Why do we attract what we don't want? An answer pointing to a higher power.

My belief on why we get what we don't want rather than what we do want is because generally we think about what we don't want a lot more than we think about what we do want.

When you're in a situation where you don't want to screw up, you usually tell yourself, "Don't screw up, don't screw up." You constantly have "screw up" in your mind. You should instead say, "Succeed, succeed."

Think about it like this. Do a Google search for "not above top secret". Though you want things that are not ATS, every result on the first page is for ATS. It's the same as when you focus on what you don't what... you end up getting it.

originally posted by: ketsuko
So then, to what do you attribute the ever present fear of "The Man" that pervades many layers of society? Is that not just as obstructive to an individual's ability to think, self-realize and achieve as any religion?

I think in many ways we are our own worst enemy. We construct our own barriers to success and lay the blame on them when the only ones building those fences are ourselves. Yes, there are some external barriers, but in the vast majority of cases where some outside agency is blamed for a person's lack of ability to get ahead, the blame also lies inside themselves.

Yes, you bring up a good point once again of how things can apply to both religion and secular institutions in similar manners. Sometimes, I think "The Man" is worse than religion, because with religion, the rules are set - with "The Man" the rules are not even known, much easier to fear the unknown.

originally posted by: scojak

Think about it like this. Do a Google search for "not above top secret". Though you want things that are not ATS, every result on the first page is for ATS. It's the same as when you focus on what you don't what... you end up getting it.

That search reference is brilliant.

originally posted by: alomaha
I was wrecking my mind with this subject for so long...in vein. Until I finally realized that you cannot conceive something with your mind which is inconceivable by your mind. Many people "think" that they are their mind but that is not true. It's just small part of our our overall being, maybe even not a part of our being but just some kind of parasite attached to our being. So it is very hard for that little part to be fully aware of the whole.

This is an interesting point. I thought about this before as well.

We can manifest anything we can think of - do you know what the true limit is? What we can think of. I think we would find it hard to manifest something we could not imagine. Yet there are so many things that each one of us cannot imagine. That is another limit to breach, probably a more interesting one to pick at, in fact...

Some people who are depressed or in a rut cannot imagine certain aspects of other ways of life. Although I'm sure they could imagine certain others.

it all boils down to our beliefs and how we perceive the world around us and what reality is, mainstream science sometimes is as dogmatic as religion, look up this brilliant cellular biologist, watch some of his lectures and interviews on youtube

a reply to: darkbake

Okay, I'm not saying I get what I want, but I can not for one ounce of a bit say I get things I do not want... I really don't, again I don't want everything I get but everything I'm fearful of and hope stays away.... well it stays away... no serious health issues for me or my family. No one has gotten in accidents or gotten hurt.... not in 27 years... Everyone is relatively happy. Happiness brings more happiness. We are positive happy people and things seem to stay that way around us.

originally posted by: OrioniusAtlantai

I've read in numerous articles that the law of attraction is founded upon positive thinking. It is also stated that negativity tends to attract faster than positive. They say things you don't want tend to attract at a faster rate because we tend to think on the negative rather than the positive.

This is what I experience-
It is the amount of emotional attachment to a concept that drives it. Forget "negative" and "positive". Think "energy", neutral... no difference between fear and happiness.

Just like gasoline that runs our car, it is neither good nor bad. Though we could choose to call it "positive" when it takes us where we want to go, and call it "negative" when a car thief directs it away from where we parked it...


The positive and negative split is a very superficial layer of our consciousness and judgement.

On a deeper level, there is no difference between repulsion and attraction. On levels beyond time and space, in which there is only "what is, now" (not what was, what will be, etc.)

In the most "down to earth" and physical sense, emotion is hormonal secretions in our body, which stimulate faster heart rate, breathing, blood pressure, electrical activity of neurons, blood flow to specific muscles or organs.

All this can happen while thinking about something, and it happens to move you towards that thing you are thinking about, and without you consciously choosing it.

There are also less physical ways that I perceive emotion effects events and beings, but they get more esoteric and I don't wish to expose them here.

But even if we keep this discussion on a very material level we can see that emotion is energy and movement.

Often people will attach more emotional charge to the things they don't want than to those they do.
Many different methods and teachings are becoming popular these days to help people learn how to stir up more emotional charge about those things they want.

But ultimately "negative" emotion doesn't create any faster than "positive" emotion- they are the same thing. It just depends upon how much of it (or the strength, the volume) is produced.

People can be stirred to produce more emotion for things they don't want by others, by the media, by groups and religions- through speaking of those things and encouraging anger, sadness, fear about them.

My point here was that we could say people thus affected are being manipulated against their will, as the OP suggests.

OR we can consider that we humans are much more complex than just a conscious individual will or ego! While we think we don't want something, a deeper less conscious part wants it.... that part, which we have pushed into darkness, repressed or suppressed, still drives our choices even if we don't know it.

(That's the part the starts firing off neurons before we are aware we have chosen.)

So people who go to, listen and are affected by such agencies trying to 'manipulate' do so because they WANT to be manipulated!!!

When things you don't want come to you, or happen, what do you feel? Like you are powerless in a world beyond your control.
In the big picture, that can also be a relief and freedom, though it is not socially accepted by our current culture to admit a part of us desires that freedom (and keep it in the dark).

Because Law of Attraction is BS.

Imagine this: you found a golden fish! But instead of fulfilling you three wishes, it would fulfill you any wish to the rest of your life (or if you wish to live forever, than for eternity)! Would you accept it? I think that after initial exhilaration your life would become a hell, you would become afraid of your every potential thought, until you wished you were dead...

a reply to: darkbake

Just wanted to chime in and say I enjoy your perspective Dark Bake.

Thoughts create actions that change reality and thus manifests a different reality that would have existed no other way.

I would imagine that the unwanted manifest reality that intrudes or disrupts a person's own manifestations is from outside forces that have more power than the human will does.

ETA: An outside force could be the forces of nature, like rain ruining an outdoor event, or the will of other people's manifest realities. The human will power could be a single person's will like my reference or of a group of people.

Let me see, from your own estimations manifestation is basically you want something then you make it happen, right? Like your own example: coffee. So lets see, I want to manifest a sandwich. So I get up and make it. But yet the fact that I'm a christian keeps me from making it. So I starve forever unable to procure said sandwich because of mighty DNA overlords. Wouldn't we all be dead? I don't get it.

Also the fact that the "Law of Attraction" is not a law in all actuality, but a belief. Therefore it has a lot in common with religion. So doesn't that mean your manifestation powers are also being manipulated through DNA mastery by alien beings? Are they aliens that are separate from the other western religion aliens? Because you are following something that is basically religion. Are we all limited through alien DNA religion mastery? Does this somehow contradict itself and become nonsensical? How do we all "manifest" our way to work or "manifest" our mouths around a burger? Do you know karma is also a religious belief? Also, no disrespect, but what exactly is going on in that head of yours that you have to visualize and write down the process before making coffee?

Also, you can manifest anything you imagine? Please manifest a turtle from thin air. Peoples need to put the doobie down for a minute. This anti christian/catholic stuff is just getting weird.

a reply to: _damon

Unfortunately you yet again like every other deep thinker I have met fall into the fear of God category, where you are in full belief that things are they way they are for and we should just be more content.

It is sad indeed that you believe that the animals are better off because they just live with nature, you are WRONG, they are totally at the mercy of the brokenness as well, this is apparent to anyone who can see without the aid of ANY religious views.

All of the religions and organizations of the world are held captive by a force that they are afraid to speak of, and they hide behind it vigorously with fervent claims that it is the "Will of God".

Luckily, a number of us have had enough, and are going to show these betrayers what REAL manifestation and power are all about.

It is time to get out from your savage belief systems that are holding us all back, the very MINUTEST ones are the worst indeed.

It is of the utmost percolating rage , that even the most open positive , creative , imaginative , manifestors of excellent things are ALL victim to this belief system that trials and victory are what life is all about.

They have no idea, NO MEANS to access anything different, they are shackled constantly with JOY at the fact that the "Universe" knows what is best for them.

They all claim to hate religion, but have unending support for every other magical books they can get their hands on;

Well I have seen enough of it for years now, to realize all of it is the SAME THING hiding in different forms to entrap the most visionary and hopeful among us, to cap them at a certain level and hold them AND their SOUL at GUNPOINT,

Something which a lot of people should strive to see, why is the soul so afraid of this hidden agenda, if it is not held over a barrel in dimensions beyond??

Faith and Hope seem to be nice, and GREAT, but in the end the victim of this perpetual cycle continues on, completely scared beyond death to offend something that may have unimaginable horrors in wait for them.

All the witches, therapeutic touch members, Self-Realizationists, EVERY LEVEL of them I can scare half to death and they start calling on the fears they know so well to shut down the immense truth of the situation... a lot of it IS built into the DNA, and I see scum introducing many things into humanity to CRUSH any resistance.

Most people know NOTHING of what they are, and are made sure to NEVER know, EVER.

Well, some of us DO.

a reply to: ParasuvO

How will you hold their soul at gunpoint? And would the soul be afraid?

Anyone else recognize the fact that many different accounts have similar philosophies, although they sound a little wacky to anyone normal? Anyone also recognize that they have similar writing styles? You know the unabomber was identified through his writings. His brother read them in the news and said "That's how Ted writes". It's almost like a fingerprint. I suspect sock puppetry. For those not familiar, it's when a single person sets up multiple accounts through multiple emails and uses them to support/verify their own claims. I have seen another thread similar to this one where the same things appeared to be going on. People with a lot of time do some strange things.

The Law of Attraction is New Age claptrap...a blind assertion which is unprovable and yet, at the same time, unfalsifiable.

You make a mental note when you don't get what you want; you make a mental note when you get what you don't want.

That's all.

VERY good thread, I have almost had the same exact thoughts as you.

And I agree with other posters, people tend to attract the things they don't want more and faster because they put more energy into those thoughts. Thoughts have power, your thoughts have more power than you know, and when a person worries about something they don't want happening those thoughts are bringing whatever it is closer and closer to you.

That's why people say - Don't Worry! Like seriously DON'T do it!

Now on thinking about what you DO want; I've read around - somewhere - that if you think about what you want too much that you choke it, and it won't come to you. Which if true, is very confusing and annoying. . .

Now with the two theories of manifestation, the second one to me is simply doing what you know you need to do to achieve the things you want to do - it's simply kicking yourself into gear; and it could be a form of manifestation but not what comes to mind when I think about manifestation.
When I think about it - it's the first theory for me and I could say it's easier for me to follow that because I've had that happen to me multiple times in my life; it's quite amazing . . .
And to do that I agree with _damon, it takes intention, focus, visualization - here I also put myself or feel the emotions, the vibrations that I would be in when I reach that goal, and faith.

Although, I'm very interested on why you believe that it could violate karma, can you explain please?

And once again GREAT thread, There have been some amazing posts here as well, I am totally saving this sucker.

The answer is simple my friend. A thought is a thought no matter if you perceive it as good or as bad, it will still occur, it will still manifest as a thought form in your mind. With that understood you attract not what you don't want, what you attract is what you consistently think about. So, if you constantly have thoughts about what you don't want you actually end up attracting it because your label of good or bad does not register to your subconscious mind, that's why they say think positive thoughts because it will attract the thought patterns you are repeating in your head.

We just eagerly blame it on negativity because that's how the ego perceives it. That's why you never see people complaining about positive thoughts, ever. Positive and negative cannot exist together at the same time, that's how you truly know that nothing is truly positive or negative because they are really only perceptions. Illusions.

You think greed is bad now, imagine a world where manifestation has been perfected in humans. If everyone had what they wanted there would be no control, our planet tapped for resources, outrageous advances in technology but with a population with a greed bloodlust how far would that get us? Doomsday clock would be chiming all the time. As with any perfectly functioning machine we, the human race, need guidance and mild oppression (government) or else we will wipe ourselves out. We are part of a huge manifestation and majority rules on what we create. It is going to take a lot more than a few hundred thousand people thinking towards a common goal when you look at the size of the entire population and our united goal as a race to populate the universe.

"if you will it, it is no dream"

originally posted by: Bluesma

People can be stirred to produce more emotion for things they don't want by others, by the media, by groups and religions- through speaking of those things and encouraging anger, sadness, fear about them.

My point here was that we could say people thus affected are being manipulated against their will, as the OP suggests.

Your entire post was very well articulated, and I agree with at least 90% of it. Your point above is exactly what I've been saying for years. I believe that what we're referring to as "The Law of Attraction" is exactly the big secret that the elites of the world know and use, and will go to any lengths to keep it from us "commoners".

I think that's the foundation of all of politics and religion. Keeping us in a constant state of conflict and confusion causes us to focus on all that is negative and prevents us from focusing on the positive.

originally posted by: candlestick
Because Law of Attraction is BS.

Okay, there are many responses here that suggest the posters did not read the OP.

Perhaps some points of it need to be highlighted?

Darkbake wrote in the OP:

A lot of people take to the belief that manifesting is just "wishing" for something and getting it without effort. Well, I don't subscribe to that philosophy

However, there is another form of manifestation that is very close to that first form - what you do is, you visualize something in your mind, write it down, and then get there. After a lot of practice, what really happens is, you begin to learn how to think critically and problem-solve. The visuals are important because you have to be able to imagine and manipulate variables that aren't directly in front of you.

I think the use of the term Law of Attraction led some to mistaken conclusions about the topic.

What is described in the OP is problem solving skills and critical thought.
Not magic.

the values given to you by religions and society are not really useful, because they don't tell you anything about what to do in any kind of situation you might find yourself in - in fact, they are mostly meant to limit your perspective and experiences.

-Which suggest it is through life experiences and changing, flexible perspectives, that problem solving and critical thought is developed as a skill.
Religion stabilizes perspective and limits life experiences (through dictating one universal perspective and rules upon acceptable behavior and choice).

It can also be observed, however:

But you also discover that there are useful pieces of wisdom that do help one manifest in this fashion without harming others or themselves. You can probably see the problem here that arises from having unlimited manifestation power -

It can take a lot of character to be able to use it in a fashion that doesn't come back to bite you, or others, see

Religion limits our manifesting power, yet it also provides some limitation on ones capability to abuse that power (to use it in ways which end up hurting themself, or others eventually).

I will offer an example- the Do Unto Others As You Would Have Them Do Unto You religious "law".

If you are very observant, you can see that others around you will eventually treat you in the same way you treat them. Simply because of psychology- mimicking happens without us being completely conscious.
A simple example is the way people will match the facial expressions of the person they have in front of them.
A more complex one is when you have a relationship of regular contact with a person who has a specific sort of behavior consistantly. If they suddenly do a different type of behavior one day, then you may surprise yourself by doing the behavior they usually do- as if you switched places with them.
Or away from them, you find yourself acting like them towards others.
It is a mechanism of psychology that we all share, and has nothing to do with magic- it is in fact a part of our automatic systems which support socialization.

So that religious "rule" could also be seen as some advice. It would limit your manifestation power somewhat- a solution to one obstacle may be "punch that person in front of me and then I can get the thing I want in front of them."
But that advice would signal the possible effect that we could be punched back and the solution wouldn't work.We'd be on the floor gasping instead of getting that thing.

My example illustrates a benign and even positive effect religion may have, which is NOT what the OP wished to express (it came to me first because my opinion is that religion might have some potential positive tools in it, especially for the development of social bonds).

The OP meant to point especially at:

a lot of Western religions are built on confusing people's cause-and-effect mechanisms to make it so that when they try to manifest something, they do it in an unhealthy manner. Basically, religion seems to be made for the direct and exclusive purpose of breaking people's ability to manifest.

-The way the life experiences can get limited by the "rules" (therefore leaving less information to pull from in problem solving ) as well as perspectives which limit critical thinking (like teaching one to not examine and analyze a situation they are in, but rather, simply tell themself God planned it this way for some mysterious reason, or some sort of spiritual justice, ending all further observation and learning).



I think this is simply a look at the old conflict between religion and science, thinking versus feeling, logic versus emotion, socialization versus individualization, masculine versus feminine, Yin versus Yang.

Religion limits individual power, as does any effective social structure.
This sometimes results in one becoming unaware of their potential as an individual.
Which is why I think many spiritual paths encourage a "period in the desert" or retreat from civilization for a time, in which one exits those limitations and expands their experiences and skills.