Beyond Pie in the Sky Abundance Consciousness

I’ve recently met a colleague who spoke of spending many years struggling with the “Follow Your Bliss and the Money Will Come” mindset and making no money. It wasn’t until she finally realized she had to learn some things about money and business that she started seeing that money come in. She was still following what was alive in her–but she had taken her head out of the clouds and started dealing with reality as it was presented to her.

I have another friend who is very into “prosperity consciousness” and would talk about her plans to open a retreat center one day. She had no idea how the money would “show up” but she believed she could will it into being if she had enough faith. After all, she believed in miracles–they happen every day. Meanwhile she was supported by her parents and struggled with credit card dept. She had a distaste for the actual details of money–she would say “I don’t want to be about money”. This masked a fear of being able to truly support herself on her own abilities.

Over the past several years I’ve watched as she has started her own cleaning business, and slowly but surely gained confidence in her ability to set a budget, earn a living, and support herself. She still works with consciousness principles, as do I, but these have finally taken on more than theoretical meaning for her as she confronts her real-world fears of dealing with that actual green stuff, money.

While I agree with the “Law of Attraction” wholeheartedly, I think sometimes people go into a fantasy place with it. They think “If I just think the right thoughts, checks will arrive in the mail.” This is spiritual B.S. and a form of denial. Let’s not kid ourselves. When someone tries to sell you that line, look at how much you paid for that book, that movie, that seminar. They are offering you something and you are paying for it. That’s how money is made. And you can create a product or service and sell it too. But it will take more than wishful thinking. If you look at the people who are selling you products about prosperity, you can bet they did more than just wish for you to give them money. They created a product that had value and marketed it and you bought it. That’s how it works.

I do think our attitude is the cornerstone of our success, and I do believe that there is a spiritual ecology to money, business, and life itself. I believe that the Universe does support us in our true mission in life and customers are naturally attracted to people, services, and products that reflect that true purpose.

However, I also think that most people with a pie-in-the-sky attitude are not dealing with their real issues and are using “abundance” thinking to stay in denial of their very real fears. They don’t believe in their own ability to actually make money and be successful. It is this confidence that is the heart of what makes the Law of Attraction work, which is why people who try to use it from a place of scarcity and lack of self-confidence do not succeed.

On the spiritual plane, we attract not what we want to believe, not what we think we should believe, but what we actually believe. This means that if we are at our core afraid of money and don’t have confidence in our abilities, that is the energy we are sending out. The cure for this isn’t more meditating and “clearing energy”. The cure is to be honest with ourselves about where we actually are with money and start where we are to develop the skills and confidence we need.

Whatever it is that scares you or intimidates you, start learning about it. Education and practice are the only ways I know to develop real confidence. By all means, keep working with your belief systems and your consciousness. Just don’t stop there. Get your hands dirty. Start learning about money. Start some kind of small business venture. Start wherever you are, but start.