these things to

24:39

happen. So

24:41

that's a major issue with this whole thing.

24:44

Another issue with this whole thing for me is that the

24:48

people who tend to promote

24:50

manifestation-based thinking have been inordinately

24:52

lucky in their lives. They've

24:54

been enormously lucky. So of course they would

24:56

believe in the law of attraction, right? If

24:58

you've gotten to a point in your life

25:00

where you are standing up on that stage

25:02

and you are making the money involved in

25:04

doing that to talk to a room of

25:06

a thousand people about how if they just

25:08

like take your course or apply your manifesting

25:11

ideas, they too will be as successful as

25:13

you, well, yeah, you're probably going

25:15

to feel like that's true. Then

25:17

in terms of what we're talking

25:19

about today, my biggest problem

25:21

practically with manifesting is that it,

25:24

in my estimation, removes the part

25:26

of the process that's actually the

25:28

most important, which is consistent effort,

25:30

right? So let's think about

25:32

manifesting. You have a thought, you

25:35

visualize the thought, you believe the

25:37

thought, you have positive thoughts about the

25:39

thought. I believe I am worthy of

25:41

money. I believe I am worthy

25:43

of finding the love of my life. I

25:46

believe I am worthy of winning the lottery,

25:48

whatever it is for you. I'm doing some

25:50

money-based ones because money is conventionally one of

25:52

the things that people really focus on manifesting.

25:54

There are manifestation courses out there that are

25:57

quite expensive that are aimed at helping you

25:59

manifest more. money into your

26:01

life. The fundamental rule

26:03

of the law of attraction is that thoughts become

26:05

things. It's not when you

26:07

change your thoughts, hopefully it activates new behaviors, and

26:09

then if you pursue those behaviors consistently and with

26:11

effort, your life will get a little bit better,

26:15

right? The whole lever here that we're

26:17

focused on in the psychological frame is

26:20

changing your behavior in useful

26:22

ways. Just changing the

26:24

thought and focused on thinking the thought

26:26

over and over again and thinking that

26:29

that's going to get you somewhere could

26:31

actually impede somebody from changing their behavior

26:33

in the ways that really matter out

26:35

in the world. And that I think

26:38

is the single biggest

26:40

problem with the actual

26:42

structure of this more kind of

26:44

psycho-spiritual approach to manifesting. And

26:47

so I'm going to toss it to you here, Dad, and you're

26:49

welcome to speak to anything that I've said so far. This

26:52

is one of those areas where in

26:54

our relationship I'm a little

26:57

more out there than you are. And

26:59

it's okay, and we're finding, I

27:01

think, good ways to talk with

27:03

each other about this. And maybe

27:05

also when I think about the

27:07

really shrill arguments

27:09

between, I'll say,

27:11

dogmatic atheists on the one hand, and

27:14

then on the other hand, people who come

27:16

at this from a much more religious or

27:18

spiritual frame, you know, those arguments can be

27:21

very heated and problematic. And I'm really glad

27:23

in a way that you and I can

27:25

kind of talk about this, a model being

27:27

able to talk about it in a respectful

27:30

and thoughtful way that

27:32

moves the ball forward. Okay. So

27:35

everything you said I totally agree with

27:39

on the one hand. And also

27:41

two things. In

27:44

my view of reality, I think

27:46

there actually is evidence for truly

27:50

unaccountable, inexplicable ways

27:52

in which intention

27:55

or mental activity

27:58

somehow seemed... to

28:01

manifest in physical form

28:03

in this reality. On

28:05

the one hand. On the other hand, those

28:08

instances, even if we grant them,

28:12

even if those exist, they're

28:14

very rare. They're edge

28:16

cases. And so even

28:18

for those who believe

28:21

in the actuality of those

28:23

phenomena, it's important to appreciate that

28:25

even if they do once in

28:27

a while come true, they're

28:30

a very small fraction of all the

28:32

phenomena in this life, most

28:34

of which are due to that

28:36

first category of causes. And I

28:38

see people getting very fascinated with

28:41

this supernatural category of, you

28:44

know, somehow magical manifestation, you

28:46

know, and even if you grant

28:48

its possibility, it's a very, very

28:50

tiny fraction of whatever's going to

28:52

make a good difference for you

28:54

in this life. So, yeah.

28:57

Yeah. You know, it's kind of cool, maybe.

29:00

And where should you put most of your attention? Point

29:03

two, I have an experience

29:05

of this, and I know many, many, many, many

29:07

people around the world who have an experience of

29:10

engaging in practices that,

29:14

in the mind of the person who's engaging them, have

29:17

some connection to supernatural matters. There's

29:20

an invocation of angels or,

29:22

yeah, even going all the way

29:24

to the transcendental, kind of however

29:27

that might be for somebody. Yeah,

29:29

I think most prayer processes are what

29:31

you're describing. Yeah. And for them, they're

29:33

very meaningful. They're sincere. Totally. They're

29:36

not trying to enroll people in their workshops

29:38

about it. Or

29:40

if they are, it's extremely sincere

29:42

and, you know, ethical and well-managed.

29:45

And still, and still,

29:49

what happens inside yourself as

29:51

that sense of releasing into the

29:53

divine. Even

29:55

if that process is

29:58

meaningful to a person, in part

30:01

because of its supernatural,

30:03

even divine slash transcendental

30:06

associations. It's

30:08

largely, if not entirely, through

30:11

natural processes of

30:13

their own experiences, their own experiencing,

30:16

their own neurons firing away as

30:18

the underlying basis for the experiences

30:20

they're having of connecting

30:22

with God. And that's

30:25

ultimately where the impact resides.

30:30

So I'm naming a category in

30:32

which people get meaningful benefits

30:35

that manifest in ordinary reality.

30:39

Whether or not those

30:41

benefits are in fact the result and

30:43

part of the mechanisms of action that

30:46

are supernatural or transcendental, nonetheless,

30:49

the benefits run through

30:51

the natural body-mind process.

30:54

It's really worth appreciating if you are

30:56

someone like me who has some interest

30:59

in those supernatural if not transcendental matters.

31:02

Great. And I think that's

31:04

totally fair for the record. And

31:07

I love how you're moving the location

31:10

of emphasis to what we're doing

31:12

day after day after day. And

31:14

you can pray day after day after day.

31:16

I think that having a consistent practice, regardless

31:18

of whether or not it is more

31:21

secular or it is more spiritual

31:23

in nature, is obviously

31:26

an incredibly powerful resource for people for

31:28

whatever reason. It is an incredibly powerful

31:30

resource for people. And one of the

31:32

most consistent findings in research is that

31:35

religious people on average are happier than

31:37

not religious people. I think that you

31:39

can chalk a lot of that up

31:41

to the consistency of engagement with

31:44

a body of knowledge and a body

31:46

of resource for people that's deeply psychologically

31:48

meaningful. Like just the optimism that can

31:51

be inherent in the idea that someone,

31:54

something is out there looking out for

31:56

you on some level. Like, wow, that

31:58

is a very powerful resource. very, very

32:00

helpful for getting through a difficult moment in life. So

32:03

totally there for all of that, even

32:05

regardless of whether or not it's personally meaningful for

32:08

me, I totally get that it's very meaningful for

32:10

many people. I think that we

32:12

did a pretty good job here of getting through this without

32:15

falling into too many of the holes

32:17

that could strew our past. I thought

32:19

it was world class and

32:22

good. We really navigated

32:24

that one. So now,

32:27

and I might even put this timestamp into the timestamps

32:31

for the episode. It's like, if you want

32:33

to skip all of that and just get

32:35

to the more practical stuff, here we are.

32:37

So I want to actually dig into this

32:39

and think about, okay, let's

32:42

take this on face value. Let's, inside

32:44

of that more, mostly inside

32:47

of that more psychological frame, we're

32:49

talking about really identifying

32:51

what we care about, changing our thoughts related

32:53

to that thing, all of that

32:55

kind of stuff. How can we get more of what

32:57

we want and how can we use these

33:01

internal mechanisms to, in a

33:03

word, manifest those things? One

33:06

of the really cool ideas

33:08

that you bumped into, as

33:11

I did the prep for this episode, watch 10 to

33:14

20 videos on manifesting, Twitter.

33:22

But a really cool idea, but a

33:24

really cool idea that is very psychoanalytic

33:26

in nature is that we get what

33:28

we subconsciously believe we are worthy of

33:30

receiving. And so if

33:32

we have kind of low self-worth or low

33:35

self-belief, we're not going to go after

33:37

the things that we really want because we take ourselves

33:39

off the field before the game even starts, right? It's

33:41

like the old, I forget if this is Michael Jordan

33:43

and Wayne Gretzky or whoever, but you miss 100% of

33:45

the shots you don't

33:47

take. And so the first step

33:49

of this process to me is all

33:52

of that content related to self-worth,

33:54

self-efficacy, and even self-respect. And I'm

33:56

wondering what you think about that,

33:58

Dad? that

34:00

you're really nailing it. I think there's

34:03

some, there's a middle ground where

34:05

we're not so sure we're worthy but we're willing

34:08

to stick our necks out. Yeah. Love

34:10

that. And I think a little

34:12

later you're gonna talk about working through inhibitions to

34:15

get in the way of our goal

34:17

manifestation, you know, goal accomplishment. Well, just because

34:19

you named this data, I think that we

34:21

can kind of almost like bump ahead to

34:23

that as we start to go through this

34:25

kind of a process and particularly for people

34:28

who have more of the, who are

34:31

working around self worth related issues or

34:33

self-efficacy related issues. There is

34:35

often an extremely loud voice in the mind

34:37

that is all of the reasons you can't

34:39

do that thing or the fears that you

34:41

have related to it. Because like when we change our

34:43

patterns that in ways that bring us

34:45

closer to what we really care about, it's

34:48

funny how painful process that

34:50

can be for people. You were even talking

34:53

about something on a recent episode that's really

34:55

stuck with me. The notion that like good

34:57

news can challenge our defenses when we start

34:59

to get what we want, we can feel

35:01

kind of imperiled by that because it takes

35:03

us away from our secure stable

35:05

ground. So anything you want to say about that

35:07

I think would be great. That's really cool. One

35:10

thing that's been really helpful for me about this in

35:13

an interesting way is to

35:15

move beyond affirmative beliefs

35:17

in helplessness and low

35:20

worth or affirmative beliefs

35:22

and agency and worth and

35:24

to in a way neutralize both

35:26

of those by adopting don't know

35:29

mind. Beginner's

35:31

mind where I don't

35:33

know if I deserve it, I don't know if

35:35

I don't deserve it, don't know and I'm gonna

35:37

water the fruit tree, right? I don't know

35:39

if it'll give me an apple, I don't know if

35:42

I deserve an apple but I'm gonna

35:44

water the fruit tree and see what happens and that

35:46

kind of don't know spirit is in

35:48

there. So I literally just let a workshop

35:50

on self-worth, people can check it out. If

35:52

you want a scholarship for it, happy to

35:54

give it to you and all the rest

35:56

of that or you can pay for it.

35:58

But anyway, self-worth, right? It's

36:01

so funny. Even when we're selling stuff, we try to

36:03

give it away for free. We just can't help ourselves.

36:07

It's cool. Okay.

36:09

So, yeah. Not

36:12

knowing. So I would say that. So I

36:14

think on the one hand, there's definitely a place

36:16

for deepening the well springs. I called

36:18

them the five well springs of worth in the

36:21

workshop. People can check it out. So there's a

36:23

place for that. And

36:25

in one of those well springs

36:27

had to do with the narratives we tell

36:29

ourselves. And it can be really helpful to

36:31

move into a not knowing place. Then

36:34

take the steps that are in front of you. One

36:36

of the things that I really love about that, Dad, is that

36:39

it helps us work with our conditioning. Yeah.

36:41

Because as we've talked about

36:43

on the podcast all the time, childhood

36:45

has a very long shadow. The early

36:47

beliefs we form are very impactful for

36:49

us. So just moving into, I don't

36:52

know if I can get to full on self

36:54

worth here, but I'm going to

36:57

start to relax some of my attachment

36:59

to or my conditioning around some of these

37:01

beliefs that I formed early on. That is

37:03

an enormous part of the process for people.

37:05

And that alone can take a

37:07

very long time and be very deep work and it's very

37:09

valuable. Yeah. Think of

37:12

the inhibitions against taking

37:14

action, swinging for the

37:16

fences. One,

37:18

they're very much about avoiding risking the

37:20

dreaded experience. So there's this

37:23

expectation, which is a kind of knowing,

37:25

a prediction of the dreaded

37:27

experience if I speak from the heart

37:29

or publish my poetry or stand on

37:31

stage and sing or grab the microphone

37:34

at the club on comedy night. Okay.

37:37

But if you don't know, if you're

37:39

in the frame of, don't know, it might go badly,

37:41

might go well, don't know. I'm going to give it

37:43

a whirl. And I do know

37:45

that I'm going to make the efforts that I can. I don't

37:48

know if you'll love me, but

37:50

I'm going to ask you to love me anyway. And

37:52

we'll see what happens, right? We

37:55

all know that the food we eat today affects

37:57

how we feel tomorrow. But what if I told you that it's going to

37:59

be a good time? could affect how you felt in 20 years. We're

38:02

learning so much these days about our bodies

38:04

and one of the challenges for people right

38:06

now is that there's an enormous amount of

38:08

information out there, but it can be difficult

38:10

to separate fact from fiction. We

38:12

had Dr. Tim Spector on the podcast

38:15

a few years ago. He's a professor

38:17

of genetic epidemiology and the scientific co-founder

38:19

at ZOE. And the ZOE Science

38:21

and Nutrition podcast is truly one of the best

38:24

resources out there when it comes to this stuff.

38:27

With the help of world-leading scientists, they

38:29

help you make smarter health choices every

38:31

week. And you don't have to just take my word

38:33

for it. Avid podcast fan Naomi's

38:35

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38:38

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38:40

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38:51

can join Naomi and millions of others

38:53

transforming their health. Find it

38:56

wherever you listen to podcasts. Anyone

38:59

who's listening to a show like ours knows mental

39:01

health challenges are a part of life, but

39:03

they don't have to define who you are. If

39:05

you're navigating something difficult, one of the best

39:07

things you can do is get some high-quality

39:09

help, and the Dr. John Delani show

39:12

is a great place to go for that. If

39:14

you like being well, I think you'll really enjoy

39:16

Dr. John's show. It

39:18

was recently in the top five of

39:20

all podcasts on Apple Podcasts, which is

39:22

just an incredible accomplishment. Dr.

39:25

John has a PhD in counseling, he's

39:27

been working with people for over 20

39:29

years, and the show has really a

39:31

very cool format. Real people call into

39:33

the show and he walks them through

39:35

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39:37

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39:39

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39:42

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39:44

questions by leaving a voicemail at 844-693-3291

39:46

or emailing askjohn at

39:54

ramzysolutions.com. It's

39:57

a great resource for people and a really nice compliment

39:59

to the world. work we do here on Being Mole.

40:01

Listen to the Dr. John Delani show wherever

40:04

you get your podcasts or follow the link

40:06

on our website. So

40:09

we've built in some of those positive thoughts,

40:11

positive beliefs about ourselves, at least we're working

40:13

around them. Maybe we've embraced a little bit

40:15

more don't-know mind along the way. We're starting

40:17

to work with any of the inhibitions that

40:19

we have to that. The next

40:22

step is goal clarity. What are

40:24

we going after? What do we care about? What

40:26

do you want, man? That's the content

40:28

that for me, I've been

40:30

surprised that when we talk about

40:33

it on the podcast, people connect

40:35

to it so much because so

40:37

many people struggle to really identify

40:40

what they want. And if there are

40:42

a lot of things in manifesting that

40:44

I've taken some shots at during this

40:46

episode so far, that's the part of

40:48

it that I think has the most

40:50

value. That notion of clarity around what

40:52

are your goals, what do you care

40:54

about, what are you really going after?

40:57

I've definitely been really big on this one.

41:00

I have things to say. Huge part of your

41:02

work. Go ahead. Yeah. Yeah, I'll try to be

41:04

short and sweet. Fundamentally, it's

41:07

useful to have overarching purposes,

41:09

especially those that we can

41:11

surrender to. One

41:13

way of understanding will and

41:16

which evades and willpower fatigue

41:18

is to think of will as surrendering

41:21

to the best within you so

41:23

that it carries you along. That's

41:25

a completely different way to frame

41:28

purposes. So we start to identify

41:30

what are those deep values or

41:32

longings or ways of being

41:35

that are wholesome and valuable and wise

41:37

and useful. How can I get in

41:39

touch with them and how can I

41:41

release into them so that it is they who

41:44

which carry me along? That's a very

41:46

different framing than most of the goal

41:48

setting which is dualistic, sets the

41:50

goal outside yourself and then you have to

41:52

scratch and claw toward it. So

41:54

as that of a frame, I think

41:57

it's helpful for people to ask themselves,

41:59

okay, However successful or not I've

42:01

been in my life, what do I

42:03

still really long for as an

42:06

experience? And this is where you are

42:08

just extremely right on the

42:10

money again and again highlighting the

42:13

ways in which what really matters is

42:15

our experience of things. And so

42:17

if we long for a nice big

42:20

house, the real question is what would be

42:22

the experience you'd have if you owned that

42:24

nice big house? And even... And

42:26

even versus that and stuff. Yeah, or the other ways to get that

42:28

experience. What do you still long for? Another

42:31

is what if you'd

42:33

experienced it, would it have made a lot

42:35

of difference in your childhood or your last

42:37

job or your career or your

42:40

last relationship? Can you look for that

42:42

experience? So in some ways you start

42:44

to find overarching purposes and

42:46

values that you're clear about and that

42:48

you can name to yourself. And

42:51

then absolutely it's really important to break

42:53

them down. One of

42:55

the things that I did once as

42:57

a very useful exercise was I kind

43:00

of named roughly eight or nine priority

43:02

areas of my life and then

43:05

I forced myself to rank order them so

43:07

that if they only get one, literally one, right?

43:11

What's it going to be? And then okay, that

43:14

leaves, let's say you start with nine, you know,

43:16

now you got eight left. Okay,

43:18

if you only get one out of the remaining eight, what's

43:20

it going to be? And then if you only get one

43:22

out of the remaining seven, what's it going to be? That

43:24

kind of forced choice can be really, you know, very,

43:26

very penetrating. And

43:29

then you ask yourself, okay, how am I living

43:32

in relationship to these real priorities? Am

43:35

I living in consistently with

43:37

regard to them? And then you start thinking about

43:39

how to get your life to line up more

43:41

in terms of them. That can be a huge

43:44

wake up call for people. And then

43:46

the last thing I'll just say that's helpful maybe

43:49

is to think about the law of little

43:51

things. A lot of little bad

43:53

things take us to bad places. Lots of little

43:55

good ones take us to good places. So what

43:58

are the little things that you could do every day? that

44:00

would probably add up to about an hour

44:02

that would be different from the way you

44:04

typically spend your day, maybe two

44:06

hours at the most. It might be

44:09

not interrupting people, it might be drinking less,

44:12

it might be going to bed 10 minutes

44:14

earlier, it might be getting up 10 minutes earlier.

44:17

You know, whatever is there for you, working

44:19

on your poetry, working on your book,

44:21

working out in the gym, you know,

44:24

one to two hours a day. That if

44:26

you actually sustained effort in those specific ways,

44:28

that it would really add up

44:30

to something big over time. Yeah,

44:33

I really like that because I

44:35

think that the single biggest pitfall that

44:37

people fall into over and over

44:39

again in the personal development world is they try

44:41

to cannonball into the deep end of the pool.

44:43

They try to create dramatic change, try to do it

44:46

all at once, and then they flame out because of

44:48

course they flame out. I mean, it would be so

44:50

hard to not flame out. It's not their fault, that's

44:52

just the way it is. You're

44:54

trying to move mountains here, but as opposed to

44:56

embracing the day-to-day small steps that typically get us

44:58

from point A to point B. I want to

45:00

mention one other thing here before we move on

45:02

to the next one, and that's really

45:05

being okay with using

45:07

pain points as a guide

45:09

to what you really want.

45:12

It can be very hard for people often

45:14

to talk about the positive things that

45:17

they aspire to. Yeah. Like I

45:19

had a video recently talking about a way

45:21

to go through a process of identifying what

45:23

you really want and what you really care

45:25

about in life. I ran through a

45:28

bunch of more positive orientations that a person can have,

45:30

things they could aspire to, things they could look for.

45:33

Something I didn't really mention very much in that video

45:35

that I kind of wished I had is that for

45:37

a lot of people, it's way easier for them to

45:39

describe what's not working right now. Way

45:42

easier. Pain is salient in our lives, right?

45:44

You can use that sometimes. You don't

45:47

want to stay there. You don't want to stay

45:50

and just griping about your life, of course, but

45:52

it can be very helpful to look through and

45:54

go, okay, what is not working for me right

45:56

now? What can I do to

45:58

change what's not working for me? me right now.

46:01

Then another piece of this ad that I

46:03

think is really interesting that I haven't really

46:05

heard people talk about is the role of

46:08

authenticity as part of this process. That's interesting.

46:10

Yeah, go on. Yeah, because we want things

46:12

for all kinds of different reasons, right? But

46:16

which of those wants are our wants

46:18

and which of those wants are leftovers

46:21

from an earlier time in life? Maybe they've

46:23

been kind of given to us by a

46:25

salient figure in our lives. Maybe they're totally

46:28

performative in nature. You want it because you

46:30

feel like you should want it or you

46:33

want it because you have the feeling of

46:35

others watching you as you're engaged in this

46:37

wanting process. Do you really care about this

46:39

fundamentally because we can pursue both more

46:42

authentic and more inauthentic wants, but I do think that the

46:44

feeling that we're left with at the end is going to

46:46

be very different. Having worked

46:48

with people around these topics for a

46:51

long time, are there things

46:53

that you think help people figure out

46:56

what's more authentic versus less authentic

46:58

because it can actually be quite hard a

47:00

lot of the time? I

47:02

think it can be quite hard because

47:04

we internalize all kinds of standards from

47:08

other people and

47:10

we also want approval. We

47:13

want to impress others, we're social monkeys.

47:16

It's understandable that we want to

47:18

have high status in

47:20

our hunter-gatherer or

47:22

baboon troop. That's

47:24

true. It's all very natural.

47:27

I find myself,

47:30

first of all, really

47:33

emphasizing the

47:35

place for just simply authentic self-expression.

47:38

The more you practice speaking from

47:40

your heart, sharing your experience as

47:42

it is, being

47:44

real about it, doing so appropriately,

47:46

which includes doing this with people

47:48

that are not going to mistreat

47:50

you because you did this, the

47:53

more you do that, the more you get in touch with yourself,

47:56

the more you wake down, not just wake up, then...

48:00

your goals, your values, your

48:02

purposes, your plans and priorities

48:04

become increasingly authentic themselves. Part

48:07

one. Part two, there's

48:10

a term object relations that

48:12

you're familiar with which was developed

48:15

in psychodynamic psychotherapy

48:18

and it's the idea that we

48:20

represent knowledge about the world in

48:22

this two-part frame in which there's

48:24

the self, me and then there's

48:27

other people and this can

48:29

be very specific like there's the me

48:31

I am if a police officer pulls

48:33

me over and writes me a traffic ticket

48:35

and there's there's the me I am when

48:37

I'm just hanging out with my friends watching

48:39

sports and then there's the me I am

48:41

when I stand up in front of a

48:43

group to give a talk and you know,

48:45

these are the different kind of object relations

48:48

frames object being the

48:50

other. Okay, it's really

48:52

interesting to consider what

48:55

your real aims are in this one

48:57

wild and precious life you have as

48:59

Mary Oliver put it that are decoupled

49:02

for many reference to others. In

49:05

other words that you do them

49:07

entirely in an interdirected self-referential

49:10

way. I don't mean self as the

49:12

ego. I mean self essentially as the

49:15

entirety of the person. It's

49:18

really cool. You realize there's a kind of

49:21

freedom there. Partly because you realize that honestly

49:23

most of what you do other people won't care much

49:25

about. If they

49:28

do praise you or blame you

49:30

that will come and go. At

49:33

the end of the day what will remain

49:35

is your own authentic reasons for doing

49:38

it and the fulfillment and

49:40

satisfaction or the accomplishment of important

49:42

purposes you have in life which

49:44

might include serving others. You

49:46

know, that's what will remain when the dust

49:48

settles on all that. That's

49:51

really great dad and a big

49:54

part of that process unfortunately,

49:56

or maybe for better or worse is

49:58

just the reality of that. the consistent grind of

50:00

it. Whether it is that we're

50:03

consistently grinding around going through those

50:05

stages that you just mentioned or going through that

50:07

kind of a process of investigating the interior, whether

50:09

we're grinding out in the world. One

50:12

of the, as I mentioned earlier, one

50:14

of the big problems with the more kind of

50:16

psycho-spiritual approaches to manifesting is that there's no clear

50:18

transition from what's going on between your ears and

50:20

what's going on out in the world. So

50:23

for me, I think a really important question for people

50:25

is what do you need in order to make steps

50:27

toward this goal? Do

50:29

you need to get more

50:31

okay with things being imperfect? Do

50:34

you need to work on your perfectionism, in other

50:36

words? Do you need to figure out

50:38

how you can 80-20 something? Do you need

50:40

to figure out how you can do this in just 15

50:42

minutes a day rather than in an hour a day because

50:45

you don't have an hour a day? Do

50:48

you need certain kinds of external resources? Do you

50:50

need to develop different internal skills? Like what's going

50:52

to really get you

50:54

there? And I've noticed, particularly

50:56

for people who have a little bit

50:59

more of that spiritual orientation, sometimes

51:02

the mundanity of

51:05

that, there can be

51:07

an inhibition around it. And like accepting

51:09

the reality of just like, yeah, you

51:11

got to grind it out is

51:14

often really tough for people. I don't

51:16

wonder what you've seen about that. It's

51:18

a great question. And I

51:20

really have been in this world reflecting

51:23

on it. On the one

51:25

hand, going back to your point about authenticity,

51:27

which I think is all too easy to

51:29

underestimate the importance of your point. It's

51:31

a really good point. I'm really

51:33

taking this away because

51:35

my experience is

51:38

that when people remove the

51:40

inhibitions, when they

51:42

remove the obscurations, when they

51:44

remove the hindrances, usually, naturally,

51:51

there's an inherent movement

51:53

that originates within people

51:55

to actualize themselves as

51:58

Maslow external and Lord

52:00

and also to contribute

52:03

to the world and

52:05

to participate

52:07

in life in a full

52:09

way, developing their competencies and

52:11

being somewhat playful with it

52:13

all along the way. I

52:16

think that's actually innate and that's the

52:18

good news. So if a

52:20

person is not manifesting in

52:22

ways that are authentic to them, a first

52:25

question is, okay, got it. What's

52:27

getting in your way? Is

52:30

that your fault? What's getting in your way?

52:33

I think it's also true in

52:36

our modern culture in ways

52:38

that are historically unprecedented

52:41

because people

52:43

can kind of phone it in in life

52:46

and not make much effort and

52:48

drift along. You know, maybe their

52:50

job isn't terribly satisfying, but they're not going to starve

52:52

to death. So the

52:55

incentives that my

52:57

dad faced growing up on a

52:59

ranch in North Dakota and his

53:01

grandparents really faced are not so

53:03

present today. And people

53:06

can acquire a certain habit

53:08

of what the Buddha called sloth and torpor.

53:11

It's one of the five entrances

53:14

to progressing on your path. You know, they're

53:16

just kind of lazy. So I

53:18

suspect both things are true, that if

53:21

we remove the inhibitions, there is an

53:23

authentic energy that has momentum

53:26

to it that moves forward. And

53:29

also we need to make sure that we

53:31

haven't acquired the habit of frankly, a

53:33

certain amount of laziness or flakiness and

53:36

that we appreciate the

53:39

singular gift of

53:41

our own one wild and precious life.

53:44

We appreciate it enough to, you know,

53:46

get up off the couch

53:49

and surrender to that authentic engine

53:52

inside that wants to carry

53:54

you along and then put it into

53:56

practice in actual daily

53:59

ways that we're doing. that are not gonna exhaust

54:01

you, they're not gonna stress you out terribly.

54:04

It just means, you know, walk

54:06

your talk each day and then go to

54:09

bed that night, knowing that you put in a good

54:11

day's work, it was enough, and you

54:13

can wake up the next morning wearing dewgill. And

54:16

I think a big part of that also

54:18

is this final stage, final step of this

54:21

process, which is about cultivating more proactive mindset

54:23

to me. So this means

54:25

viewing yourself as something that's flexible and can

54:27

change, something that can bear

54:30

the weight, bear the effort of what you're describing

54:32

to your dad, you know, that day-to-day process of

54:34

moving through it. A person

54:36

who's capable of dealing with changing situations because change

54:38

is an inherent part of life. And

54:42

that belief that we've talked about in the

54:44

last several episodes that I've kept on returning

54:46

to, of a view of

54:49

the self as being sturdy, capable, and

54:51

able to resist trouble,

54:53

resist struggle, resist, bad

54:56

things happening out in the world, fundamentally

54:59

sturdy. And as

55:01

a source of your own safety is a big part

55:03

of that as well. Like the belief

55:06

that you can really keep

55:08

yourself secure, I think is a huge part of

55:10

what allows people to then go and do all

55:12

of these other things that we're talking about. And

55:15

so, you know, that's a big part of this process

55:17

as well. Another part of it might be accepting the

55:19

reality of difficulty, like I said sometimes,

55:22

bad things are gonna happen. And I

55:24

think that those six-ish things that we've talked

55:26

about here, first step,

55:28

we're working around that like self

55:30

worth, self-efficacy parts of things. Second,

55:32

we're setting intentions, we're creating a

55:34

clear target, we're identifying what we

55:36

really care about. Third, we're

55:39

exploring authenticity. Fourth, we're

55:41

embracing the reality of consistent effort in

55:43

life. Then as kind

55:45

of a little thing that runs across all

55:47

of these, I would say, we're working with

55:49

some of the inhibitions and the fears that

55:52

can arise along the way. And

55:54

then finally that along the way, cultivating

55:56

a proactive mindset as well, I think

55:58

could be really helpful. That,

56:00

to me, is really what

56:03

manifesting is in that more

56:05

psychological, natural frame process.

56:08

That's really what we're doing. And

56:10

a big part of that, Dad, gets to changing

56:12

those underlying beliefs. And we talked about this

56:14

a bit already when we talked about that

56:17

first category, self-worth and so on. But

56:19

we often get a question for people, how

56:21

do I actually do that? You talk about

56:24

changing beliefs all the time, but I try

56:26

to hold a different thought in my mind

56:28

or think something different about myself. And it

56:30

just doesn't stick. What do I do? That

56:33

sounds nice, but how do I do

56:35

it? And this is

56:37

basically what you do. So I mostly

56:39

just want to kick the ball over to your court

56:41

here, and you're welcome to go wherever you want with

56:44

this. But I would love you to walk us through

56:46

a really practical example

56:48

of how somebody could do this in their

56:50

life. I know one that's really important

56:52

for people is issues related to self-worth. But

56:54

if you want to take it in a different direction, you're totally

56:57

welcome, too. Well, that's great. Okay,

56:59

so let's suppose that a person

57:02

would like to take a step in their life

57:05

and they're aware of the fact that low

57:08

self-worth, a sense

57:10

of self-doubt, inadequacy,

57:14

a view of themselves is not actually capable

57:16

or likely to be successful at taking that

57:19

step, which could be in the interpersonal space,

57:22

going out and dating again, or

57:25

pursuing a particular person. They

57:28

just don't feel worthy to it or

57:30

taking steps in their career. That's

57:33

what you're getting at, right? Let's suppose that's the example.

57:35

Yeah, great. I want

57:37

to name two things first, which is that

57:41

if we take action that

57:44

starts to produce results

57:47

that reassure us or

57:50

help us disconfirm those old beliefs,

57:52

that can be really helpful. And

57:55

also, if we're having

57:57

experiences like experiences, somatic

58:00

experiences below the cognitive level, in

58:02

other words, of belief. If we're

58:05

having experiences that

58:07

of, for example, in this

58:09

case, feeling loved, feeling valued,

58:11

feeling cared about, experiences of

58:13

our own natural goodness, well,

58:16

those experiences can gradually change beliefs as

58:18

well. So I'm naming that beliefs

58:21

can be changed based on external events and

58:23

conditions, some of which we can foster, and

58:25

also beliefs can be changed from

58:27

the bottom up. That said, I'm

58:29

going to focus now on how to

58:31

do it top-down. So step one, name

58:34

the belief, identify it. We

58:37

can't change what we're not aware of. Freud famously

58:39

said we call it the unconscious because

58:41

it's unconscious.

58:44

It's not conscious. You

58:47

can't address it if it's not conscious. So name

58:49

the beliefs. It can be helpful to do it

58:51

as an exercise where you write it on paper.

58:53

Sometimes when you actually put it on paper and

58:56

you don't censor yourself,

58:58

you really let the

59:00

parts of you that believe that

59:02

belief and are pushing it in

59:05

their misguided but well-intended efforts to

59:07

help you. When you really let them

59:10

talk, in fact, you really put

59:12

the belief down. When you step back from

59:14

it, you realize, wow, that's

59:17

just so not true. Just

59:19

let yourself see it. Say it out loud.

59:22

A nice interesting exercise is to

59:25

pick a belief, identify it, put

59:27

it into language, and then say

59:29

it out loud with

59:32

or without another person hearing you. And

59:34

then, oh, ask yourself

59:36

how you feel when she said it.

59:39

That too. In other words, when we kind

59:41

of get it out of the voice in

59:43

the back of the head, murmuring away, whispering.

59:46

Yeah, I think this is a really

59:48

great process to add where you're making

59:50

the unconscious conscious. You're trying to put

59:53

words to the voice. You're really

59:56

spelling out what is it that

59:58

you think in part because Because

1:00:00

then when something has taken a

1:00:02

physical form, or sometimes we talk about doing

1:00:04

this with fears too, people have amorphous fears

1:00:06

floating around in the back of their mind,

1:00:08

but then when they really have to write

1:00:10

down what the specific fear is, it becomes

1:00:13

much easier to work with because it's bounded

1:00:15

in nature. It's clear. That's exactly

1:00:17

right. You're getting worm

1:00:19

tongue out of your head

1:00:21

and out in front so you can really

1:00:24

see what that character is saying. Okay.

1:00:28

That's one. You do that. Then second,

1:00:30

once you have it out on the table, it's

1:00:33

really useful to ask yourself, okay,

1:00:36

what is true about this belief?

1:00:40

So you give it its due. You

1:00:42

don't attack it initially. You appreciate

1:00:44

it. You respect it. Well,

1:00:47

what is true about it? You see that

1:00:50

part? Is it true

1:00:52

in certain settings? Is it true with certain

1:00:54

people? Has it been true? In

1:00:57

the past, right? Third,

1:01:01

what's the function the belief serves?

1:01:04

This is very useful. What

1:01:07

are the benefits of that belief?

1:01:11

What does it do in terms

1:01:13

of helping me be safe, to

1:01:15

protect myself, to get along

1:01:18

with other people, to kind

1:01:20

of shore up my

1:01:22

feeling of identity or my own worth? What

1:01:25

are the functions it serves? It

1:01:28

might be a function of

1:01:31

leading me to not do stuff

1:01:33

that when I was a kid

1:01:36

got me punished. Like

1:01:38

a belief that I'm

1:01:42

not very smart would then just

1:01:44

naturally lead me to not speak up in

1:01:46

some kind of loose way that got laughed

1:01:48

at when I was in school. Yeah,

1:01:51

that what the function part of it is huge,

1:01:53

I think. And then

1:01:55

in the fourth step, you

1:01:57

ask yourself, well, what's the function of

1:01:59

that belief? What's not true about this

1:02:01

belief and what are

1:02:03

the cost to me and others of

1:02:06

it? And here too,

1:02:08

you're being in the

1:02:10

way I've described, you're being neutral, you're

1:02:13

being fair, you're exploring it. What's

1:02:15

not true about it? Is

1:02:17

it actually true? So we

1:02:19

explore that and you see the ways in

1:02:21

which it's not true. And you also explore

1:02:24

what's the cost to me of this belief?

1:02:27

So the third question is about what's the

1:02:29

payoff, what's the function? Now

1:02:31

in the fourth question, we're asking ourselves

1:02:33

what's untrue and what are the costs?

1:02:37

And then finally, you get to the fifth step,

1:02:41

which is about what would

1:02:43

be an alternative belief

1:02:47

that would be more true and

1:02:51

less costly in

1:02:53

the service of whatever is

1:02:56

legitimate in the

1:02:58

function that you've clarified

1:03:01

for yourself in the third step.

1:03:04

In other words, think of the belief

1:03:06

as a vehicle, it got

1:03:08

you here and yeah, it's kind

1:03:10

of a cramped and smelly and leaky

1:03:12

rowboat, but you

1:03:15

know how to work it. It

1:03:18

gets you across the bay. All

1:03:20

right, what would be a better vehicle? Yeah.

1:03:23

What would be a better vehicle? So

1:03:26

now you're starting to identify that better

1:03:28

vehicle. The sixth

1:03:30

step, now you've started to identify the

1:03:32

belief system and this could be broader,

1:03:34

it could be a sense of perspective,

1:03:36

it could be meanings, it

1:03:39

could be interpretations, this

1:03:41

could involve expectations, assumptions,

1:03:43

predictions, views of yourself, views

1:03:45

of the world, views of the past, views of

1:03:47

the future, views of others. Now

1:03:53

that you've identified what the

1:03:55

better way is, the better

1:03:57

perspectives, now you want

1:03:59

to develop... conviction. You want to

1:04:01

transfer from that old leaky

1:04:03

smelly rowboat, cramped and

1:04:06

awkward, to a much better vehicle. You

1:04:08

want to transition to it now in

1:04:10

the sixth step. So you're helping yourself

1:04:12

to start to really believe the

1:04:15

new perspectives. So

1:04:17

you're stepping away from

1:04:20

the old views because you've disputed them,

1:04:22

you've seen what's not true about them,

1:04:24

you've recognized what's costly to

1:04:26

you and others about them, you've done that

1:04:28

part, and now you're stepping into the new

1:04:30

belief frame by repeating

1:04:34

it to yourself, by

1:04:37

surfacing your yes

1:04:39

butts to

1:04:41

get in the way, and you want to

1:04:43

really ask yourself, am I prepared to step

1:04:46

away from that old familiar but problematic way of

1:04:48

being into this new way of being? Which one

1:04:50

do you want to win? You've

1:04:52

got two lawyers arguing in your head. The

1:04:55

old lawyer, you're a schmuck, you

1:04:57

suck, you're no good. Or the

1:04:59

new lawyer, he's like, wait a

1:05:01

minute here. You really want

1:05:04

in the sixth step the new way of looking

1:05:06

at things to prevail and then ways of implementing

1:05:09

that are to know what conviction

1:05:11

feels like. Know what

1:05:13

it feels like to really believe something

1:05:15

is true. I think about, I believe,

1:05:17

Oprah's question to people, what's

1:05:19

one thing you know for sure? What

1:05:22

does it feel like to know something for

1:05:24

sure? And then can you help yourself gradually

1:05:27

inhabit that way of relating

1:05:29

to this particular belief? And then also take a

1:05:31

look at how would you manifest this belief? How

1:05:33

would you put it into practice? If

1:05:35

this is about manifesting, okay,

1:05:38

how would you apply it? How would you

1:05:40

operationalize that belief? How would you act upon

1:05:42

that belief in new ways? Write those down

1:05:45

or know what they are, visualize them. And

1:05:48

then if you really want a bonus here, you

1:05:53

can quite helpfully, and I've done this, imagine

1:05:56

yourself acting

1:05:58

on the basis. This is a very effective

1:06:00

trick to the brain. Imagine

1:06:02

your...it's three steps. Imagine yourself acting on the

1:06:04

basis of the new way of being and

1:06:07

realistically imagine the rewards of it for

1:06:10

you and others and how wonderful it

1:06:12

will be. Okay? Imagine yourself

1:06:14

working through yes-buts or obstructions

1:06:17

or in difficulties in realistic

1:06:19

ways successfully with a felt

1:06:21

sense of how rewarding that would be.

1:06:24

Step one. Step two. You

1:06:27

then just imagine kind of quickly what it

1:06:29

would be like to operate on the basis

1:06:31

of the old belief with

1:06:33

awareness of what's not true about it

1:06:36

and also potentially how

1:06:38

it was installed in you by people

1:06:40

that you know you're not very happy

1:06:42

about sticking that sucker in your

1:06:45

head and programming you with it. No?

1:06:48

And observe the cost of it. Okay,

1:06:50

great. So run out the second scenario

1:06:52

operating on the basis of that old way

1:06:55

of looking then you make an existential choice.

1:06:58

Which one? Which one do

1:07:00

you pick? It's you.

1:07:02

It's you existentially. Which one do you pick?

1:07:05

People usually pick the

1:07:07

higher road belief and then in

1:07:09

the third step imagine yourself again

1:07:11

maybe more quickly operating on

1:07:13

the basis of the new belief and experiencing

1:07:16

in your imagination and ideally in a felt

1:07:18

way how good it will be for you

1:07:20

and others to do that. That's

1:07:23

really great, Dad. That's a fantastic

1:07:26

summary of an

1:07:29

enormous body of thought. For starters, it's a

1:07:31

great job. I just like tidying that up

1:07:33

so much and I think it's a great

1:07:35

answer to that question that people have all

1:07:37

the time. How do I actually go about

1:07:40

installing this new thing into me?

1:07:42

Because it can feel like this very fuzzy

1:07:45

and vague process and is

1:07:47

often very vague in how people talk about it. You just

1:07:49

have this new belief and you just believe it. No,

1:07:52

there are actually deliberate steps that

1:07:54

you can go through to maybe

1:07:57

not perfectly bake it into you because

1:08:00

Because that's uncommon. But

1:08:02

to really have this new

1:08:04

way of being increasingly internalized

1:08:06

through action, also, how we behave out

1:08:08

in the world becomes positively reinforcing. We

1:08:11

start to acquire evidence that

1:08:13

we really are the way that this new belief

1:08:15

says we are. If we just

1:08:17

go through all those processes that you described,

1:08:19

but our behavior doesn't change, we never have

1:08:21

any evidence. So

1:08:24

an important part of it, as you were

1:08:26

saying, putting into action, creating evidence and finding

1:08:28

that evidence and letting that evidence sink in.

1:08:30

So I really love that. I think it's

1:08:32

an incredibly important part of this whole process.

1:08:36

And man, I'm

1:08:39

really happy with how this whole thing went. This

1:08:42

could have been a total mess, honestly, and

1:08:44

I think that we navigated it very

1:08:46

skillfully. I'm really pleased with it. I actually love

1:08:48

this whole episode. Yeah, so thanks for

1:08:51

doing this with me today, Dad. I think that was

1:08:53

really rich. Oh, thank you. And thank you for being

1:08:56

artful with it all and

1:08:59

tolerant of my more

1:09:01

woo woo. Hey,

1:09:04

we all got to have a little tolerance that are live

1:09:06

here. So I just had

1:09:08

a great time today talking with Rick about

1:09:11

manifesting and about what

1:09:13

we can do to take

1:09:16

a psychologically inclined approach to

1:09:18

some of these ideas. I

1:09:20

thought it was super valuable for me personally, and I hope

1:09:22

that the people who are listening got a lot out of

1:09:24

it too. I

1:09:33

was a little nervous going into this

1:09:35

conversation because I am not a manifesting

1:09:37

person. There are a lot of people

1:09:39

who really care about manifesting and particularly

1:09:41

really care about it and believe in

1:09:44

it in the more metaphysical way that

1:09:46

we described during the conversation. And

1:09:48

I thought that this would be a episode where

1:09:50

it would be really easy for us to fall into

1:09:52

a whole bunch of sinkholes while

1:09:54

talking about it and get bogged down in a

1:09:57

lot of parts of it that just wouldn't be that interesting

1:09:59

for people. But by the end of

1:10:01

it, I was very happy with all of the

1:10:03

stuff that we covered. I found it really interesting,

1:10:05

and I thought it was great how Rick began

1:10:07

the conversation by breaking how to

1:10:10

think about manifesting into these different buckets.

1:10:13

The first bucket is just the pure

1:10:15

material frame, and that includes all of

1:10:17

the psychological tools that we talk about

1:10:19

on the podcast. The second

1:10:21

bucket were plausible processes that

1:10:23

we don't yet understand. So

1:10:26

this is the stuff that we're going to find out in

1:10:28

10, 20, 50 years as science continues to

1:10:32

grind away in its natural process. The

1:10:34

third bucket is metaphysical or transcendental

1:10:37

things that are working on the

1:10:39

physical world. And then

1:10:41

the fourth bucket is the truly transcendental. And

1:10:44

we spent most of this conversation talking

1:10:47

about that first bucket, because

1:10:49

manifestation, to put it into a

1:10:51

phrase, is bringing what's in our

1:10:53

mind into reality. We

1:10:55

know that our beliefs and our thoughts about

1:10:57

the world play a big role in this

1:10:59

process because they impact our behavior out in

1:11:01

the world. If you're carrying

1:11:04

around a bunch of beliefs that get in the

1:11:06

way of identifying or pursuing your goals, designing a

1:11:08

life that would feel good for you, and

1:11:10

pursuing those goals and objectives consistently, then of

1:11:13

course you're going to have a very difficult

1:11:15

time getting what you want out of life.

1:11:18

And believing that you can accomplish something

1:11:20

is the first step to actually accomplish

1:11:23

it. So in that more

1:11:25

material frame, we're talking

1:11:27

about a pretty delineated

1:11:29

process of developing self-belief

1:11:31

and self-efficacy, maybe self-worth

1:11:34

alongside that, really

1:11:36

thinking that you can accomplish the thing that you're

1:11:38

setting out to accomplish. Then

1:11:40

second, goal clarity and lifestyle design. What

1:11:43

is it that you really want? And we talked about

1:11:45

that at some length during the episode. And

1:11:47

third, discipline, applying consistent effort over

1:11:49

time. This is one of the places

1:11:51

where I think the law of attraction

1:11:54

and more metaphysical manifesting really falls

1:11:56

apart because it focuses on the

1:11:58

thoughts you have. not

1:12:01

the direct ways in which those thoughts

1:12:03

impact your physical actions out in the

1:12:05

world. You can think that you

1:12:07

are worthy of a master's degree until you are

1:12:09

blue in the face, but if you don't actually

1:12:11

submit the papers by the application deadline, you're never

1:12:14

going to get there. And then

1:12:16

finally, we want to cultivate a mindset

1:12:18

that tends to lead to good outcomes

1:12:20

for us. This is one that is

1:12:22

flexible. We talk about psychological flexibility a

1:12:24

lot, rationally optimistic. We are

1:12:26

going to search for meaning and

1:12:28

purpose and the good parts, even

1:12:31

amidst a difficult life. And

1:12:33

then having a growth orientation, the belief that

1:12:35

we can learn what we need to learn

1:12:37

in order to succeed. Now

1:12:40

manifesting, if we want to interpret it

1:12:42

kind of charitably, is a way to

1:12:45

understand that very practical process. And it

1:12:47

can be particularly helpful for people who

1:12:49

don't really have a background in psychoeducation,

1:12:52

or maybe they have more of a

1:12:54

background in spiritual practice. And

1:12:56

it can help them connect the

1:12:59

dots between the more metaphysical and

1:13:01

the more psychological or realized out

1:13:03

in the world. And Rick

1:13:05

talked at some length about the value

1:13:07

of those more practices

1:13:09

of faith, spiritual practices,

1:13:11

metaphysical practices. And

1:13:13

one of the things that I mentioned during

1:13:15

the conversation is that we know from research

1:13:18

that people who are religious are often happier

1:13:20

than people who are not. That's a real

1:13:22

resource for people. Where

1:13:24

things become problematic for me is

1:13:26

when there is an attempt to

1:13:29

add evidence to something that

1:13:31

does not have evidence by

1:13:33

using a lot of psycho-babble

1:13:36

and techno-babble. By misusing terminology,

1:13:38

by making vague allusions to

1:13:40

quantum mechanics without really understanding

1:13:42

how any of that actually

1:13:44

works. It just feels

1:13:47

kind of mystical and out there.

1:13:49

So sure, we'll use that language and we'll kind

1:13:51

of adopt it as part of our process. And

1:13:54

there are many things that bug me about this,

1:13:56

but what bugs me about it the most is

1:13:58

that this is a fantastic way to exploit vulnerability.

1:14:00

people. Because what you see over

1:14:03

and over and over again is this

1:14:06

techno-babble, this quantum

1:14:08

flap-doodle to quote physicist

1:14:10

Murray Gell-Mann, is

1:14:13

applied to manipulate, to coerce,

1:14:15

and to frankly take money

1:14:18

from vulnerable groups of people, people

1:14:20

who are not as educated around

1:14:22

these issues, who don't really understand

1:14:24

the terminology. And I'm sure that

1:14:26

there are instances where the word quantum

1:14:29

is used appropriately in a personal development

1:14:31

context, but the overwhelming majority

1:14:33

of the time it's used incorrectly, or

1:14:35

even worse, as a sort of excuse

1:14:38

for why an idea has no evidence

1:14:40

to support it. Like, well, we don't

1:14:42

know. Maybe it's just quantum, right? I

1:14:45

would be totally fine with most of the stuff embedded in

1:14:47

the law of attraction if the people

1:14:49

had the honesty to just say, oh, it's

1:14:51

faith. Oh, I just kind of think

1:14:53

that things work that way. Okay. The

1:14:56

whole point of faith is that it

1:14:58

is without evidence. That's why you need

1:15:01

faith. If you had evidence, you wouldn't

1:15:03

need faith. And that's okay. That's an

1:15:05

incredibly meaningful resource for many, many people.

1:15:08

It's that lack of honesty

1:15:11

and that attempt to science-size

1:15:13

things that are not scientific that

1:15:16

really rubs me the wrong way. Then

1:15:18

alongside that, there are some specific problems

1:15:20

with the secret in particular and the

1:15:22

law of attraction as well that

1:15:24

I just think just create

1:15:26

a lot of issues here. The

1:15:29

law of attraction is essentially a way to take

1:15:31

credit for luck and

1:15:34

also to not appropriately

1:15:36

credit the role of luck in

1:15:38

the lives of less fortunate people.

1:15:42

If somebody's circumstances are entirely based on the

1:15:44

power of their thoughts, and if we call

1:15:46

in the things that happen to

1:15:48

us based on the energy of

1:15:50

those unique thoughts, then everything that

1:15:52

happens to you, whether good or

1:15:54

bad, is your fault definitionally. And

1:15:56

this is spelled out on Oprah's

1:15:59

website where Whereas somebody, maybe

1:16:01

she, maybe somebody else, but somebody writes,

1:16:03

the energy you put into the world,

1:16:05

both good and bad, is exactly what

1:16:07

comes back to you. You

1:16:10

don't have to dig very deep to

1:16:12

find the problems with this fear point.

1:16:15

And suggesting that we can overcome

1:16:17

any obstacle through the power of

1:16:19

thought alone completely ignores

1:16:21

any kind of systemic issue, any kind

1:16:23

of systemic problem that a person might

1:16:25

be dealing with, because it turns out

1:16:28

that indeed our thoughts aren't the only

1:16:30

thing that matters, people.

1:16:32

Then we went from there into

1:16:35

a roadmap for practical manifesting. So

1:16:37

this is that more bucket one,

1:16:39

psychologically inclined approach to manifesting. So

1:16:42

here's a quick summary of that six

1:16:45

step process. First we

1:16:47

focus on improving self-worth,

1:16:49

self-efficacy, and self-respect. Because

1:16:52

a manifestation principle, if you want to call it

1:16:54

that, is that we get

1:16:56

what we subconsciously believe we are worthy

1:16:58

of receiving. So if we

1:17:00

have low self-worth or self-belief, we're not

1:17:02

going to go after the things that

1:17:04

we really want. So if we

1:17:06

don't think that we're worthy of something, we're never going

1:17:08

to put in the effort required to go out and get

1:17:11

it. Then second, huge

1:17:13

piece of this puzzle, setting intentions

1:17:15

and creating clear targets. And this

1:17:17

gets to goal clarity, planning,

1:17:19

and lifestyle design of different kinds.

1:17:21

To start with, what do you really

1:17:24

want? And Rick talked about this process

1:17:26

in detail. He really got in there about

1:17:28

how we can explore this. Third,

1:17:31

the exploration of authenticity is part of this

1:17:33

process. We want things for all kinds of

1:17:35

different reasons. Why do we want them? And

1:17:37

are they our wants or are they somebody

1:17:39

else's wants? And Rick

1:17:42

here talked about authentic self-expression. How can

1:17:44

we come into the world? How can we

1:17:47

embody ourselves in a way

1:17:49

that's a little more real, a little bit more felt,

1:17:52

a little bit more true to who

1:17:54

we feel we really are, as opposed

1:17:57

to being true to the mask that we've been

1:17:59

carrying around. Fourth,

1:18:01

facing the reality of consistent effort.

1:18:03

We get where we want to

1:18:05

go based on taking many, many

1:18:07

small, real steps. Accepting

1:18:10

that can be really challenging for

1:18:12

people, and it's often surprising how

1:18:14

many inhibitions come up to the

1:18:16

reality of that day-to-day work. And

1:18:19

that's the fifth step, working with inhibitions

1:18:21

or the fears that emerge along the

1:18:23

way, changing patterns in ways that

1:18:25

bring us closer to what we really care about

1:18:27

or the outcomes that we actually want from life

1:18:30

is often surprisingly difficult for people,

1:18:32

in part because it

1:18:34

puts us in close contact with

1:18:37

a vulnerable psychological material. This

1:18:40

is often the stuff that we have

1:18:42

buried deep down, that we have not

1:18:44

unearthed yet. It often relates to painful

1:18:46

experiences that happened to us much earlier

1:18:48

in life. And

1:18:50

putting yourself out there, period, including putting

1:18:53

yourself out there by just saying normal

1:18:55

things like, I am a

1:18:57

fundamentally worthy person or I am a

1:18:59

good person, it can

1:19:01

be really surprising how difficult that can be

1:19:03

for somebody. Then along

1:19:05

the way, we're trying to cultivate a more

1:19:08

proactive, more helpful mindset that brings us closer

1:19:10

to the things that we really want. We're

1:19:13

trying to view ourselves as more

1:19:15

flexible, as somebody who is capable

1:19:17

of dealing with shifting situations and

1:19:19

embracing and overcoming difficulties. And

1:19:22

we're increasingly developing that view of the self

1:19:24

as something that keeps us safe. You

1:19:26

are safe because you are who you are, not

1:19:29

because of the circumstances that you are in. That

1:19:32

feeling of fundamental safety is often a

1:19:34

huge resource for people. And

1:19:36

then at the end of the conversation, I asked

1:19:38

Rick to walk through a practical example of changing a

1:19:41

belief and embedding a new

1:19:43

belief inside of us that can

1:19:45

support those desires to manifest something

1:19:47

new and different. And I thought

1:19:49

he did a fantastic job of running through this. It

1:19:52

was again a six step process. First

1:19:55

putting the belief into clarity, bringing

1:19:58

it from the unconscious to the conscious. we

1:20:00

can sometimes do this by really writing

1:20:02

it down very clearly. Then second,

1:20:04

asking ourselves what's the function

1:20:06

of that belief. Beliefs exist

1:20:08

for reasons. What got

1:20:10

that belief into us and why has

1:20:13

it still stuck around? Particularly, most of

1:20:15

the time, what is it protecting us

1:20:17

from? Then third, what's

1:20:19

not true about the belief? What are

1:20:21

the things that we really can see

1:20:23

about it that aren't accurate?

1:20:25

How has it not lined up with

1:20:28

what's actually happened to us or what

1:20:30

is really true about who we are

1:20:32

as a person? Fourth,

1:20:34

what are the costs of the belief? What are

1:20:36

the things that it is preventing us from getting

1:20:39

that we really care about? And

1:20:41

then fifth, really great question, what

1:20:43

is an alternative belief that

1:20:46

would be more true and

1:20:48

come with less costs

1:20:51

that is also in the

1:20:53

service of that same function?

1:20:55

That is an incredible question to

1:20:57

ask. Then finally, after

1:20:59

you've identified that new belief, argue

1:21:02

for it and want it to win.

1:21:06

Really love this episode. I'm also really curious

1:21:08

what the feedback for it is going to

1:21:10

be. Leave a comment down below if you're

1:21:12

watching on YouTube. You can leave a rating

1:21:14

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1:21:16

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1:21:18

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1:21:20

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1:21:22

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1:21:24

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1:21:39

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1:21:46

again, thanks so much for listening. This was

1:21:48

a bit of a longer one, and I

1:21:50

really appreciate the amount of

1:21:52

time and attention that our listeners give

1:21:54

to the podcast. It is really incredible

1:21:56

stuff. I'll Talk to you soon. Have A great week.