The law of abundance

One of the first lessons to becoming wealthy and successful is to understand the principles of the Law of Abundance. The Law of Abundance states that there is plenty of everything to go around all you need to do is be ready to accept your share. This share can be of anything you can conceive of in your mind whether it is money, friends, material goods, energy, health and even happiness.The secret to the Law of Abundance is that to be able to you receive you must be ready. This is where most people run into trouble with the law.

A simple way to think about this is to imagine a closet full of clothes. Suppose you would like a wardrobe full of designer clothing made by the world’s best fashion designers of Paris, London and New York but your closest is crammed full of clothes you bought at Wal-Mart. Until you empty out your closet of the old clutter there will be no room for you to add the designer clothes you want to have.This emptying of the closet does not just apply to clothing; it applies to every aspect of your life. You must get rid of all of you baggage both physical and emotional to allow into your life the things and the people you want to have.Another example of this would be relationships. Supposed you are in an abusive relationship with a partner who does not respect you. Before you can begin a new healthy relationship with someone new you must first end the old unhealthy one. Ask yourself, what baggage is holding me back from achieving what I want in life? What do I need to eliminate from my life to begin reaping the rewards of the Law of Abundance?

To really understand this principle I often talk about the internal thermostat each one of us has when it comes to all aspects of our own lives. A thermostat is a very simple device used to maintain consistency. I am sure you are familiar with the one in your home. You set it to the temperature you would like you home to maintain. For example if you would like your home to maintain a moderate temperature of 70 degrees your thermostat will accomplish that for you. As the room cools down it will turn on the heater and heat the room back up to the 70 degrees you want it to be. Conversely, as the temperature of the room rises the thermostat will kick the air conditioning to cool things back down to your ideal temperature once more.

As I mentioned each one of us has one of these thermostats in our own mind that controls each aspect of our lives such as money, happiness and health. Human nature is for us to seek our comfort zone, when we reach it we all get nice and cozy. When it comes to money each one of us has a different comfort zone. We need enough money for rent, food, car payment and the other items we deem a necessity in life. The list of necessities will be different with everyone but the premise remains the same. We all have a standard of living we are used to and have a desire to maintain. Our built in thermostat is designed to keep us in this comfort zone and allows us to maintain the standard of living we have chosen for ourselves.

Sooner or later in life change will come along that threatens the comfortable bubble we have grown accustom to and our little thermostat jumps into action. Perhaps this change has made money tight or we have lost a job. You will begin working overtime, searching for a new job or taking on a second one to get back to the level of income required for you to be in your comfort zone. I am sure you can think back to several times in your life when this was the case. I can recall times working 70 hour work weeks on 2 jobs just to make ends meet when I was younger. This is our thermostat at working getting us back to where we are comfortable again. There is a minimum standard each of us will not allow ourselves to be below.

The flip side of this is when we have too much money or too much happiness. I know this sounds counter intuitive but it happens far more often than your probably think it does. Have you ever read about someone who has won the lottery only to be broke again in 6 months or a year? Perhaps you have seen people lining up to buy big screen TVs when the tax returns come in?

My good friend Tim runs a pizza delivery restaurant and once a week without fail they receive countless $50 or $100 orders coming from the poorest neighborhoods in the city on the day that welfare cheques are issued.
Each one of these are examples of our thermostats kicking in to get us back to where we are pre-programmed to be. I know it seems obvious that being broke or poor would be an uncomfortable place to be; however, the sad truth is comfort is often found in what we are familiar with.

Can you relate to any of these situations? Have you ever found yourself going on a shopping spree when you got a bonus at work? Do you ever go out for dinner or to the bar after work on payday? Perhaps after a few days on a new diet you find yourself eating an entire bag of potato chips in one sitting? Or maybe you pay for a gym membership each month and yet you cannot remember the last time you actually went to the gym? I am pretty sure at least one of these situations is all to familiar to you or someone you know.

So now the question becomes, what in your life are you trying to change but have so far been unable to do so? Would you like to be making more money? Perhaps you would like to be spending less money? Are you looking to lose weight? Are you wondering why every relationship you enter into seems to end badly? The definition of failure has long been regarded as doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different results.

Where you program your internal thermostat to is a very powerful self fulfilling prophecy. To make real meaningful change in your life you have to first consciously become aware of where you have set your thermostat to and then consciously begin to change it. Once you can clear the clutter you allow yourself to move forward toward success. In order to become successful you must first give yourself permission to do so. Remember the golden rule when it comes to the Law of Abundance, nothing is neutral. Everything you do either helps you or hinders you along the way so be clear on what you want and make sure you remove your own roadblocks so when you are offered the gifts in life you are able to accept them.

One of the best things you can do to begin this process is emulate someone who is successful already in an area you would like to be successful in. If you want to be better with your time and your money, then start hanging around those people who are great with their time and have money.

To begin this process you must first understand what your current reality is. What kind of person are you now? How much money do you have? How many friends do you have? How much do you weigh? In order to improve in any area you must first be able to take an unbiased view of yourself and accurately figure out where you are at.

One way to do this is to take a look at the 5 people you associate with most often; your five closest friends. If you were to take the income of each of the 5 of them and add it together and then divide by 5 you would be very close to your own personal income. Take a look at the fitness levels of your 5 friends and I bet the average is pretty close to yours.

The reason for this is we most like to associate with people who share our hobbies, interests and activities. You and your friend will often eat at the same places, exercise similar amounts and go to the same activities or seminars. So let me ask you a question you may find to be uncomfortable. Is your current group of friends the best people for you to be hanging around with based on your goals in life? When you express your desire to change for the better are they going to support you and go along with you for the ride? Are they going to ridicule you and tell you they think you are being foolish?

There is a widely known story of crabs in a bucket which I feel is very relevant in this situation. Put several crabs into a bucket with no lid and leave it for a while; not a single crab will be able to escape. This is because as soon as one crab attempts to pull his way out of the bucket all of the other ones will quickly respond and pull him back in. The crabs would rather wallow together as a group of failures than allow one of their brethren to escape to freedom while they are still in the bucket.

This is also a very sad example of what happens in our society each and every day. It is far easier to pull people down than it is to help them up. The reason for this is it makes people feel bad to see someone who is “just like them” to be successful. As a general rule people are far more likely to criticize you for your failed attempt than to offer you a word of encouragement. The average child hears the word no approximately 10 times more often than he hears the word yes. This is an alarming stat that to means needs to change and needs to change quickly.

So I ask you this question one more time; is your current group of friends the best people for you to be hanging around with based on your goals in life? If you truthfully answered yes to this question you are truly blessed with wonderful friends and you should feel fortunate to have such wonderful people in your life. Take a minute to write a thank you card to each and every one of them thanking them for the support they have given you thus far and tell them how blessed you feel to count each of them as a friend.

Conversely; if the answer was no, congratulations you have made your first achievement in this process. You have identified a goal for yourself; identify some successful people to make friends with.

Let me take a minute here to clarify one thing before we move on. I am not suggestion you stop being friends with your college buddies who make you laugh so hard beer shoots out of your nose, that is not what I am getting at here. I am suggesting it is time to widen your scope and become introduced to new people and new ideas. Moderation is the key here for everything.