by Marc Allen
You will be what you will to be;
Let failure find its false content
In that poor word “environment,”
But spirit scorns it and is free.
It masters time, it conquers space,
It cows that boastful trickster, Chance,
And bids the tyrant Circumstance
Uncrown, and take a servant’s place.
The human will, that force unseen,
The offspring of a deathless Soul,
Can hew a way to any goal,
Though walls of granite intervene.
Be not impatient in delay,
But wait as one who understands;
When spirit rises and commands,
The gods are ready to obey.
— James Allen, As You Think
When your spirit rises and you dare to dream of doing, being, and having what you want in life, the creative forces of the universe mysteriously appear and give you all the support you need.
There are no more excuses — our spirit scorns them, and is free, even able to master time and conquer space. And that is no small thing.
You have a powerful will, an offspring of a deathless soul, and it can find its way to any goal, regardless of the apparent obstacles. You have all you need within you. All resources are at your command — all you have to do is ask for them. A great visionary teacher said it all, very simply and clearly:
Ask and you will receive.
Seek and you will find.
— Jesus, Matthew 7:7
Mind is the master power
that molds and makes,
and we are mind, and evermore we take
the tool of thought,
and shaping what we will,
bring forth a thousand joys, a thousand ills.
We think in secret, and it comes to pass —
our world is but our looking glass.
— James Allen
As You Think
LESSON 1
IMAGINE YOUR IDEAL SCENE; LIST AND AFFIRM YOUR GOALS
THIS IS THE ESSENTIAL FIRST STEP
This step is simple — all it involves is writing down a few pages of ideas — and yet it proved to be vitally important, fundamental to the rapid growth I experienced after I did it. It opened the door to every other discovery in my life, and has brought me to a level of success and fulfillment that had been completely unimaginable to me before I did this simple process.
You don’t need to accept all of this as truth written in stone, and you don’t need to ponder every key and master every lesson in this Course before you see results in your life. Just work with one key at a time, for as long as it feels appropriate, and that key will begin to open doors for you that will lead you to your own unique success in your own unique way.
This Course works in many different ways for different people, and on different levels within each of us at different times: Sometimes we’re dealing with purely physical, material issues, sometimes mental, sometimes emotional, sometimes spiritual. We are multifaceted people, each with our own unique way of being and of doing things.
It’s worth repeating: Feel free to change and adapt the material along the way. You are unique! So do it your way. Work with this material in any order and any way that appeals to you. Use these exercises to stimulate your own innate creativity. You’ll end up creating a unique personalized Course that will serve to guide you in creating success as you define it to be.
A POWERFUL EXERCISE
This little exercise involves doing just a bit of writing, and then following up with the regular affirmation sessions described later. But don’t underestimate this exercise because it’s so simple — it will undoubtedly have a powerful and positive effect in your life, just as it had in mine.
The first step is called the “ideal scene process.” It is another way to look at the second habit Stephen Covey gives us in his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. This habit alone is a great key to success:
Begin with the end in mind.
— Stephen R. Covey
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People
This is a simple, powerful key: Begin with the end in mind, and keep the end in mind, always. Then you’ll discover that the opportunities that lead you there have always been right in front of you — you just haven’t seen them until now.
IS IT NECESSARY TO BE A MILLIONAIRE?
Whether your ideal scene includes being a millionaire is entirely up to you. It certainly isn’t necessary for everyone, but it’s a perfectly achievable goal if you feel you want that level of financial security. I know I do — and I’ve gone from poverty to being a millionaire using the principles and practices contained in these keys.
The important thing when imagining your ideal scene is not the money involved — the money is only a tool that helps you live the life of your dreams. A great many people can live the life they dream of without needing to become millionaires first to do it.
Being a millionaire in itself is an empty goal. What kind of life do you want to create for yourself? That’s the worthwhile question to ask. What steps do you need to take in order to live the life of your dreams?
DREAM FREELY AND DEFINE SUCCESS
The important thing is to allow yourself to freely dream, and then to clearly define what success is for you.
The “ideal scene” exercise that follows is wonderful for giving you an easy, playful way to clearly imagine what success is for you as the unique individual you are.
Before we get to writing down our ideal scene, though, let’s first reflect a bit on the meaning of success and the value of money. Some unknown writer put it this way — giving us another great key to success.
To live your life in your own way,
To reach the goals you’ve set for yourself,
To be the person you want to be — that is success.
— Anonymous
You may very well discover you don’t need to be a millionaire at all before you can be the person you want to be. In fact, you will probably discover that being a millionaire has nothing to do with it. Having a lot of stuff, including a big house and a hefty bank account, will not make you happy or fulfilled — and has nothing to do with the person you really want to be, ultimately. (You may not agree with me at this point, and that’s fine. Go ahead and get the big house and big bank account — they’re perfectly wonderful goals — and once you get them you’ll discover for yourself that it doesn’t make you happy or fulfilled. And then you can go on to what’s really important in your life.)
Don’t get me wrong: Being a millionaire is a great goal, and it has the wonderful advantage of being a very concrete, achievable number. I set that goal for myself, and attained it. But I found along the way it has nothing to do with the person I want to be and the life I want to live. It has nothing to do with my happiness or deep, lasting satisfaction or fulfillment — nothing to do, in short, with what is important in life.
Understanding that makes things a lot easier for us: We don’t need to achieve our goals of success in the world before we can find enjoyment and even fulfillment in our lives, because enjoyment and fulfillment are found within us, not out there in the world, and certainly not in a big house or hefty bank account or diversified investment portfolio.
As Eckhart Tolle puts it, all we need to do is get the inside right, and then the outside will take care of itself.*
THE RIGHT ATTITUDE TOWARD MONEY
In a newspaper interview, Eckhart Tolle — author of The Power of Now — showed us in his open and unassuming way a simple way to deal with the whole issue of money in our lives. He was asked what was it like to suddenly be so successful financially, and he said, “For years I had no money, and that was okay, and now I have money, and that’s okay too.”
That pretty well sums it up, doesn’t it? It does no good to be frustrated about money: It is what it is, you either have it or you don’t, and either way it’s okay. Life goes on.
We shouldn’t crave money; it will not bring us happiness. We shouldn’t worship money; it is a very good servant, but a very bad master.
We shouldn’t despise money, for it is neither good nor bad in itself. We need not be puzzled by money, for it is but a tool for us to use as we will, and the rules governing it are not complex, as we will see as we continue with this Course.
Here’s a powerful key, an affirmation:
In an easy and relaxed manner,
in a healthy and positive way,
all the money I want and need is now coming to me,
in its own perfect time,
for the highest good of all.
You can substitute abundance for money, if you wish. Or prosperity. Or you can say a shorter form of it — something like, Money comes to me easily as I do what I love. Or, My life is filled with abundance as I do what I love.
You might want to reflect on what you’ve read so far before you go on to the next section. Perhaps ask yourself these questions, and just notice what pops into your head. Think about your answers for a while; play with different possibilities.
• What does it mean to you to live your life in your own way?
• What goals have you set for yourself? Are they written down? Do you remind yourself of them frequently?
• What kind of person do you want to be, ultimately?
Now we’re ready to take the first step, the one that makes us visionaries.
IMAGINE YOUR IDEAL SCENE
It all starts with a dream. The essential first step is to dream and to imagine:
Imagine five years have passed,
and you are living your ideal life:
doing what you want to do,
being who you want to be,
having what you want to have.
Some of us don’t even allow ourselves to dream — and yet it is the essential first step. Without the dream, achievement is impossible.
Take a bit of time to quietly relax, and then allow your imagination to wander. Allow yourself to dream. Encourage yourself, the way you would encourage a child, to play with different possibilities that could await you in life — if you but dare to dream.
Imagine you’ve been so inspired by the words and exercises in this Course — and by many other things you’ve encountered along the way — that you have created the life of your dreams. You have become a success in every way you wish. And best of all (as we will affirm later, repeatedly), you’re doing it in an easy and relaxed manner, in a healthy and positive way, in its own perfect time, for the highest good of all.
If money were no object, and you could do, be, and have exactly what you wanted, what would it be?
WHAT ARE YOU DOING, IDEALLY?
• What kind of work and career do you have?
• What is a typical day for you?
• What do you do for relaxation and inspiration?
• What are you doing to contribute to a better world?
WHAT DO YOU HAVE?
• What have you accomplished?
• Where do you live?
• What does your home look like?
• What are your most intimate relationships like?
• What is your family life like?
WHAT KIND OF PERSON ARE YOU?
• What is the quality of your life like?
• How would someone close to you describe you?
• What are your physical and emotional states?
• What are your mental and spiritual states?
Here’s where you begin to create your own version of this Course: Take a piece of paper and write “Ideal Scene” at the top, then write whatever comes to mind.
Use these questions as a starting point. Describe your ideal. Let it be as far-fetched as you want — we’ll deal with reality later. For now, let your imagination soar. Don’t restrict yourself, and don’t edit it as you write it — no one else has to see it, and you can always change it later.
We are limited only
by our own imagination.
When you’re finished, put your ideal scene in its own folder or notebook, or even a three-ring binder (I use a simple folder with pockets on the inside). This is the first step in creating the exact kind of life that you want, the life you’ve described on that sheet of paper. You are on your way to building the architecture of your success.
Don’t forget this key as you do this little exercise — it was something I heard from my cousin, Katherine Dieter. She was on a yacht with a very wealthy man, and she asked him what would be the best piece of advice he could give her. He immediately said:
Don’t dream too small.
That’s great advice for every one of us, especially for artists, politicians, businesspeople, and those working to improve the world in some way.
LIST AND AFFIRM YOUR GOALS
When you take this next step you will see powerful results. Within your ideal scene are bound to be several different goals. Take a clean sheet of paper, write “Goals” at the top, and list your major goals, however many there are, on the page. I had ten or twelve goals when I first did my list; now I have just six — my life has gotten simpler over the years.
State your goals simply at first — maybe you’ll have something like this:
• Succeeding by doing my art
• Home in the country
• $_____in liquid assets
• A happy, fulfilling family and personal life
• Building my business successfully
AFFIRM YOUR GOALS
First we simply list our goals, in any way that comes to mind. Then we go back and rewrite each goal as an affirmation: words that affirm those goals are now in the process of being realized. The trick is to state your goals in the present, and yet put them in a way that is believable to you at present, so your subconscious mind can get to work on them.
Rewrite your goals in a way that affirms that those goals are in the process of being created now, rather than in some distant future. For the goals we listed above, rewrite them something like this:
• I am now succeeding by doing my art.
• I am now finding a beautiful home in a quiet area I can easily afford.
• I am now building over $_____in liquid assets.
• I now have a happy and fulfilling family life and personal life.
• My business is now growing and building, profitably and successfully.
The most effective affirmations are stated in the present tense, and yet are entirely believable to you. They are worded so your goal is now in the process of happening — not that it has already been achieved, which is not believable.
I am now a millionaire is stated in the present, yet it is something your conscious and subconscious mind will have difficulty believing if, in reality, you are scrounging to pay the rent every month. Here is the affirmation that worked for me:
I am now creating total financial success,
in an easy and relaxed manner,
in a healthy and positive way.
As I repeated these words, I got a clearer and clearer picture of exactly what “total financial success” meant to me. It meant having the freedom to do what I want with my time. It included being a millionaire; it also included saving well over 10 percent of my income and giving away well over 10 percent — a great key we will discuss later.
As I repeated these words, something magical happened, in due time: All kinds of opportunities appeared, all kinds of possible ways to achieve the lofty goal of financial freedom started to become obvious to me, and then plans just naturally began to form in my mind. That led instinctively to the next step: making a simple, written plan for each major goal. (We’ll get to that in Lesson 2.)
Once I started affirming my list of goals, I naturally over time developed clearer and clearer pictures of each of those goals — and those pictures started to include some very specific steps to take.
A FEW EXAMPLES
Not long after I started affirming I am now find
ing a beautiful home in a quiet area I can easily afford, a doable, detailed plan became clear to me: First, I would need to get into some kind of funky little starter house, anything at all to quit paying rent and start building equity. Then, after several years, the equity in that house would be enough to make the down payment on a much nicer house in a quieter neighborhood. Then — if I wanted — the equity on that house could eventually be enough to get my dream house on a hill.
That plan is exactly what happened.
Here’s another example: Once I started affirming I am now creating total financial success, in an easy and relaxed manner, in a healthy and positive way, a detailed way to measure my success came to mind: I saw that, for me, there were four levels of being a millionaire, and I wouldn’t have achieved total financial success until I had reached the fourth level.
This is the way I chose to look at it; you of course can look at it differently — and you probably will. What is true for me is not at all necessary for everyone; I’m presenting it here as an example of the kind of plans that naturally come to mind once you start affirming something. This is the plan that emerged for me. I imagined I would move through these four stages:
1. Net worth of over $1 million. (Net worth is adding up all your assets — cash, real estate, investments, art, value of personal business, etc. — and subtracting your liabilities — mortgage on home, credit-card and all other debt and loan obligations.)
