The Magnetic Touch

Photo by Jim Gupta-Carlson

They say that the law of attraction works at all times, and that one can control this powerful energy simply with the quality of thought. Simply put, you want to attract the attention of a certain individual – all you have to do is put out a vibe that you want to attract that person’s attention. But you have to be prepared for the response. That person might not be pleased at the magnetic summons and retort with a slap on the face, a slam of a door, a sharp rebuke.
A second principle of the law of attraction is based on a presumption: You attract what you put out. So if your response from the person in question is not what you initially desired, it behooves you to look at the energy you’re putting out.
And then there’s final thought: You might attract exactly what you need, even if you do not know what you need.
This magnetic draw both perplexes and fascinates me, mostly because I am fairly sure that it works and because I am fairly skeptical of theories like this. They seem beyond New Age, which is something I somewhat approve of, and misleading.
Still …
How else does one explain the fact that survivors of Hurricane Katrina started appearing everywhere I went in Seattle – at the bus stop, in the grocery store – after I began looking for individuals for students to interview? How else does one account for all the ads and informational articles about wetsuits that began showing up on my Facebook page after I mentioned to one person face-to-face, not via cyber space, that I was weighing the options of acquiring one? Oh yes, cookies. That explains the latter.
Often, self-help and personal development books discuss the law of attraction in terms of looking for romantic love or in regards for the unquenchable lust for money and power. That’s where the magnetism is seemingly within one’s control. You go to bed every night meditating on money, and before long, there’s money coming at you in a hundred different directions. You dream of sex, and before you know it, you’re having a lot of sex. Or so the theory goes.
I don’t think the process can be so deliberate. That’s more like wishful thinking. It’s the CEO of a bankrupt company – morally and financially so – saying we’re going to build something massive but having no budget and no plan for doing so. That’s perhaps where the line between attraction and vision exists. One can have a vision, and with that vision acting as a guide post, one can develop, modify, practice, assess, reflect, evaluate and constantly refine that plan to get to a goal. But simply turning a vision into a mantra with no backup? That is a recipe for disaster.