Talane’s Blog of the Week, July 23, 2007

Attraction Principle #6
What You Resist Will Persist

This is the corollary to What You Focus on Expands (or Like Attracts Like) from the first Law of Attraction. The idea is that if you have positive thoughts, you’ll attract positive things and if you have negative thoughts, you’ll attract negative things. So let’s take a look at Resistance. If you resist anything, it will persist and may in fact even get worse because of all the negative energy you are giving it. For example, if you resist your credit card debt, you will not get out of debt and are very likely to get deeper in credit card debt. What are the signs that you are resisting your credit card debt? Here are a few: 1) You cringe every time you get what looks like a credit card bill in the mail and dread opening it; 2) When you open the bill, you are shocked that it is higher than you realized; 3) You have never sat down and added up your total debt load; 4) You are consistently using your overdraft protection on your checking account; 5) You may have tried a few get rich quick schemes or multilevel marketing businesses. These are all indications that you are resisting your credit card debt. If you want your debt to go away, you must stop resisting it. Get that it is perfect that you have debt. You don’t have to like it, but it is perfect. Your debt is showing you that you have not yet learned how to manage money properly and respectfully, or that you have unmet emotional needs driving you to spend. Instead of ignoring (a form of resistance) your debt, you need to acknowledge it, know all about it (how much?) and create a plan for handling it. (See the brilliant book, How to Get out of Debt, Stay out of Debt and Live Prosperously by Jerrold Mundis for exact instructions that work.) Then, you will have gotten over resistance and be on the road to financial freedom.

Or, let’s take another thing we commonly resist. Fat! I know because, after giving birth to my second daughter, I have been resisting the excess 30 lbs. on my body. I’ve resisted going on a diet and exercising. And, as a result, no surprise, the weight is still there. Now that I’ve broken through resistance and started a diet plan, I’ve lost 7 lbs. and am on the way to recovering my figure. Give in to resistance and you lose. It’s that simple!

How to overcome resistance? Forget about inspiration—that only lasts a few minutes in most cases. Although by all means, grab inspiration wherever you can find it. My mother, who has been overweight for years, said the comment that really shook her up was made as a crass joke by ….when he said, “Everybody can lose weight. They proved that in the concentration camps.” Yes, even people with thyroid problems etc. lost weight. Horrible, but true. The only way to beat resistance is to tackle it head on. Get as much support as you possibly can, line up an unbeatable team behind you and go for it. Start small, but start. The moment you start, you’ve beaten resistance that day. Every day you wake up, resistance will be ready to knock you down and claim its victory if you let it. And every day that you don’t let it, you will have won another round. The more rounds you win, the easier it gets. What are you resisting? Tell the truth about it, get all the facts, put your support team and systems in place and get on with it.

There is another way around resistance and that is to put in place a much, much bigger goal that dissolves all resistance. For example, instead of a goal to get out of debt (a negative not very fun sounding goal), try putting in place a goal to be financially independent (to have enough money saved or income streams so that you don’t have to work). Now that is a goal worth getting excited about! Then, getting out of debt becomes a minor piece of a much greater plan. Or weight loss. No one can get excited about weight loss or dieting—it sounds restrictive and boring. But, put in place a much larger goal and the weight loss part of it becomes automatic. For example, put in place a goal to run the NY Marathon, or win a dance competition or simply, a goal for Ultimate Self Care which includes a nutritionist, regular massages, manicures, pedicures, physical activity that you love such as horseback riding, swimming, dancing, etc., all to be rewarded with a new wardrobe selected by a personal image consultant. Now that sounds like fun!

Both approaches can work—you can beat resistance by tackling it head on or you can beat it by going around it with a much bigger, appealing goal.

Warmest,
Talane