Excerpt from Exhilarated Life: Discovering Inner Happiness
The Law of Garbage
Let the Bells Ring Out—I Get It!
In the middle of the night when I am wont to wake, I sometimes
surface with those trailing tendrils of prophetic dreams. Last night,
the dream was about searching for a job of a certain description. I
was using search terms similar to those I had used a year before and
found that the jobs that came up were the same as the previous year.
Not only that, they seemed to have a similar feeling of negativity.
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Curious. How could these jobs still be open, I wondered? Then I realized
these were different jobs entirely but matched my search nonetheless.
The negativity was somehow part of my criteria and the dissatisfaction
of the result commensurate to my lack of expectation.
Then WHAM! Lights! Bells! I got it! I knew it all along—repeated it
to myself like a mantra and still didn’t get the significance and sublime
simplicity of THE LAW. What law? The Law of Attraction? Nope.
Simpler. More real and grounding (literally) than the Law of Gravity.
What is it? The LAW of GARBAGE! Yep! Garbage In = Garbage Out.
The thing is, I’ve been working on a book called Making Friends
with the Sky: The Chicken Little Guide to the Internet. In it I share my
discovery, as I drop deeper into web design, Internet marketing, traffic
trends, and search engines, about the very nature of the Internet. That
the Internet is a model for consciousness. In short, it is our precursor
or teacher for the rate and subtlety of communication and creative
manifestation that we have been promised for centuries.
Of all the prophets and spiritual leaders, many used the simple language
of parable so that the lessons on how the universe works as a creative
vehicle driven on Love could be easily understood by all—educated
and simple alike. A mustard seed. A lily. We seem continually bent
on looking past the obvious in search of a more complex solution to
the woes of Life on Earth. We stand on the headland of Life and are
buffeted by the winds of change and whimsy. Life seems to be what
happens to us.
And then this morning came the revelation. So clear. So simple. So
provable. The books all say to be specific in your intentions. To write
down your goals—repeat them over and over. If you want a car, name
the model. If you want a successful income, name the amount. If you
want a great relationship, describe the very qualities you desire. Why?
I used to think it was to train my mind or somehow forge a bridge
between my desires and the universe so the universe could get busy and
manifest it. If I repeated it enough I would finally believe it and then
the universe would provide it.
Then I’d get caught up in what was “right” for me. What was the divine
plan? What was my role in creation? If I got what I thought I wanted,
would I be happy? Would it be “good” for everyone around me? And
while I was grunting and fretting through consciousness, the rest of
the world was either doing the same or more often, careening through
life, banging into people and circumstances beyond their control. And
there’s a good word: Control. How many of us think we have to control
the outcome to get what we desire?
So what is this epiphany? What is so sublimely simple and obvious
that I had to climb up and lumber over it every minute of every day
while I looked for the light? Well it is this: You get what you ask for.
Right, you say. We know this. “Ask and it shall be given.” “Be careful
what you wish for.” Of course. I ask…but do I get? Sometimes. Mix
emotion with your request—it makes it happen faster, like fuel on the
fire of desire. Is that right? Maybe, but not for the reasons I thought.
I had my list of wishes and I’d ramp up my emotions—first to
overwhelm my emotions of doubt, fear and anxiety, and then to fire
up the excitement for…what? Harmony? Success? A villa in the sun?
My business? Love? Peace? Happiness? Cool. Now, let me show you a
simple little illustration using the Internet to model how the universe
manifests. Interested? I think you will be if you get what I get.
When I Google my desires, here are my search results:
Harmony: 61,000,800
Success: 311,000,000
Villa in the sun: 34,300,000
Business: 1,600,000,000
Love: 1,350,000,000
Peace: 244,000,000
Happiness: 69,800,000
Now let me get a little more specific: “For sale traditional stone
villa in Hydra Greece three bedroom, terrace overlooking Kamini
Harbor walk to beach…” Now watch this…search results? 101. In
case it’s not yet clear, think about this. How long would it take me
to find what I want if I have to go through thirty-four million, three
hundred thousand websites? Would I give up before I got to the last
page of junk?
Now that I have 101, I can fine-tune that still more until I have a short list.
Then, once my house sells—I’m outta here! So it’s not about repetition.
It’s not about emotion. It’s not about “good” or “bad.” It’s not about “conjuring”
a result from the universe by will or intent. It is about specific and clear directions.
No more. No less. No garbage (unless trash is what you seek).
The clearer the vision, the more specifics given—the faster the circumstances
can be met. There are fewer matches and so you and the love of your life can
find each other because neither of you will be bothering with the dross
of wasted time and emotion in the wrong relationships. The life you
want cannot be left to chance. Period. And doubt? You don’t have time!
I’ve had random experiences of this and called it synchronicity. But
now I get it.
Emotion is important—not for the level of passion— but for the detail passion
gives you. I want to live on Hydra because Leonard Cohen lived and loved
and wrote poetry there; artists and authors cluster there; and by chance,
hmmm, a photo I cut out of Architectural Digest in the 1990s that has helped
me get through my toughest times, I discovered recently, is looking over
Kamini Harbor from the terrace of the McGuire (furniture design) family villa.
Now is it too much to imagine that the man in my life is, what? Greek,
maybe? Coincidentally (did I say that out loud), two friends chatting
at my husband George’s funeral wondered what would happen next.
One said to the other, “Oh, she’ll probably end up on an island in
Greece, writing a book.”
My mistake has been to see will and intention as a jaw set, hands on
hips determination to manifest—dammit! To rake off the weeds on the
top of the water until your dream glimmers up from the depths. But
now I see that you can’t even think about the weeds, let alone engage in
raking them. Google search for weeds: 70,500,000. If I put “weeds” and
“Greece” in the search I’m going to get a lot about Dandelions, which
has nothing to do with where I want to live when I kick this pop stand.
Mixing up our search gets results but they are garbled and unsatisfactory.
My own ambiguity has cluttered my path on many fronts.
I’ve got to tell you, it was the rubber band that did it. Once I started
being aware of all the moments I give energy and focus to negative or
insecure thoughts, I got closer to this realization. When your mind is
not engaged in all the garbage that can, might, is, did, or will go down,
there is finally room for sunshine thoughts. It’s easier to fill in the details
and get specific about disaster, disease, discord, and distrust because
we are constantly pummeled with the message in both our news and
“entertainment.” Turn it off. Turn your desires on. Sketch out your desire
and then fill in the details. Very clearly. Be specific. Cut out pictures. Add
music. Daydream about a conversation in these circumstances.
Think about it. If impulses of light traveling on fiber optics can connect
you instantly with your cousin in Saudi, or allow you to purchase a
$55,000 painting on eBay, can Creation Itself not tumble Paradise at
your feet for the asking?
And what about God? The divine plan? When you are fulfilling your
desires and the outcome is your happiness, then the world will follow
you and will be a happier place. It cannot be otherwise. Look at the stats.
It’s easy to see where the global “head” is. War, 800 million, outweighs
Peace, 244 million, by nearly 4:1. So if your head is your computer and
the universe (collective unconscious, according to Jung) is the Internet,
what are you putting into your search? Every single choice you make
gets a result. When you don’t make choices—clear and definitive—
you get the world of spam; everybody else’s uncensored, unconscious,
unclear, noise and confusion.
Now that you get it too, rather than life happening to you—make sure
you happen to Life!
~mh
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