It's Not Really Attraction, It's Art

Do you really attract things to you like magnets or do you transform what you experience?

This is the question that has begun to interest me as of late.

To me, the Universe is a wonderful canvas and your dreams, focus and feelings are your palette. Your dream is the vision of what you want to create. Your focus is the brush choice. Your feelings are the colors. Your actions make it happen.

The Universe has within it every possibility. Anything you can dream, you can create.

Have you heard this quote?

"Everything that can be invented has been invented."
- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Patent Office, 1899

Once you believe that something cannot be done or more cannot be invented, history will mark you down as a fool. (You can quote me on that).

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home."
— Ken Olsen, founder of Digital Equipment, in 1977.

The point here is that the Universe is boundless. Everything is possible. Just follow the artist's code.

1. Decide what you want to create.


2. Visualize it as if it were complete.


3. Internalize the motivation. Feel what it will be like with it complete.


4. Take focused action and don't stop until it is done.


5. Special note: Stay open to the possibility of something even better coming out of your dream.

"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication."
— William Orton, president of Western Union, in 1876, when Alexander Graham Bell tried to sell the company his invention.

Take some time now to decide what you really want. Next, follow the steps and allow it to happen.

The Pursuit of Happiness

"Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness..." This famous phrase from the U.S. Declaration of Independence has made me pause. How does one pursue happiness? More importantly, how does one achieve happiness?

First of all, let's look at what happiness is. According to Webster's Dictionary, happiness is...

1. State of well-being characterized by emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy.
2. Emotions experienced when in a state of well-being.

Wow, that didn't really help much, did it?

Let's look up well-being.

Well-being - The state of being healthy, happy, or prosperous.

So, I guess that happiness is the emotions experienced when you are healthy, happy, or prosperous.

At this time, let's focus on the happy part. (Mind out of the gutter please). How do you get truly happy?

I looked through quite a few quotes to find some inspiration. Here is what Brother David Steindl-Rast has to say...

"Gratefulness is the key to a happy life that we hold in our hands, because if we are not grateful, then no matter how much we have we will not be happy -- because we will always want to have something else or something more."

I believe that Brother David has the key to happiness laid out perfectly for us here. You must be fully grateful for your present and your past to be truly filled with happiness.

This brings up another interesting thought... If you are totally happy and fully content, why would you want to do anything else? Would you become a slug?

By the way, before we get to that, there are two kinds of things that bring happiness. (I am changing focus from outside in for the moment and then we'll go back to inside out). There is the thing that makes us happy.

1. Those things that make us happy that are not really good for us. This would be our bad habits (i.e. alcohol, spending, gambling, smoking, etc.) They make you feel good, but they are not really good for you.

2. Those things that make us happy that are good for us. These may be a compliment, a hug from a loved one, a smile, accomplishing a goal, etc. They make you feel good and they are good for you.

Okay, back to what motivates you when you are totally happy...

It is true, unhappiness is a great motivator. This is about avoiding pain. How do I no longer experience unhappiness? The down side to this type of motivation is that it creates a roller coaster effect. For instance, I feel unhappy so I do something to avoid this unhappiness. I find contentment until I am unhappy again. Repeat.

Another motivator is purpose. This is the pleasure driven motivator. Can you see how this type of motivation allows you to be happy and still move forward? I am happy. How can I create more happiness in the world?

Here is how James Openheim describes this...

"The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance; the wise grows it under his feet."

In summary, the pursuit of happiness is being truly happy through the practice of gratitude while unfolding your purpose (displaying your natural gift) onto the world.

I'll end with this Benjamin Franklin quote.

"The Constitution only guarantees the American people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself."

Listen to Your Body

Symptoms are your bodies way of telling you that something has to change.

A few months back, one of my clients was having a really hard time. He was having an anxiety attack and depression. He was desperate for help.

We worked together for quite a while. I adjusted him and I did some emotional work in an attempt to give him some relief. My patients were starting to back up, so I had him go for a walk and come back. I knew we had more to do.

When he came back, we sat down to have a chat. I told him about when I had anxiety attacks.

Here is my story in a nutshell.

Many years ago, I was having anxiety attacks and they were getting progressively worse. I remember driving in the car with my family and having crazy thoughts of dying, my car rolling, my wife being killed and my dogs getting lost on the freeways. After dinner every night I would need to go for a walk to calm my feelings of impending death. It was bad. I had pain and pressure in my chest that I just knew was my heart failing.

I had been checked out by a medical doctor. I was getting regular adjustments. I was taking all kinds of supplements. Nothing was working to alleviate my symptoms.

One night after dinner and my walk, it kept getting worse. I walked some more. I tried to focus on something else. Nothing calmed it. I woke up my wife, Barbara, and had her call 911.

The fire department came with the paramedics. I remember sitting on the edge of the fire truck with the sticky pads stuck to my chest as they ran the EKG. I remember the fear I was under. Mostly, however, I remember Barbara standing with a neighbor's arm around her as she watched me and cried.

That was my bottom.

I made a decision. Something had to change.

I started by assessing my bad habits, the toxins that I kept putting into my body, and right then elected to quit them. I started an exercise program, began daily affirmations and addressed other areas of my lifestyle. My anxiety went away and never came back.


I asked my patient, "Are there any toxins in your life that you know you should let go of?" He said, "Yes" and committed to quit.

He then asked me, "Can you please do something about this anxiety I am feeling now?"

I asked him, "If I waved a magic wand and took this pain you are feeling away right now, would you quit?"

He said, "No."


He quit drinking that night and now, he looks great. His anxiety is gone. He has a new outlook on life.

Our symptoms are our body's way of getting our attention. Numbing these messages out or ignoring them can lead to more serious consequences.

Listen to your body. It will save your life.

Focus on the Heaven

Recently, the subject of heaven and hell has crept up in my life again. Have you ever though about it? Most of us have. The subject fascinates me so sit back and enjoy a perspective on the subject...

I believe that there is heaven and I believe that there is hell. What makes my understanding a little different than most is that I do not feel that it is something that we have to wait until we die to experience.

Heaven and hell are all around us all of the time. I believe that it is represented by what we choose to focus on. We determine if we are experiencing heaven or hell in every single moment.I came to this understanding by really looking at the Lord's Prayer. The part about "on Earth as it is in Heaven" really stimulated my thoughts. I asked myself, "Is it possible to create heaven right now, here on Earth?" "How does one create Earth as it is in Heaven?"

Some clues started to reveal themselves when I looked at science. There were a couple of discoveries in science that freaked out the whole scientific community.

Do you remember high school science class? We learned that light was both a wave and a particle. That was about as far as it went. What they did not tell you is this... light is a particle or a wave depending on what you are measuring. If you want to measure it as a wave, it shows up as a wave. If you want to measure it as a particle, it shows up as a particle. Trippy.

So, light is either a particle or a wave depending on what we expect it to be.
You might be wondering what this has to do with heaven or hell. We'll get to that.

Another amazing discovery in science was the theory of relativity. You know, E = MC (squared). Get this, E is energy. M is matter. C is the speed of light (a constant). What this equation says is that energy and matter are the same. To be completely clear, there is a whole bunch of energy in a little bit of matter.

Just think about this. Everything that you touch or see as reality is energy and a little bit of matter. In fact, as you look at smaller and smaller units of matter, it all becomes just energy.

Here is what Einstein said about reality. "Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."

The point of stating these scientific discoveries is this. What they show is that two things can exist in the same place at the same time. It is you that determines which is perceived. You must be asking yourself, "What does this have to do with heaven or hell?"

Here we go. I believe that heaven and hell exist simultaneously, in the same space, like energy and matter. You determine whether you are experiencing heaven or you are experiencing hell. The existence of heaven or hell is determined by your perspective.

Try this.

Write down something bad that is happening in your life. (I'll do an example here, this is my example so please do not judge me. Make up your own...)

The Iraq War

Now write down every possible bad thing that there is about it.

People are dying, gas prices are going up, there doesn't seem to be an end, the country is split, there is a lot of hate, we have become an even bigger target for terrorism, etc.

Next, write an equal number of good things that can come from it.

America will come out of this with more tolerance, we will learn to think before we react, we will learn that an eye for an eye is not always a good strategy, I am learning the importance of knowing what the outcome is before I start something, I am more grateful for my freedom, people are moving towards alternative fuel sources, etc.

If you notice, both these perspectives are true (to me). If I choose to focus on all of the first set, I am seeing things more as hell. If I choose to focus on the second set, I see things more heavenly.

Where do you tend to focus?Here is another Einstein quote, "There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle."

Start looking for heaven in everything. It is there if you seek it.