Yesterday Barry and I went to Ashland for a craft fair, did some Christmas shopping, then headed up to Medford.

In Medford, we spent an hour or two getting lost in the Barnes & Noble bookstore… where he instantly manifested several types of books he was looking for.

The first one was a book that had a similar format to another he had wanted to find, that was to serve as inspiration for the formatting of my upcoming Success Unwrapped book. And even though he had never seen or heard of this book he picked up, it was exactly what we needed — and it only took a few minutes to find it.

Then he wanted a research book that was newer and went deeper than the one he had already picked up, on a topic we’re going to write about… and moments after putting the first one back on the shelf, he found it.

But his manifesting abilities were not perfect… we had a bet over the color of a new cat bed we picked up, and whether it was the same color as the one we had. He said yes, and if he was right, I would have had to do five nights of both cooking and cleaning.

I said no — the old one was slightly greener than the new one — and if I was right, he would have to give me five nights of massages.

>>> CONTINUE READING Tapping Into The Inner Child…

All my life I’ve been celebrating Thanksgiving about six weeks before my birthday, and Christmas about six weeks after my birthday.

That’s because in Canada, Thanksgiving is the second Monday in October. Everyone wonders why, but it’s pretty simple… the crops need to be harvested sooner up north, and since Thanksgiving was created to give thanks for the harvests, Canadian Thanksgiving was earlier.

Having said that, it’s worth pointing out that in Southern Oregon… just about an hour north of the California border… I’m actually on a higher latitude than I was in Toronto, Canada. But still, the weather here is warmer… go figure.

Anyhow, I just shared a video and a powerful exercise over on the LWL Worldwide blog that shows you why gratitude is so important to manifesting what you want… so I’d like to invite you to check it out. The post is called “Giving Thanks and Getting Desires”

But while you’re here, I’d like to share another video with you here. I thought it was going to be religious-focused because it’s done by a monk, but it’s really just inspirational about being grateful for the little things:

Speaking of the little things, Barry just sent me a chat that said:

look forward to watching the movie, tonight, with you – grateful for times like dat

And I’m very grateful, not only for the times we spend together, enjoying each other’s company, but for the little notes like that. They make my heart skip a beat, and realize how lucky I am to have found someone special like him.

>>> CONTINUE READING Gratitude, Appreciation, and Giving Thanks…

Writing about carrot juice yesterday reminded me of an email that was circulating the web a year or two ago. I happened to keep it, and posted it in my old Success Unwrapped membership area, so I found it again to share here:

ARE YOU A CARROT, AN EGG, OR A COFFEE BEAN?

A young woman went to her mother and told her about her life and how things were so hard for her. She did not know how she was going to make it and wanted to give up. She was tired of fighting and struggling. It seemed as one problem was solved, a new one arose.

Her mother took her to the kitchen. She filled three pots with water and placed each on a high fire. Soon the pots came to boil.

In the first she placed carrots, in the second she placed eggs, and in the last she placed ground coffee beans. She let them sit and boil, without saying a word.

In about twenty minutes she turned off the burners. She fished the carrots out and placed them in a bowl. She pulled the eggs out and placed them in a bowl. Then she ladled the coffee out and placed it in a bowl.

Turning to her daughter, she asked, “Tell me what you see.”

“Carrots, eggs, and coffee,” she replied.

Her mother brought her closer and asked her to feel the carrots. She did and noted that they were soft. The mother then asked the daughter to take an egg and break it. After pulling off the shell, she observed the hard boiled egg. Finally, the mother asked the daughter to sip the coffee. The daughter smiled as she tasted its rich aroma.

The daughter then asked, “What does it mean, mother?”

Her mother explained that each of these objects had faced the same adversity — boiling water. Each reacted differently.

The carrot went in strong, hard, and unrelenting. However, after being subjected to the boiling water, it softened and became weak.

The egg had been fragile. Its thin outer shell had protected its liquid interior, but after sitting through the boiling water, its inside became hardened.

The ground coffee beans were unique, however. After they were in the boiling water, they had changed the water.

“Which are you?” she asked her daughter.

“When adversity knocks on your door, how do you respond? Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?”

Think of this: Which am I?

Am I the carrot that seems strong, but with pain and adversity do I wilt and become soft and lose my strength?

Am I the egg that starts with a malleable heart, but changes with the heat? Did I have a fluid spirit, but after a death, a breakup, a financial hardship or some other trial, have I become hardened and stiff? Does my shell look the same, but on the inside am I bitter and tough with a stiff spirit and hardened heart?

Or am I like the coffee bean? The bean actually changes the hot water, the very circumstance that brings the pain. When the water gets hot, it releases the fragrance and flavor. If you are like the bean, when things are at their worst, you get better and change the situation around you.

When the hour is the darkest and trials are their greatest, do you elevate yourself to another level? How do you handle adversity?

Are you a carrot, an egg or a coffee bean?

May you have enough happiness to make you sweet, enough trials to make you strong, enough sorrow to keep you human and enough hope to make you happy.

The happiest of people don’t necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the most of everything that comes along their way.The brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past; you can’t go forward in life until you let go of your past failures and heartaches.

When you were born, you were crying and everyone around you was smiling.

Live your life so at the end, you’re the one who is smiling and everyone around you is crying.

You might want to send this message to those people who mean something to you; to those who have touched your life in one way or another; to those who make you smile when you really need it; to those who make you see the brighter side of things when you are really down; to those whose friendship you appreciate; to those who are so meaningful in your life.

May we all be COFFEE!!

The power to change the world we live in — to change our environments, in essence — truly lies within ourselves.

What’s the best way to “be” coffee?

>>> CONTINUE READING The Joys of Being Coffee…

Last night I was making carrot juice, and I poured some of the pulp down the sink, into the built-in garbage disposal. It seemed to work fine, but then I looked in the sink to see a mess of spewed carrot bits and egg shells, smelling pretty raunchy. It made me think immediately that the sink was sick, and I tried to remedy the situation, but the mess kept coming back up into the second sink… then back to the first one.

I asked Barry to help me out, and he was able to stop the suction effect by removing some pots from the second sink. The way they had been covering the hole, they kept the suction going and wouldn’t let the mess go down the drain.

“It’s okay,” he joked. “The sickness is gone.”

Now that the thoughts of doing irreparable damage to our sink and having to call plumbers had vanished, I was immediately swept with emotions, and said, “I’m sorry for making the sink puke. I didn’t mean to hurt it!”

Then I laughed at how I had personified the sink, and it suddenly reminded me of an old commercial I used to see on TV a lot. I told Barry about the Ikea commercial, which was apparently created by Spike Jonze, and how it used to effect me emotionally:

But it wasn’t just me. All the girls I knew felt sorry for this little lamp when watching the commercial…. then we’d laugh when the host said, “that’s because you’re crazy!”

But deep down we knew we weren’t crazy. We had been affected by the same tools movie makers use when hooking you into a story: the music, the pacing, the positioning of the “victim”, and the back-and-forth points of view.

>>> CONTINUE READING Inanimate Emotions… Just as Powerful as Real Ones…

Barry just shared this Native American parable with me, and I absolutely love it:

The Creator gathers all the animals and says, “I want to hide something from humans until they are ready for it — the realization that they create their own reality.”

“Give it to me. I’ll fly it to the Moon,” says the Eagle.

“No, one day soon they will go there and find it.”

“How about the bottom of the ocean?” ask the salmon.

“No, they will find it there too.”

“I will bury it in the great plains,” says the Buffalo.

“They will soon dig and find it there.”

“Put it inside them,” says the wise grandmother mole.

“Done,” says the Creator. “It is the last place they will look.”

Okay, so now that you know where to look… I’d like to share a great way to find it.

>>> CONTINUE READING Where Are You Looking?…

I’m eating a sugar-free Twizzlers strawberry twist right now… the same brand of red licorice that used to be my absolute favorite when I was a kid.

I had to buy the package — in fact, I had to buy TWO packages — because it instantly manifested in front of my eyes.

Now in case you’re thinking, “poof, there it is!” when I talk about instant manifestation happening right before my eyes… that’s not how it works, and that’s not what happened.

It’s magical, but it’s not magic.

Editor’s Note — Added After Publication: In a humorously synchronistic event that completely jives with the vibe of this post, Barry was just reading this and said, “Hey, didn’t you know that 2 1/2 years ago, I ended my Manifesting Mindset e-book with a similar phrase?”

No, I didn’t know that… but what he wrote was “It’s Not Magic… But It Can Be Magical!”

When you see a magician make something appear before your eyes, it really didn’t. It just looks like it did, through an illusion. That “illusion” (and some illusions are more illusionary than others) is what we call magic.

But when you manifest something, and suddenly it’s in front of you, it’s not quite an illusion… except for the fact that, on a quantum physics level, all of reality is an illusion. But the thing you’re manifesting is as real as our reality allows it to be, hence the word “manifest”. It’s just that the experience, the way that real thing becomes part of your reality, is magical.

I know, it might seem like I’m talking in circles, or not making sense… or even a little loopy. Okay, so let me clarify.

Here’s the story of how it went down…

>>> CONTINUE READING The Power of Instant Manifestation…

Today Zen DeBrucke dropped by to visit Barry and I. She’s a metaphysical coach I wrote about the other day, who teaches people about their Internal Guidance Systems.

This is actually the first time I’ve met her in person, although we’ve talked on the phone, and she was the first ever two-on-one interview that Barry and I conducted, almost a year ago. He’s met her a few times since that, though… some of her family live in Grants Pass and she comes up to visit occasionally.

It seems like things are going really well for her, and she’s been working a lot with Jack Canfield‘s Transformational Leadership Council.

What was really interesting was sitting at a table with her, enjoying some coffee (and she’s the one who teaches that there’s joy in every moment, and every accomplishment, so a good cup of coffee should be savored with gratitude) and having her talk off-the-cuff about things we could do, just like she does with her life coaching clients.

Except that she has now decided she’s a life consultant, rather than a life coach, because she doesn’t really ask the questions a coach does.

>>> CONTINUE READING A Visit From Zen…

Last night, Barry and I did our interview with Patrick Combs that I referenced a few days ago.

We got to ask him lots of questions about manifesting his dreams, the power of not giving up, and his #1 secret tool for getting what he wants: taking action.

Some of the listeners writing in questions from the webcast — and in fact, some of the community members who send us emails — have a tough time understanding the context of the term “taking action”. They tend to see it as being the opposite of “allowing” things to come to us.

They also have trouble putting together how they can “focus” on what they want to manifest, and yet “allow” it by not being attached to it.

And in fact it’s such a prevalent complaint that, coincidentally, as I started writing this, Barry was posting a similarly-themed article over on the LWL Worldwide blog.

(And no, I don’t believe in coincidences, only synchronicities.)

But if I was going to boil the process down into a nutshell version (which I also did on the call, to sum up what Patrick was saying) it’s not a bunch of contradictions that are happening at the same time; it’s a process, a sequence of events, and all the parts need to be in place:

1. Focus on what you want by thinking about it, emotionalizing about it, visualizing it, singing about it, writing out a list of goals, or however you like to do it.

2. Let it go and allow it to come when and how it wants to (in other words, don’t be attached to exactly what the result has to look like… and, Patrick doesn’t advocate dream boards or vision boards because they tend to make it more difficult to let go).

3. Take action towards that outcome, and action could mean any variety of things including picking up the phone and talking to someone, looking for ads, checking your finances and saving up for what you want to buy, or getting out to a party.

4. (And, as Patrick added, the cycle continues as you go back to focusing again as required.)

And if you’re worried about taking action BEFORE you know what direction you should be taking action in; Patrick suggests always taking small action steps.

That makes it easier to do, and also, in my opinion, easier to switch directions if need be.

This is where standard physics meets metaphysics.

>>> CONTINUE READING Where Physics Meets Metaphysics…

We have a new secret blog over at Manifest Life (you can get access to it at ManifestLife.com/wow) that’s part of our Integration Celebration, a special promotion to celebrate Barry and I integrating our work (and our lives) together.

I just posted an article over there called Powering Up Your Internal Guidance System… and I can’t link to the article directly, because you need to sign up for the secret blog to read it, but this is the beginning of it:

Ever had one of those challenges in life that you just couldn’t get around?

A challenge that just made your chest and stomach tighten up, with a literal “gut reaction” that told you to hold off – to let it breathe – even though your head told you there was a way to make it work?

Zen DeBrucke talked about the IGS, or Inner Guidance System, in our one-and-a-half hour two-on-one interview Barry and I conducted with her in December, 2006.

It’s a way of listening to your heart and your gut, and letting your intuition do the talking and decision-making for you – arguably the very best way to keep out of proverbial hot water, as most teachers would agree.

She walked us through how it works, and we felt the tightening sensation that tells you something is off, and the opening or freeing sensation that says you’re right on.

The rest of the article tells more about the IGS and how I’ve used it in my life.

It’s funny, because people always say, “listen to your gut,” or “follow your heart,” but they don’t realize that it’s really possible to tune into these parts of our bodies and get a valid response back.

Here’s Zen introducing the IGS in a video of her own:

I’ve been using my IGS constantly since she told me about it, too.

>>> CONTINUE READING Following Your Gut Instinct…

Last night I conducted my first on-camera interview with a live audience… kinda like a real talk show!

It went incredibly well… which, for me, means lots of learning and the odd burst of laughter too (because if it’s not fun — whatever “it” is — it’s not worth doing at all).

The interview was with Guy Finley at his world-renowned Life of Learning Foundation in Merlin, Oregon.

(I always find that town name funny because it reminds me of my good friend, Merlin Holmes — someone I jokingly call a wizard, who was partially responsible for making me the person I am today, with the partner I’m with today, through his ongoing encouragement that made me open my mind and heart. Thanks, Merlin!)

But back to Guy… he has a loyal following of students on a quest to open their own minds and hearts, and several times a week Guy either teaches them a live lesson, or gives them a chance to be guest speakers themselves (or sometimes both).

Last night my live interview was the curriculum rather than a solo talk from Guy, and the focus was his international best-seller, The Secret of Letting Go and his new release, 365 Days to Let Go: Daily Insights to Change Your Life.

We talked about what it means to let go, why and how to do it, how to overcome the stumbling blocks that typically stop us from letting go, and the ebbs and flows of life.

I personally learned a lot from Guy through the course of conducting the interview — and from reading his book in preparation — and I know that most of the audience members (including Barry) did as well.

One of the main takeaways was to love unconditionally, and not put any weight on what “should” happen or how things are “supposed” to be (in other words, “stop shoulding on yourself,” as Michael Angier says).

To be happy, we need to accept every moment as perfect; whether it’s going the way we expected or not, it’s rewarding us by either giving us our desires or teaching us a lesson.

>>> CONTINUE READING Learning to Let Go With Guy Finley…