Recipe For Lemonade: Chapter Five

PART V: PLAN FOR THE BEST... AND JUST DON’T THINK ABOUT THE WORST

This might be the chapter where you start to hate me.

Stick with me, though, okay? I promise it will make sense later.

I believe, to a certain extent, in the principles of “Law of Attraction,” and in things like vision boards and statements of intention and wish lists. Used properly, I believe these things can motivate us to “plan for the best.” What they don’t do, unfortunately, is prepare us to deal with the worst.

In case you haven’t seen a movie or read a book about the Law of Attraction, here are its basic tenets:

1. The world is made of vibrating waves of energy - down to the tiniest molecule.
2. Energy and matter have a relationship that allows them to affect each other.
3. Human beings are capable of “transmitting” and “receiving” energy, both positive and negative.
4. Positive energy attracts more positive energy; negative energy attracts negative energy. Like attracts like.
5. Because of the relationship between energy and matter, positive energy can also attract positive matter (or events, or circumstances) and negative energy can attract negative matter (or events, or circumstances).
6. As such, the “Law of Attraction” states (roughly) that good or bad, whatever energy is dominant in your life will attract more of itself.
7. There is no “Law of Repulsion,” because energy is inherently attracted to itself, regardless of its positivity or negativity. In order to “repulse” energy (or events, or circumstances), you must, effectively, starve it for attention by ignoring it or removing it from your life.
8. Being conscious of how you manage your positive and negative energies can give you some degree of control over your life, allowing you to “attract” more of what you want by focusing on it, whether through “setting your intentions,” meditating on your desires, journaling, creating vision boards, making wish lists, etc.
9. Note that, although conscious attention to managing your energies is the most effective way to use the Law of Attraction to your advantage, because it IS a “Law,” it is always working, regardless of our consciousness about our energies. Thus, even if we are unconsciously focusing on something, more of it (positive or negative) will come into our lives, whether we like it or not.

This all seems very - forgive the pun - attractive. I can have control over my circumstances just by thinking happy thoughts and surrounding myself with positive imagery? In a world that is unpredictable and uncontrollable, it almost seems too easy.

It is.

Here’s the rub: according to most proponents of the Law of Attraction, we’re not supposed to even think about the worst-case scenario, or we might “attract” it. When things don’t go our way, when the world rains on our parade, when life gives us lemons, The Law of Attraction says that we attracted them, like a magnet. It’s a kind of schizophrenic belief system - on the one hand, you have control over your future, because you can use this irresistible force to draw the things you want to you. On the other hand, if you have unconscious desires you’re not in control of, those will flood into your life too (sometimes when I listen to proponents of the Law of Attraction, they sound a little like The Sphinx from Mystery Men).

The Law of Attraction says, if we aren’t where we want to be in life, it’s all our fault, because we didn’t clarify our intentions enough, we wanted something else more, or we let some fear of success creep into our daily affirmations. A fervent devotion to this dogma, while helpful in opening us up to the possibility that our dreams can come true and encouraging us to take responsibility for our actions, just doesn’t prepare us for lemons. It doesn’t! It only makes us feel like we brought our misery on ourselves, and we end up hating the person in the mirror for not being a good enough manifester.

If you really want to be capable of true alchemy, of turning lead into gold, a vision board will not be enough. An intention and a meditation journal will not be enough. This may not be what you want to hear, but making lemonade out of lemons is not easy. You have to roll up your sleeves, bust out some elbow grease, and work at it every day until it becomes second nature. That’s why it’s called making lemonade, not manifesting or attracting lemonade.

The good news is, it’s not rocket science. Anyone willing to do the work can turn a lemon into lemonade. So, are you with me?