LOA Deep Dive: Do You Really Need Goals, or Is Feeling Good Enough?

It’s a common idea out there that all you need to get what you want is to feel good. If you’d only feel good most of the time, then you’d get everything you want, and more—so the teaching goes.

But is this true, or is there more to the equation? Is feeling good enough?

I was recently reading an article on the link between mindfulness and the law of attraction. The concept itself is good, but there was a line in there that caught my attention:

Feeling good in the present moment always creates a desirable future experience.

Emphasis mine.

Is this true? I’ve been experimenting with the law of attraction for over two years now, so I’ve had quite a while to test this for myself, and I’ve indeed come to my own conclusions.

No, Feeling Good Is Not Enough

One thing you should know about me, if you don’t know this already, is that I’m very practical. I’m interested not in what the popular teachers say, but in what works.

And here’s the truth, like it or not: feeling good does not guarantee that you’ll get your desire.

Actually, in some senses (get ready for this one) feeling good may have very little to do with it.

How can we know this?

Well let’s take an example. If feeling good gives you more good things, by default, then rich people should be the happiest, or feeling the greatest.

But check out this article on whether rich people are happier. It gives some quotes from rich people about how they feel on a day-to-day basis. This one really stuck out to me:

After a few months of wealth you will eventually get used to it and become the same person that you are now.

Remember what I’ve said before about your desire needing to feel ordinary before you can get it? This is exactly that principle in practice. A millionaire isn’t always going to feel great. Eventually, those millions will just feel ordinary, just like your normal bank balance feels to you.

I’ll be very up-front here. Prior to about a year ago, my average bank balance was maybe $300, depending on the time of the month you asked. Towards the beginning, it was more like $800-$1,000, and towards the end of the month, more like $50-$100.

I just checked my bank balance before publishing this post (October 26), and it is $3,194.79. I’d say that’s pretty average. Towards the beginning of the month it is often more like $4,500 or so, and down in the lower to mid 2K range towards the end of the month.

But do I feel significantly different than I did a year ago, that could account for this extra 2-3K of money? Not really. I still have good and bad days. I still have resistance here and there.

And as my bank balance rises even more, I’m sure that’ll remain the same.

Did the extra money feel good initially? Yeah, of course. And is it nice to just be able to buy things when I want to? Obviously it is. But it’s just life now. It’s not extraordinary, at least not to me now. It took me about two months to adjust to this level, and then it was just ordinary.

There’s not a certain level of happiness that translates to a bank balance of $100, vs. some higher level of happiness that translates to a bank balance of $3,000, or a level of happiness that translates to $10,000.

You have to decouple your level of happiness from your level of success.

Again, I’m practical. If I saw a direct correlation between in-the-moment happiness and success, I’d certainly tell you. But I haven’t seen it.

Does that mean that feeling good doesn’t have its place? Of course not. It is important, and I’ll discuss why later in this post. But it’s not the end-all be-all that LOA teachers make it out to be.

It’s More Involved Than You Think

Just to add to the confusion a bit, it is actually possible for someone to become wealthy because of resistance they hold.

For example, I heard of a story once of someone who became very wealthy, because he was so afraid of being poor. But, he was always running away from poverty, so much so that he was deadly afraid of spending the wealth that he had amassed.

Someone else became rich and famous because he wanted to be worthy in his father’s eyes. of course, it was never going to be enough, so he was always reaching for more and more wealth and fame to feel that sense of worthiness, which would never come.

So anyone who says that wealth comes from feeling good, is just way oversimplifying things to the point that it becomes totally useless.

And by the way, this can apply to any situation. People have gotten into good relationships, and even got married, because of a pressing fear of loneliness. It happens all the time, and I think we all know at least one person who has done this.

And of course, there are extremely happy people who are poor, or are single, or sick, or whatever negative manifestation you care to mention.

I remember about a year ago, posting on the Abraham forum about my own blindness. Not because I want to change it, but I wanted to see what Abraham’s position on such a thing was, according to those most experienced in their teachings.

what I was told was that if I felt good, I’d be healed, even if I never explicitly asked for, or even wanted, it.

Quite odd. I have no desire personally to try to manifest vision, and I actually feel like blindness is part of my life purpose.

Anyway, my point is that it’s far more involved than simply “feeling good = success”.

The Only Reason You Don’t Have Your Goal Yet

If feeling good doesn’t do it, then how exactly does the law of attraction really work?

I’m going to make another bold statement, but just stick with me for a moment.

There is only one reason that you don’t have your manifestation yet.

It’s not because you’re not feeling good enough.

It’s not (directly) because you haven’t asked for it enough.

It’s not even because you may not believe it’s possible.

So what is it, then?

Ready?

The only reason you don’t have what you want is because your subconscious mind believes that you want what you have now more than you want the goal itself.

That’s all, end of story.

Your making the income you do because your subconscious mind believes this is what you want to make, and nothing more.

Your love life is the way it is because your subconscious mind believes you want it to be this way.

“What? Is the subconscious mind dense?”

No, you’re just really good at sending mixed signals to it.

So let’s say you want more income. But, every time you think about having more income, or get opportunities to have more income, a huge amount of fear comes up. You think things like, “I’m not worthy of that much success.” Or, “What if it doesn’t last?” Or all sorts of other fear-based thoughts.

You’re so uncomfortable with the idea of more income, that your subconscious mind gets the idea that you’d feel much better staying where you are.

See, there are two things you have to know about your subconscious mind:

1. Your Subconscious Mind Is Interested in Being Comfortable, Not Feeling Good

Consciously you think that if you had more income, you’d feel so much better. You’d be able to easily pay all your bills, plus buy some nice things for yourself. You could have a lifestyle upgrade.

And so you think, “If I feel better with more income, then why doesn’t my subconscious give me that?”

And again, it’s because the law of attraction isn’t about feeling good.

Your subconscious doesn’t care what feels good. It cares what is familiar and comfortable.

It sets what I call a point of homeostasis. It’s the point at which you are the most comfortable.

Go too far outside that range, and your subconscious starts regulating you. Make a bit more money than usual, and you start finding more ways to spend it, until you’re back at your point of homeostasis.

Don’t make enough money, and your subconscious mind will find ways for you to make more, until you’re back at that PoH.

Let me give you an example. Think of your current yearly income. For argument’s sake let’s say it’s $50,000.

Now double it. Imagine you’re making $100,000.

Or you know what? Triple it. You’re now making $150,000.

How does that feel?

And I mean, how does it really feel?

One part of your mind might be jumping for joy, imagining all the things it could do with so much extra money.

But look a bit deeper. Another part of your mind is a bit freaked out by that amount. It feels weird. It feels unnatural.

In a sense, it almost feels wrong.

Recently Christine posted up a status on Facebook, asking a hypothetical question. If you’re on my mailing list, you already know this story, but I’ll be brief.

Her question was: “What would you do if you suddenly received a million dollars?”

So I tallied the results, and 80% of all respondents just spent it, or even gave it away.

I was surprised, but I realize I shouldn’t have been.

Their subconscious minds would have no idea what to do with a million dollars. So, it’s safer to spend it all, and return right back to that point of homeostasis, where things are comfortable.

You don’t really want to be a millionaire, unless that’s an active goal of yours now. Your mind would be too freaked out by that amount of money.

You think you want that, because it means all your worries would be over. But in reality, you’d most likely be right back where you started, at your PoH: say $50,000 per year.

Your subconscious mind wants to be comfortable. And so when you reach for these goals, your subconscious mind doesn’t feel safe. And so, it brings up all the reasons you don’t really want this goal. It brings up the fears, the insecurities, the doubts.

It’s not trying to sabotage you. It’s only trying to give you exactly what you’ve programmed it to give you.

2. The Subconscious Mind Is a Goal Machine

And so that brings me to my second point.

Whatever you really and truly program your subconscious mind to do, it will do, no questions asked.

You are getting what you’re getting now in life, because this is what you’ve programmed your subconscious mind to get for you.

Your income, your love life, your health, are all a result of what you’ve programmed your subconscious mind to achieve.

The reason you don’t get more is because you haven’t actually programmed your subconscious mind to get it.

Sure, you try. But the conversation often goes something like this:

“Hey subconscious, I want $100,000.”

—“What the heck are you going to do with $100,000?”

“True. That’ll be hard.”

—– Later On —–

“Hey subconscious, I really want that $100,000 per year.”

—“Remember what we decided before? I can do that if you want, but that’ll be really uncomfortable for us.”

“Oh yeah, I guess you’re right. Never mind that then.”

And so on and so forth.

Basically, you drop the goal because you focus more on the things that seem to stand in your way of getting that goal. The subconscious was just helpfully pointing out why it would be uncomfortable.

The only solution is to focus on the goal in spite of all the discomfort and resistance, and eventually it will become your new normal.

For example, when I wanted to get off of SSI, that was super uncomfortable. But I knew I wanted it, persisted in the goal, and now it is my new normal. It is my new point of homeostasis.

Your subconscious mind is a goal machine. It will bring about whatever you program it to achieve, regardless of how you feel about it.

This explains why a happy person can be poor, or single, or have some physical condition, etc.

They simply haven’t programmed their subconscious mind to achieve more.

If a person making $25,000 never programs their subconscious mind to make more, then they will always make $25,000, no matter how happy and “in the Vortex” they might be.

Even if you hand them a million dollars, they’ll find a way to quickly return back to that PoH of $25,000.

In fact, it is when you ask your subconscious mind for something different, outside of your PoH, that the resistance and discomfort begins. That person earning $25,000 per year can be perfectly happy, up to the point when they ask their subconscious mind for $50,000. Then suddenly, all the hidden resistance comes up to the surface, and they are quite uncomfortable, likely not so happy as before.

But if they work through that discomfort, they’ll reach that new level, and become their normal happy selves once again.

Notice, just as I said earlier, that they won’t become happier. They will return to that same level of happiness, just now making $50,000 instead of $25,000.

just to hammer it in, happiness and success are not correlated.

What is correlated is what you program your subconscious mind to achieve, and what you actually achieve, regardless of level of happiness.

The rich person who is afraid of being poor has programmed his subconscious mind to be rich, and probably doesn’t feel very good along the way. But, the subconscious mind is a goal machine, and it’ll do what he asks of it.

And you, too, have the absolute freedom to program your subconscious mind for any goal you wish, as long as you are willing to put up with the discomfort that will ensue for a time. You cannot achieve greater success without a measure of discomfort.

So Where Does Feeling Good Come In?

Now I’m not saying that feeling good is useless. It’s quite important in fact. But it’s an aid to the process, not the entire cause of you getting what you want or not.

When that discomfort comes up, it helps to be able to simply let go of the discomfort and return back to a state of contentment.

And when you are visualizing or affirming, it helps to feel positive, so that the manifestation you get also feels positive.

But those are really the only two ways that feeling good can help.

Feeling good on a daily basis will ensure that you get more positive things overall—better luck, more synchronicities, etc.

But it will not ensure that you get all of your desires, just by feeling good in general. That’s not how it works.

And there is no need to be over-the-moon ecstatic about your desires. I often say that my emotions regarding a desire rarely rise above a 2 or 3, where 10 would be absolutely blissful about that manifestation.

I just feel pretty good—contented. It’s an easy, peaceful, flowing state.

You don’t need to manufacture highly positive emotions just to get your desire.

In fact I often find that this is counterproductive.

To get your goal, all you need is to:

1. Focus on it twice daily to convince your subconscious mind that this is what you want.
2. When discomfort arises, don’t react to it. Just let it go and return to a peaceful, contented state.
3. Feel pretty good overall, and focus more on the positive things in life.

That’s really about all you need to do. No fancy techniques, no hidden secrets or anything else.

Of course there are lots of tips to optimize this process, but this is the bare bones of it.

Program your subconscious mind for what you’d like to achieve in life, be persistent in that goal, and simply allow the results to easily come to you.

How About You?

Now it’s your turn. What have you programmed your subconscious mind to achieve? Have you been consistent with what you ask of your subconscious? Let me know your thoughts in the comments.

[mbr_form form_id=”1″ exclude_tags=”1″]