Once again we come back to James Allen’s classic, As a Man Thinketh, a staple of the Eclectic Method. This chapter Allen dedicates to the dreamers of the world, those who take the invisible in their minds and create wonders for humanity.
There is no denying that a powerful vision creates substantial results. SpaceX was once a vision in the mind of Elon Musk. Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony was once a piece that played in that famous composer’s head. The art we love, the technology we depend upon, the music we sing along to, these all started in the mind of a creator.
The Principle of Mentalism teaches us that the universe is mental, and that the world around us and both the beauty and evil that dwell inside of it come first from our minds in the forms of thought, visions and ideals.
What kind of vision do you have for your life? What you are envisioning is what you are silently and invisibly creating. You can go as far as you can imagine yourself to go. So, what are you imagining? What is your vision? Do you imagine your dream coming to fruition more often than you envision negativity for your life?
“Your circumstances may be uncongenial, but they shall not remain so if you but perceive an ideal and strive to reach it. You cannot travel within and stand still without.”
-James Allen
Allen makes an example of this concept by describing a young man in poverty who instead of focusing his attention on the long working hours and the unhealthy environment and lack of education, dreams of a better life.
He forms an ideal of intelligence and refinement and liberty and actively pursues it until one day he is a man of considerable wealth and influence. Becoming one with his ideal, and changing the world within, the world without adapts to his heightened vibrations and he receives what he has mentally asked for.
This is were I believe the vast majority of people fail. They do not cherish ideals. They envision the worst things happening and idly wish for only slightly better conditions. They fail to dream big and establish firm ideals for their lives and even less often they act towards them. Most people hope that the vision of a better future will just happen to them by a stroke of luck and continue to think in negative and detrimental ways.
“And you to will realize the vision (not the idle wish) of your heart, be it base or beautiful, or a mixture of both, for you will always gravitate towards that which you secretly most love. Into your hands will be placed the exact results of your own thoughts; you will receive that which you earn- no more, no less. Whatever your present environment may be, you will fall, remain, or rise with your thoughts, your vision, your ideal. You will become as small as your controlling desire, as great as your dominant aspiration.”
-Jame Allen
Allen’s words beg an important question: If your life is not what you dream of, do you secretly love something that is out of resonance with your vision? The Principle of Vibration teaches us that we attract that which our vibration is in resonance with, so we must ask what is keeping our vibration at a low frequency?
For some I believe that they love to be lazy, that they love a lack of responsibility and an easy life. Sometimes the fear of responsibility and the fear of potentially failing when in pursuit of those dreams is enough to prevent any productive action. Some love that which is holding them back more than the vision of a life moving forward.
To have an ideal for a better life, one must be willing to take on the responsibilities of that position, whatever it may be. Many people love, perhaps secretly or unknowingly, remaining children their whole lives so that they never have to face their own issues and their own secretly coveted thoughts.
Many people love being lazy and not having to face the fear of failing and the strife involved with building yourself up and doing the hard work to get to a better place. Many people love ignorance, not facing who they are because the pain of doing so would be unbearable. Some people are so in love with their base desires that they cannot give them up even when they are the very things holding back growth.
Instead of changing themselves, they look to those who have done the work and call them “lucky” or proclaim that the successful have been blessed by fortune, not acknowledging the sacrifice, effort, and inner-work done to achieve success. They ignore the process and call the success “chance”.
“In human affairs there are efforts and there are results, and the strength of effort is the measure of the result. This is not mere chance. “Gifts,” powers, material, intellectual, and spiritual possession are the fruits of effort. They are thoughts completed, objects accomplished, visions realized.”
-James Allen
Ask yourself some important questions. What do you secretly love? Do you have a vision, or do you idly dream? Do you put forth the effort, or do you support your fears more than your ideals? Solidify your vision. Fortify your ideals. Correct your thoughts, and then put forth the necessary effort. The only thing guaranteed by not trying is not getting the desired result.
Envision for yourself the best life you could have. Live up to that ideal in your thoughts and actions. Identify with that ideal and mold your behaviors to follow suit. Think not of the worst possibilities, but of the best that can happen and work toward that vision. Greatness starts in our hearts and minds.
“The vision that you glorify in your mind, the ideal that you enthrone in your heart- this you will build your life by, this you will become.”
-James Allen
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