Originally Published in CO Yoga+Life Magazine

We are constantly exposed to the message in yoga – in our classes, workshops and trainings, in marketing slogans and product endorsements – that through our practice we can create a life that we love, full of our heart’s deepest desires. We’re told that that passionate relationship, financial wealth, adventurous travel, and the joy and peace of a life well lived is right here for us. Well, then why after months or years of dedicated asana, meditation and perhaps even soulful inquiry, are so many of us still stuck in the struggle and effort of trying to create an abundant life?

There’s a science and an alignment methodology, call it a law of the universe, that has to be recognized, adhered to with discipline and trusted implicitly to put into motion the energetics of manifestation, and from what I’ve seen it’s often misrepresented and misunderstood.

If we are to believe the mainstream messaging around manifesting, all we have to do is cut pretty pictures out of a magazine and glue them to a vision board, then sit back and wait for all our wildest dreams to come to us. While part of this instruction holds some merit, there is a missing piece and it is in this where we find the keys to the kingdom.

Too often this critical element is missing. And so the tendency is to throw the baby out with the bathwater, relegate the practice of conscious manifestation to the world of the “woo-woo” and return to a life of striving to earn and make a desired outcome reality.

From my own experience – and I started manifesting seemingly miraculous circumstances in my life long before I was ever a yogi or had any idea that I was actually practicing co-creation with divine forces – the following elements must coincide for desires to begin to take form in our visible world:

  1. A burning desire. This is almost an all consuming passion, dream and vision. I find I experience it as nearly bordering on obsession. Wispy and casual dreams won’t ever make it.
  2. A singleness of purpose. When this is present you are determined at a level that might surprise others to do whatever it takes to see your desired result come to pass. Most of your spare time and thoughts are filled with seeing your desire fully realized.
  3. Absolute knowing that the object of your desire is yours and is coming to fruition right now. It’s the feeling of “of course this is going to happen” even when others might think you’re still dreaming, or are a little crazy.
  4. Let go of trying to figure out the “how.” At first you’ll want to analyze the thing to death. Your mind will chew it all to bits with all the reasons why it’s not practical and the risks and the lack. Suspend disbelief and instead watch for unexpected opportunities that will come your way. And be ready to act when they do.
  5. A willingness to take action in the form of leaps of faith. What I often find with this step is that the actions will look like giant risks to others, but to you, since you have steps 1-3 in place, will feel like the most natural, solid and obvious step in the right direction that you could take. A big part of this is having the courage to ask for what you want and believe that you deserve. I can’t emphasize this piece enough. Almost all of my life changing manifestations came from asking people for things that others thought I was nuts to ask for.
  6. Patience. Sometimes the lining up of circumstances, the right people, places and things at the right time takes time. Keep watering the seeds daily with a vision of the full fruits coming to bear and watch for stepping-stones and invitations to play (synchronicity) along the way.

When it comes to putting these principles into action, one of the biggest disconnects that I see in my yoga students is the gap between what people truly desire and where their attention and energy is focused in their day-to-day lives. This is a fast-block to manifesting. There may be an expressed desire, but if the predominant thoughts inside the person, and the actions that they are taking on a daily basis don’t align, there is nothing that the forces of the Universe can do to get that desire to show up in reality. For example, have you ever known someone (maybe you) who talks about how they want to start their own business, maybe a yoga studio, but 90% of the rest of the what they talk about is how much they can’t stand their current job, they don’t have the money and there’s too much competition in their town?

And for some, there’s the first big stumbling block to creating and living a lit up life is between their conscious mind and their heart: They don’t know what they really want. This most often shows up as: “What’s my purpose? Do I have one? Why can’t I find it?” Trust me, it’s in there, it’s going to take some quite time seated in meditation just listening and then watching yourself like a detective. What books and articles are you drawn to? What do you compulsively search the Internet for in your spare time? What sort of people do you find yourself envying? Those are important clues to your inner desires. Open the space and listen. The answer will come. Remember, it’s inside of you. Not out here somewhere.

Every major “miracle” I have manifested in my life came from a deep inner knowing and an almost compulsive sense that this had to come to life for me and that it was meant to be. Time and again I put myself out there in ways my friends and family were baffled by. Here are a few examples: I grew up with a single mom and we had literally no money. Yet I was one of the few people from my town who went away to a private college by combining financial aid and scholarships with an unexpected gift from a distant relative. In a super competitive market where writers were told they had to provide clips and a portfolio to prove their merit, I got a job in the newspaper industry with a political science degree and my college term papers as writing samples. I went on to become an award-winning journalist in my field. When I first had the idea that I would open my own yoga studio I was not yet a certified yoga teacher and I had nothing in the way of savings or means to create my business. I now own a thriving studio in Boulder, Colorado. I could go on and on…In some ways I was lucky in that I often have simply had to create my dreams from nothing. I never have had family money or support. I just was always a kid with an overactive imagination and a fire in my heart and belly that made me brave and maybe even what some would call slightly reckless in my willingness to dive right into the deep end of my passions. When I look back on my life though, I see a neat little checklist, fulfilled, step-by-step, all my greatest dreams right here in form in my life’s legacy. And I know that my unfailing trust in the unseen force that lives in the spaces in between, call it the ether or the cosmos or Universe or God, it doesn’t really matter, results time and again in what I see and experience in my “real” life.

Einstein is famous for saying that if he were able to ask God one question it would be: Is the Universe a benevolent or malevolent force? I have come to believe that it is neither. It’s a force and it’s at your beck and call to manifest into the form of your life whatever your predominant thoughts are focused on. Whatever you ask of it, consciously or unconsciously, it co-creates with you. Like a vine grows towards the light no matter how it must wind and contort itself to get there, the Universe is always seeking the light in you and opportunities to express itself in your life. Your job is simply to give it clear direction.

Optional Infobox Manifester’s Tool Kit: