I receive messages from people who feel exactly like this, and I understand why they feel that way. Life can be difficult and sometimes circumstances appear to conspire against us, but I have always believed that there is another way of looking at the situation. You cannot always choose what happens to you, but you can choose what you do with what happens to you, and that distinction is at the heart of everything I mean by powerful positive thinking.
This is also where I think many people misunderstand the Law of Attraction. They imagine that it is some kind of cosmic vending machine into which you insert a positive thought and out comes the life you ordered. If only it were that simple. The reality, at least as I see it, is much more interesting because the thoughts you continually entertain influence the way you behave, the things you notice, the opportunities you recognise and the decisions you make. Your thoughts therefore become part of the mechanism by which your life changes.
The great difficulty is that we often send out entirely contradictory messages. We say we want money, but spend our days worrying that we will never have enough. We say we want happiness, but continually discuss everything that is making us miserable. We want love, but remain emotionally attached to someone who hurt us years ago. We want success, but spend our time reminding ourselves of every occasion on which we failed. We desperately want change while constantly concentrating on the very circumstances we want to escape.
That, for me, is the trouble with the Law of Attraction. I think of the Universe rather like the Great Amazon. It is listening to what you repeatedly put into your order, but it may not understand the complicated explanation that you have attached to it. If your mind is constantly occupied by lack, failure, anger, resentment or fear, then that is the signal you are repeatedly reinforcing. You may be saying, I don't want this, but your mind is still spending enormous amounts of energy concentrating upon it.
It's not there to punish you
The Universe, in this philosophy, is not there to punish you and it is certainly not something to blame when life goes wrong. It is simply part of a much bigger process that we do not entirely understand. Perhaps that is where faith comes in. I have never believed that you need to understand every mechanism before you can benefit from it. We breathe air without seeing it, we use electricity without seeing it travelling through the wires and we experience love without being able to place it under a microscope and explain exactly what it is. There are many things in life that are real even though we cannot see them.
But positive thinking should never become an excuse for doing nothing. If you are in debt, thinking about abundance does not pay the bill. If you dislike your career, imagining a better job does not send your CV to a prospective employer. If you are in an unhappy relationship, visualising happiness does not automatically repair it. If you want to improve your health, positive thoughts need to be accompanied by sensible choices and, where appropriate, professional advice. The Universe may open doors, but you still have to walk through them.
This is why I prefer to talk about thinking better rather than simply thinking positively. Thinking better means looking at your circumstances honestly but refusing to accept that today's circumstances necessarily determine tomorrow's. It means asking different questions. Instead of asking, Why is this happening to me?, ask, What can I learn from this? Instead of saying, There is nothing I can do, ask, What is the one thing I can change? Instead of staring endlessly at the obstacle, start looking for the route around it.
Think of your life as a journey. You get into your car, enter your destination into the satnav and set off. You know where you want to go, but you have no guarantee that the journey will be straightforward. You might encounter traffic, roadworks, an accident, a closed road or some unexpected diversion. You do not normally conclude that your destination has disappeared simply because one particular road is blocked. You allow the satnav to calculate another route.
I believe life is much the same. You need a destination, and that destination should be something you can genuinely imagine yourself achieving. Perhaps you want financial security, a better relationship, a different career, improved health, greater happiness or simply a life in which you feel more comfortable being yourself. Whatever it is, you need to know where you are going before you can begin to move towards it.
This is where imagination becomes such an important part of positive thinking. Close your eyes and imagine what your life would look like if the things that currently trouble you were no longer controlling your thoughts. Do not simply imagine having more money; imagine what financial security would actually mean to you. What would you do differently? Who would benefit? What opportunities would become available? Do not merely imagine being happy; imagine what a genuinely happy day would look like. Think about the people around you, the things you would do and, most importantly, how you would feel.
Write it down if you need to. Give your future some substance. You are not pretending that it has already happened. You are establishing a destination. Then comes something that I believe is desperately important: expect it.
The difference between wanting and expecting
There is a profound difference between wanting something and expecting something. Wanting can sometimes contain an element of doubt because when we say, I want to be successful, there can be a little voice immediately whispering, but what if I am not? Expectation is different. Expectation says, This is where I am going and I am going to keep moving towards it.
That does not mean you should wander through life believing that you are entitled to everything you want. Life does not work that way. It means developing sufficient faith in yourself, your abilities and the possibility of a better future that you refuse to allow today's difficulties to become tomorrow's destiny.
There will be setbacks. Of course there will. Anyone who tells you otherwise is selling you a fantasy. You will make mistakes, people will disappoint you, opportunities will disappear and sometimes things will happen that you could never have predicted. The positive thinker does not live in a world without problems. The positive thinker has simply learned not to turn every problem into a catastrophe.
I have always liked the idea that perhaps some of the things that happen to us are actually redirecting us. We think we know exactly where we should be going, yet something happens that forces us to change direction. At the time we may see it as failure, bad luck or even punishment, but years later we may look back and realise that the apparent disaster took us somewhere we would never otherwise have gone.
That is where faith and the Law of Attraction come together for me. You do not have to believe that every disappointment is secretly wonderful. Some things genuinely hurt. Some experiences are devastating. But you can have faith that your life is not finished simply because something has gone wrong. You can believe that there is another road, another opportunity, another beginning.
Karma also has a part to play in the way I see the world. What you put into the world matters. If you are kind, trustworthy, supportive and generous, you create relationships and connections that can eventually come back to you in ways you could never have predicted. If you spend your life being selfish, dishonest, spiteful and destructive, you may achieve some short-term victories, but you are also creating the environment in which you have to live. The energy you put into the world influences the world you experience.
This is why becoming a positive person is much more than repeating a few optimistic phrases each morning. You cannot spend the rest of the day gossiping, criticising, bullying, complaining and putting other people down and then expect an affirmation to transform your life. The real transformation takes place when positivity becomes part of who you are.
You become the person who looks for solutions rather than someone to blame. You become the person who encourages rather than undermines. You become the person who can celebrate somebody else's success without feeling threatened by it. You become the person who can admit a mistake, learn from it and move forward. You become the person others can trust.
And when you become that person, something rather remarkable happens. People respond differently to you.
A positive, open and generous person is more likely to attract friendship, cooperation, opportunities and goodwill. That does not require any supernatural explanation. People simply like being around people who make them feel good. They are more willing to help them, recommend them, work with them and open doors for them. Your thoughts have therefore started producing practical consequences in the real world.
That is the part of the Law of Attraction that I think is often overlooked. The process does not have to be mysterious to be powerful. Change your thinking and you change your behaviour. Change your behaviour and you change the way people respond to you. Change those relationships and opportunities begin to appear that you might previously have missed. Take advantage of those opportunities and your circumstances begin to change. Your circumstances change and suddenly you look back and wonder how your life became so different.
Perhaps that is the invisible part of the process.
You cannot necessarily see positive thinking working in the background. You cannot put faith on a weighing scale or measure hope with a ruler. You cannot photograph an expectation. Yet these invisible things can influence the decisions you make every single day.
Do not pretend
So, if you are currently surrounded by problems, do not make the mistake of pretending they are not there. Look at them honestly. Make your list if you have to. Decide which ones you can influence and which ones you cannot. Deal with the things that require practical action, seek help when you need it and then stop allowing the problems themselves to become the centre of your universe.
Instead, establish where you want to go.
See yourself there. Feel what it would be like. Become excited about the possibility. Have faith that your circumstances can change. Then start moving.
If the road is blocked, find another road. If you make a mistake, learn from it. If someone closes a door, look for another one. If you discover that you were heading in the wrong direction, be grateful that you discovered it and turn around. There is no shame in changing direction when you realise that the road you were travelling is not taking you where you want to go.
Most importantly, never allow a temporary setback to become a permanent belief about yourself.
You are not your debt. You are not your failed relationship. You are not the job you hate. You are not the mistake you made ten years ago. You are not the person somebody else told you that you were. You are the person who can decide what happens next.
That, ultimately, is what I mean when I talk about the Law of Attraction. I do not see it as a promise that the Universe will simply hand you everything you desire. I see it as an invitation to change the way you think, the way you behave and the way you approach the possibilities that life puts in front of you.
The Universe may be listening, but you have to make sure you are sending the right message.
Stop ordering more of the life you are trying to escape from and start imagining the life you want to create. Think better. Live better. Treat people better. Expect better. Take action when opportunities appear and have sufficient faith to keep going when they do not.
You may never see exactly how the process works, and perhaps none of us ever will, but you will know something has changed when you begin to change. And that is where the real power begins.
Frequently asked questions about this subject
1. Does the Law of Attraction mean I can simply think my way out of my problems?
No. Positive thinking is not a substitute for practical action, professional advice or taking responsibility for your circumstances. Its value lies in changing the way you approach those circumstances. When you stop seeing every problem as a dead end and start looking for possibilities, you are far more likely to recognise solutions and act upon them.
2. Why do I seem to attract the things I don't want?
It can feel as though life continually delivers the same problems, but sometimes the pattern begins with what occupies your attention. If your mind is constantly focused on debt, failure, rejection or disappointment, you can become so absorbed in those things that you overlook opportunities to change them. Changing the focus of your thinking can alter the decisions and behaviours that follow.
3. What does faith have to do with positive thinking?
Faith is the willingness to believe that your present circumstances are not necessarily your permanent circumstances. You may not know exactly how your life will change or when it will happen, but you can choose to believe that another route exists. That belief can give you the courage to keep moving when circumstances might otherwise persuade you to give up.
4. What should I do when positive thinking doesn't seem to work?
Don't immediately assume that you have failed. Look at what is actually happening and ask whether something needs to change. Perhaps you need more knowledge, a different approach, better preparation or an entirely new direction. A setback can be treated as information rather than a verdict on your future. Reassess the route, make the necessary changes and continue moving towards your destination.
5. Can changing the way I think really change my circumstances?
Changing your thoughts can change the way you behave, and that can have a very real effect on your circumstances. A person who expects failure may avoid opportunities, while someone who believes improvement is possible is more likely to learn, ask for help, make connections and take constructive action. The transformation may therefore begin invisibly, with a change in thought, but its consequences can eventually become very visible in your life.
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