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Missing Messages

Imagine this: You’re at a friend’s house, cheerfully chatting, and there’s a knock at the front door. But your friend makes no move to go see who it is. The knocking continues, gradually becoming more insistent, but still your friend ignores it.

Finally, you offer, “Don’t you think you should go see about that?”

“Oh no,” your friend says, “It’s just the door again. It happens sometimes. But if I ignore the noise, it’ll eventually stop.”

You think that’s strange, but you let it pass. And sure enough, after a few minutes the knocking does cease.

Later, your friend says, “Man, I wish the pizza delivery would hurry up and get here. I’m starving.”

What just happened here? Pretty obvious, isn’t it.

Your friend ordered pizza, then when it came he ignored the delivery man’s knocking.

But don’t laugh at your friend. You may be doing the same thing every single day of your life.

How often do you do affirmations, make requests or pray for a particular result, then ignore the input of your inner mind?

Not very often, you say … but are you sure about that?

To make this a bit clearer, let’s back up a few years. Back to our childhood days. Back when the world was bright and new to us, and we suspected that everything might be possible.

Scattered in amongst the insecurities and uncertainties of childhood sparkled your fantasies, your hopes, your wishes.

And your daydreams.

One day it was: “Someday I’m going to grow up and be a doctor.”

The next day it was: “I think I’d like to be a famous scientist.”

And on another day you may have sighed: “That movie star is so terrific. Someday I want to be a movie star just like that.”

We know that your inner mind is set up to monitor your wishes, wants and desires, and to find ways to give them to you.

When you wish for something, your inner mind takes that wish as a serious request. The only trouble is, you keep changing what you’re requesting.

Yesterday you were thinking, “Tomorrow, I’m going to get to work early and tackle some of these projects that have been hanging fire.” A little later you might have thought, “I ought to take a day off and relax — all day to myself.” Then you watched a movie on TV, stayed up later than usual, and went to bed thinking, “Maybe I’ll sleep late in the morning.”

Those were all instructions to your inner mind, but they all pointed in different directions. So your inner mind probably ignored them. We all do this — and we do it constantly.

So when you sit down to do an affirmation and make a request to your inner mind, is it any wonder your request is often ignored? You’ve spent years training your inner mind to ignore what you say you want. It knows you’ll probably just change your request again within minutes. It assumes you’re not being serious because most of the time you’re not.

“Yeah, but this time is different. I really, really want the money (house, husband, vacation, job, etc.) that I just requested. This time is different.”

Remember the story of the boy who cried wolf?

The kid was a teaser. He cried ‘wolf’ so often for his own trivial entertainment that the townspeople finally just started ignoring him.

Just like our friend ignored the pizza man’s knocking at his door.

And just like our inner minds ignore our serious requests.

So how do you change that?

How do you break through your inner mind’s pattern of ignoring your requests?

Well, it’s not complicated. But it’s not entirely easy, either.

You’re going to have to do three things differently.

First — Stop Trivial Requests

Don’t ask your inner mind for anything until you’ve carefully thought it through and have decided that you really want what you’re requesting. And not until you’re positive you’re going to keep on wanting it next week.

For example, how many times have you sat down to make a request and you changed it even as you were asking?

Or maybe you make one request today, and you make a different, conflicting one tomorrow:

Monday:
Bring me the love of my life; someone to love and cherish
forever, and who will love me with all their heart.

Tuesday:
Bring me a constant stream of new romantic partners who
are exciting, loving and don’t expect long-term commitment.

Wednesday:
Bring me serenity and the contentment to live alone
without the need for lovers or partners.

See what I mean? How on earth could your inner mind take seriously such a series of requests?

How can your inner mind know what you want if YOU don’t?

It’s the job of your inner mind to supply the things you want and need.

It’s your job to decide.

And when you make a whole career out of not-quite-deciding anything … well, that’s what your inner mind will deliver.

Second — Learn How to Get Your Inner Mind’s Attention

Most of our thoughts are trivial — that’s sad but true.

And after years and years of having to ignore most of those trivial thoughts, your inner mind has become very good at filtering out the unimportant, passing stuff. It knows from experience that it’s mostly just noise.

Now it only pays attention to the most insistent thoughts.

So you’re going to need some persistence to break through your inner mind’s “triviality filter”. Only real persistence will get it to take your requests seriously.

That’s why teachers suggest that you repeat affirmations so many times.

But even that isn’t a sure thing. I’m certain you’ve had affirmations that didn’t bring the desired results. Remember the affirmations above — three different wishes on three subsequent days — by the person seeking love in three different ways.

We learn a technique for getting through to the inner mind, like affirmations, and what do we do?

We abuse it.

We use it to ‘cry wolf’ by changing our requests almost as often as we change our passing wishes.

Indeed, we train our inner minds to ignore us even more resolutely.

All because we have never learned how to make up our minds about what we really want.

Sometimes it seems that the only thing we ARE sure about are the things we DON’T want. We think about them a lot — so what happens? Sure enough, our inner mind takes note of those thoughts (because they’re the strongest, most persistent), and assumes they’re instructions. Soon our life is filled with loads of what we don’t want.

That’s exactly how most of us take this great mental system of ours and pervert it.

But it is possible to change this pattern.

Third — Listen for Your Inner Mind’s Feedback

This part may be the hardest for some people. It’s the one that — when omitted — causes us to miss most of the opportunities in life.

This is the skill we are least likely to have developed, and it’s the one that would enable us to accept all the things our inner mind is trying to bring us.

Let me put it like this: have you ever gotten spam e-mail? You know the kind. It’s the stuff offering to make you rich by next Thursday, but you don’t have to do any work for those riches — they’ll do it all for you, and just give you the money.

Or it will show you how to “be a bigger man” or “more of a woman” if you’ll just send them money.

If you’re a newcomer to the Internet, you may not be familiar with ‘spam’ yet. But you will be. Just as soon as the bulk mailers get hold of your e-mail address, they’ll sell it all over the world, and soon you’ll be receiving every goofy offer imaginable.

Everybody who receives spam e-mail soon adopts the same strategy — they filter out what they can and ignore the rest. They’ll be automatically deleting the stuff as soon as it shows up in the in-box.

Well, that’s what your inner mind does with most of your wishes and requests — ignores it — because you’ve been spamming your inner mind for years.

What’s the main characteristic of spam? Sure, it comes in bulk, and it’s usually not very realistic. But even more typical, the sender is never interested in knowing you, learning what you need, or listening for your input.

He blasts out millions of messages, but he never asks for your comments or suggestions, doesn’t want to know what you want. He only wants you to purchase. He wants your blind obedience.

And that’s how most people treat their own inner mind.

They blast in a request because they’ve heard that the inner mind will obey.

Then, when their inner mind offers feedback or suggestions, they ignore the messages.

Our friend ignored the knocking at his door, even though he had ordered pizza. And we often do exactly the same thing to our own inner self.

The inner mind usually doesn’t speak in words. That’s the realm of your conscious mind. Instead, it speaks to you through impressions, moods, hunches. Subtle stuff.

And if you do your best to ‘master your moods’ and ‘ignore distracting feelings’, then you may be refusing to open your door to the delivery man you called for.

Let’s say you’re doing an affirmation requesting a certain amount of money. All the while, you have this sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach that something is wrong. Maybe it’s a feeling that you ‘don’t deserve’ riches.

So you ignore the feeling, flooding it with more repetitions of your affirmation. Just keep going, you tell yourself — you’ll overcome those feelings and win.

But often you don’t win, no matter how many repetitions you do. I had exactly that experience for years.

Now, please don’t misunderstand. This nagging feeling is not the message. It’s only your inner mind knocking on the door, trying to get your attention.

The error is in ignoring the knocking — you’ve been missing the input from your inner mind for years, as it tried to call your attention to important information.

For example, you’re affirming ‘riches by next August’. But deep down in your inner mind is a previous instruction (maybe put there years ago by a friend or family member) that you’ll never be rich — or that you’re not a good enough person and you don’t deserve fine things.

Your inner mind is knocking on your door, hoping you’ll sit down and tell it how to reconcile those two contradictory instructions. It’s saying, “Hey, I want to do what you’re requesting, but I’ve got conflicting instructions here, and I need some help sorting it out.”

But you don’t listen. You just keep on giving commands.

Ever work for a boss like that? The kind who never listens; he just issues orders left and right, but doesn’t want to be bothered with helping you figure anything out?

Well, the good news is, you don’t have to keep doing that to yourself.

Why does that ‘bossy’ supervisor act that way? It may be because he really doesn’t know how to communicate the details of what he wants. So he just issues orders and expects you to magically get it right somehow.

But that’s not comfortable for you … it’s not really your role, is it?

Same with your inner mind. It has its own role to fulfill in your life, but you’re asking it to do both its own job and yours too. However, the inner mind is not wired to make decisions.

It brings you information, it draws your attention to things, and it carries out your instructions brilliantly, provided your instructions are clear enough.

So how do you communicate with your inner mind?

Here are five simple steps you can take to get real inner communication going within yourself.

Step 1: Look for Subtle ‘Door Knocking’

Remember, I said that those uneasy feelings are not the message — they’re just your inner mind trying to get your attention.

Anytime you’re working on affirmations, or praying, or doing any kind of inner work, be on the lookout for quiet little signs that something just doesn’t feel quite right.

That’s always a signal from your inner mind.

Instead of ignoring or suppressing those feelings, look for them — become more aware of them — because they are priceless.

As soon as you feel some kind of consistent distraction, stop and pay close attention to it. Maybe you suddenly feel drowsy, or bored, or you can’t stop fidgeting. Maybe you feel like ‘this won’t work’. Whatever it is, that’s your inner mind trying to break in, using the only language it speaks.

It knows something you don’t, and it wants to help you keep things going right, but it can’t help if you don’t listen.

When you get that kind of feeling or distraction, stop and acknowledge the signal. Then ask what the message is. Just ask.

When’s the last time you engaged your inner mind in real two-way dialog? Have you EVER talked with your inner mind as an equal?

Step 2: Ask for Suggestions

Once your inner mind has your attention, simply ask for suggestions. State what you want, explain how you THINK you want it to be delivered, and ask for ways to change what you’re requesting so that it satisfies both you and your inner mind.

Then just wait and ‘listen’ for answers. Now, unless you’re schizophrenic you’re almost certainly not going to hear thundering voices proclaiming answers. What you’ll get are subtle nudges and quiet little ideas crossing your mind.

You may suddenly remember an old friend or recall the name of a certain company, and get the feeling that you should call them.

You may have an urge to drive a different path to work on a given day, or have a sudden impulse to speak to a stranger when you never do such things.

Your inner mind speaks a very subtle language, and as you learn to heed that language, you’ll be developing what others call ‘intuition’. That’s the language you’ll be learning.

Step 3: Always Use Insurance

Here’s a wonderful add-on phrase that should go onto the end of every request, every affirmation, every prayer you ever utter.

“Please do this or something better in ways that are for the highest good of me and everyone involved.”

According to Stuart Lichtman and Joe Vitale, authors of “How to Get Lots of Money for Anything — Fast”, this type of phrase was first recorded by Socrates many centuries ago.

Here’s why you should always use this phrase: your inner mind is a very literal mind. There’s the story of a gambler who kept wishing he could break the bank. He got his wish. One day, in a traffic accident, he lost control of his car and ran through the front window of the local Savings & Loan.

Sue, a lady I knew, did affirmations to receive $25,000 and then did nothing to try and open a door for the money to come to her. Eventually she did get her $25,000 … in the form of an insurance settlement … which she then had to turn around and pay right back out to her doctors for medical care she had received. Net gain: zero; net pain: enormous.

If she had used this insurance phrase, her inner mind would have known that some possibilities were not acceptable, and would have brought her the money through some other, safer, more pleasant channel.

Step 4: This Is a Joint Venture

Your inner mind is your equal partner. It can do things you (your conscious mind) cannot do.

And vice versa.

Ever watched a bird with a broken wing trying to fly? It doesn’t work.

And trying to reach success using the strengths of only one part of your mind is like that poor, crippled bird. It also doesn’t work.

Unless you use both wings, nothing you do will ever be very successful. Not because life is unfair, not because ‘God has it in for you’, and not because of Murphy’s Law. It’s simply because that’s how it is. You need both wings — both areas of your mind — to fly in this life.

So it’s important for you to start getting familiar with that other part — your inner mind.

Step 5: Don’t Stop Halfway

Calvin Coolidge wrote this about persistence.

“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan ‘press on’ has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.”

How often have you done an affirmation, then before you got what you requested, you were changing it and asking for something else entirely?

It’s important to stay on track.

At the same time, it’s also crucial that you be flexible enough to adjust your target in light of feedback from your inner mind. Adjusting your path is not forsaking your goal.

Let’s say you affirm: “I am rich. I have a million dollars in the bank, and I receive a yearly income of half a million dollars.”

Nothing wrong with any of that — except for one little, nagging doubt.

So you go to a quiet place, still your thoughts, and ask your inner mind what it’s trying to tell you.

In response, you realize that for years you’ve mistrusted rich people. Your family always said things like, “I’d rather be honest than rich.” Or “We may be poor but we’re happy.”

So you realize that forgotten suggestions hidden away in your early memories have told you that rich people were dishonest and unhappy.

Now, by asking your inner mind to make you rich, you are (in effect) requesting that it make you become dishonest and unhappy. Of course your inner mind is trying to get your attention … Hey! Are you SURE that’s what you want?

Your initial request was only half a description of what you want. Your inner mind is trying to help you complete the picture.

So you change your affirmation to something like: “I am rich, happy and healthy. I have a million dollars in the bank, and I receive a yearly income of half a million dollars, all of which I receive in totally honest and honorable ways. My family, friends and co-workers or employees all rejoice with me for my success.”

This nullifies the effect of that childhood suggestion.

Now your inner mind is happier about these instructions. Then, to be extra safe, you add on your insurance: “Please do this or something better in ways that are for the highest good of me and everyone involved.”

Then keep listening. If your inner mind has more reservations about your request, it’ll knock on your door again.

If it does, just ask what still needs resolving, and listen for the conflict. Resolve that conflict the same way you just did the ‘rich people are dishonest and unhappy’ conflict.

When you’ve got everything ironed out, you’ll have a content, easy feeling. In fact, when you think about the target you’re requesting, you’ll get a buoyant, excited feeling of near-total certainty. That’s how you’ll know your conflicts are all cleared up.

Never quit halfway to your goal, and never quit halfway to your perfect affirmation. Be persistent.

Step 6: Always Say ‘Thank You’

Anytime your inner mind takes the trouble to knock on your door, always acknowledge it with something like: ‘thank you for wanting to help me; what do you suggest we change?’

And when you have attained your target or received what you requested, it’s time to say ‘thank you’ again.

It’s especially effective if you keep notes as you go along, and to add a special thanks note — in writing — in recognition of the help you’ve received, once your target is achieved.

This thanks is as important to your inner mind as it is to you, so don’t forget it.

And always, ALWAYS pay close attention when your inner mind seems to be knocking on your door.

Because your whole future could be about to change. But you gotta get up and see who’s there.