I was never called to summon things with a flick of my wand or straddle a broomstick and take off for the dark side of the moon, but I was certainly interested in magic. Real magic. The kind of magic that transforms ordinary lives as they are lived here on earth.
Since I was a child I’ve been fascinated by stories about personal mastery and the transformations that are possible when we apply powerful principles. Being a writer, I was always particularly interested in the power of the word. But all sacred teachings worth their salt come wrapped in mystery and symbology, and sometimes we’re so impatiently ripping off the wrapping that we miss the essential teaching.
You see, I thought that all I had to do was dream up some great goal and then write it down and visualise it a few times and presto! Changed life: money rolls in through the door; kids behave themselves; people give me tickets for overseas trips…
So it made sense that if I did the ABC and didn’t receive the goodies, then either the laws didn’t work or I was a failure at applying them. Neither conclusion was particularly attractive.
When I realised that my most gorgeous goals were lying latent for years on end, I kind of gave up… but I couldn’t totally give up on the idea of being the deliberate, conscious co-creator of my life. That sort of teaching haunted me for years, so naturally I wanted to give my kids the same message. I’d have to do it with smoke and mirrors, of course. “Hey kids, look at these great ideas! They work!!!!” (“But don’t look at me applying them – hopeless…”)
In my passion I wrote a fabulous inspired book for adolescents called The Mastery Club – See the Invisible, Hear the Silent, Do the Impossible. (I know it was inspired because of how it evolved and has been received, and I know it’s fabulous because people tell me so!) In this book I showed kids how to create the lives of their dreams using the simple principles that I felt I hadn’t used successfully myself. Hm.
But so much magic happened in the process of writing and marketing my book, that I had to have another look at my so-called failures, and I realised I was actually succeeding at my goals after all. I was succeeding at my most highly valued goals.
It’s increasingly common knowledge now that, yes, we are all successful manifestors. We are manifesting all the time. The thing is, we’re not always successful at deliberately manifesting what we want – we also often manifest things we don’t want.
Well, that’s the message that’s emerging in the aftermath of the furor around The Secret (when many people have become frustrated that their goals aren’t manifesting as quickly as they’d like).
But actually it goes deeper than that. We are each resoundingly successful at manifesting what is genuinely most important to us. When we sit down and get clear on the hierarchy of our values, it becomes patently obvious that our successes lie in the arenas to which we commit our time, energy, money and love. This is the wisdom that Dr John Demartini conveys so powerfully in his books and programs.
So while I’d be rapt to have a truck back up to my front door and unload crates of money, and while I’d be utterly delighted if someone were to hand me free tickets for overseas travel, neither of those goals has been top of my list. Instead, I’ve focused on relationships, personal development, creative expression… And in those arenas I enjoy great success.
Which brings me to my next point: the purpose of setting goals is not to achieve them so much as it is to grow. As motivator, Ralph Marston says: “The value of an ambitious goal is not measured by what it will bring to you. The worth of a goal is measured by what it will make of you in the process of following and attaining it… What matters is not how realistic or practical your objective may be, but how much it compels you to push beyond your limitations.”
The modern wizard is a ‘wandless wizard’ who creates magic through applying the principles of personal mastery. All over the world, through the ages of human history, there have been people who have studied these principles and applied them in their lives. Today this information is becoming common knowledge but not many people understand that personal mastery is a journey, an apprenticeship.
Those fantasy characters who ride dragons and battle evil lords don’t do it in a blink – they work up to their big goal. It’s a quest. They have to develop their character by learning skills, facing challenges, dealing with obstacles. They’re also doing what they genuinely love and value.
And it’s exactly the same in our real ‘ordinary’ lives. Achieving mastery in one’s life is not a snap-your-fingers affair; it calls for introspection, self-awareness, clarity, focused action, commitment, persistence – a whole swag of skills that are developed over time as one deals with the challenge-fraught ‘road to mastery’. But the reward of living your dreams is utterly worth the journey.
We might not wear the outer symbols of wizardry, but if we are dedicating ourselves to realising our potential, we are indeed wizards and dragon-riders, and our business is that of real magic.
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