You can manifest ‘til the cows come home — but that ain’t going to put beef on the table. But then again you might be vegan.
If you’re unfamiliar with manifesting — it is a verb, with Oxford defining it as “to display or show (a quality or feeling) by one’s acts or appearance; demonstrate.”
The hippy down at the local gluten-free cupcake shop (who learned it from her yoga instructor — who probably picked it up on an ashram) will probably phrase it something like ‘bringing things into existence with aspirational-thought practice’.
Manifestation is similar to the pseudoscientific Law of Attraction, which will sound familiar if you read Rhonda Byrne’s 2006 book, The Secret. The theory behind the book, and the concept of manifestation, is that if you think something will happen, you can make it happen.
No offense to Rhonda, but the line is ‘if you build it, they will come’ (if you’re too young to have had a corded phone, this is a line from the movie Field of Dreams) — not ‘if you think it, it will come’.
Having the right mindset can help you recognize opportunities — but, you have to do the god-damned work. You have to build the framework, and set the stage for the opportunity through work.
‘Manifesting’ alone is like a rocking chair; it will give you something to do — but it won’t get you anywhere.
Do The Damned Work
Have you heard the joke before about the guy who prayed to God every single night, saying “please, please, please God — let me win the lottery”. One day God finally answers him, “please, please, please…buy a ticket”. That’s manifesting.
You can ask the universe for ‘abundance’ (or Ryan Reynolds in nothing but a towel), but you have to do the work to create the opportunity to receive it.
I had a friend who was a money mindset manifestation life coach, Ashley. Ashley sold online courses, one-on-one trainings, and in-person ‘money mindset’ events for a living. And she often crashed in my spare bedroom.
Ashley was so busy manifesting money, that she often forgot to actually make some. When she was flush with money after her big yearly event, her ‘living in abundance’ mindset had that money drain from her fingers like water through a sieve. And she needed that money — it turns out being a vegan is surprisingly expensive. Maybe that’s why her veganism only lasted 5 months.
Ashley would see me working hard, budgeting, and skrimping on one thing to save up for another. And then launch into her ‘you need to manifest abundance’ coaching rant. Lucky for her, I’m nicer in person than I am in writing.
Manifest your ass off my couch, Ashley. Go ahead and ‘live in abundance’…in your own apartment.
Does Manifestation Work?
The thing with manifestation is that it isn’t a provable science. That is probably because it isn’t science —and its results can’t be independently replicated.
‘But manifestation works for me Robin!’
This is the defense of manifesters. ‘I manifested a raise at my job!’. No, you worked there for four years Jill, two of which were underpaid. A stopped clock is right twice a day too.
I have another example I can give you. It’s real. I swear you can’t make this shit up. Ashley had a friend, who I can’t for the life of me remember the name of so I’ll call her Blah-Blah.
Blah-Blah had a similar type of business, helping people achieve their best lives. She had a ‘quantum de-entanglement’ machine. Quantum entanglement may sound familiar if you’ve seen the movie The Butterfly Effect. If a butterfly flaps its wings in Kuala Lumpur it can have reverberations across the planet and change the weather in LA.
OK, so there’s some quantum-entanglement, chaos-theory, quantum mechanics crossover there. But basically, it’s sciencey shiznit that neither of us probably understands.
Blah-Blah didn’t have a quantum physics degree, but she had the machine. A machine she used to improve the lives of unhappy rich people. She said, anecdotally, that it worked on about 50% of her clients (the ones it doesn’t work on of course didn’t have the right ‘mindset’).
For perspective, The Placebo Effect works on approximately 30–60% of people.
Does Blah-Blah’s quantum de-entanglement machine work? Who knows. Ashley’s manifesting sure never seemed to work out. Jill would have gotten a raise at some point anyway.
So — Does Manifestation Really Work?
I suppose I can’t know for sure, but I definitely have my doubts. Maybe it works? For some people? But, I can tell you that the only people I’ve seen manifest their success (or money, abundance, Ryan Reynolds in a whipped-cream bikini, etc.) are the ones who put in the god-damn elbow grease.
Manifesting works sometimes — like the clock, and The Placebo Effect — but putting in the work and creating your own opportunity works a lot better.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to go manifest myself a Ferrari.
Here's how manifesting works: once while on a road trip home, my husband and I made a list of every single thing we needed to do to get the long-neglected property I'd inherited ready to sell. It was a ridiculously long and arduous list. Over a year later, when we'd sold the property (for an excellent price) I found that list and realized we'd completed every item on it. And we toiled like serfs to get it done. Manifesting is nothing more than focused intention: there's the crucial difference between intending to get your ass off the couch and actually standing up.
The "Prosperity Gospel" of the Christian Nationalists is based on that manifesting mindset. God's grace is only bestowed on the rich. Their favorite phrase? "There but for the grace of God go I" while pointing fingers at the poor and marginalized.