BEN DEPRAZ-BRENNINKMEIJER

The law of universal gravitation has dominated the field of physics for centuries. Even if science is now moving beyond gravity and exploring dimensions that a layman like me cannot fully comprehend, no one would question the fact that the principle of gravitation governs life on Earth.

There is a similar law in the universe of human fulfillment. I am not referring to the idea of “success” here, because success can be measured in many different ways, shapes or forms. Also I don’t believe success is a desirable driver in and of itself. But fulfillment, this is something that we can all measure internally and we can all strive for in a healthy, personal way. Regardless of the opinions of others, the feeling of being fulfilled is priceless.

Much has been said about the ‘Law of Attraction’ (the “Secret”) and fantastic marketing has helped make this idea into some kind of divine path; an alleged truth that only a few enlightened individuals supposedly grasped and understood over the last few millennia of human history. A secret that has now become universally available and that promises heaven on earth for those immersing themselves in it. Also, this idea is a nice echo to our dear Sir Isaac Newton and his the law of gravitation (objects attracted to the center of the Earth, right?) so of course, being the meaning-making and associative creatures that we are, we love it!

But I would like to suggest that the Law of Attraction is incomplete. Whatever one truly, deeply, intensely want in life, this will NOT manifest itself just because one focuses one’s mind, thoughts or attention on it. Even if you are in a peak state and you feel energy in your body as you think positive thoughts and intensely visualise your desired result, when you calm down and open your eyes again, nothing will have happened in the external world.

UNLESS…

You actually go and DO something about it.

Don’t get me wrong: I consider that there are wonderful insights and incredible value in choosing to alter your perceptions, seeing the positivity around you, realising that you have the freedom to control your life, creating the right mindset to support your drive. All these things resonate with me.

But I think there is not enough emphasis out there on the simple fact that you still have to ACT, you still need to DO something which is, on some level, related to your goal, desire or dream.

Even if you were just having a conversation with someone, and in that conversation a wonderful opportunity showed up and you had no idea it would happen, you still needed to engage into that conversation and be open enough so that the opportunity would present itself. You took an action which was to go to this place, or contact this person, or send this email.

The more actions you take, the more flexible and creative you get, the more active you become, the closer you will get to your outcome. And it may come from somewhere totally unexpected! But you still needed to take the actions you took to have your outcome manifest, even if there does not seem to be a direct cause-effect relationship between your actions and your outcome.

So rather than hoping to “attract” certain events, things or people into our lives, let’s actually decide to ACT and make them happen.