I am happy to announce that this February 16th I will be starting an evening Procrastinator’s Power-UP! Group. This group is in person in Port Townsend, WA.

Procrastinator’s Power-UP!

• Feel energized and supported
• Learn the 5 secrets to freedom
• Turn breakdowns into momentum

Experience the value of Professional Group Coaching!
Tuesdays 5:30-6:30 • Ongoing group, limit 8
$59.00 per month • Contact Heather for more details and to register

heather(at)heatherflanagan.com

360-379-0322

Also, see this posting at PTguide – City Guide to Port Townsend, Washington

Do you believe that there is a truth out there with a capitol T that you are simply learning more about? Or do you like the idea that you are the creator of your reality? I do not know the answer to the quandary about the nature of reality. I have an intellectual perspective that evaluates hypotheses based on my sense of what is scientifically demonstrable and repeatable. And then I have a subtler intuitive “knowing” based on experiences that I can neither explain nor repeat systematically. I am torn between two interpretations of the nature of reality.

My intellect tells me that, logically speaking, I, and everything else, is an emanation from the matter of the universe. Whatever is has co-evolved following the same laws of science. I am one with all matter. While I may think of myself as a distinct entity separate from the other, mostly carbon-based, beings, I have emerged much the same way grass, oceans, and planetary systems have emerged. The thing that largely distinguishes me from the moss on the roof is that I can talk about my experience. From this intellectual perspective (which is likely in direct opposition to the carefully thought out intellectual analysis of someone else) I see reality in certain ways.

From my intellectual perspective, I see reality as something that is hard and fast and true. If it is observable by others, it is real. If something is only experienced by one person, it is likely a misperception. As for creating reality, intellect says that both the world that I observe and I, the observer, have emerged from the laws of nature and continue to respond in fairly predictable ways based on all the events that have preceded the current moment. I am experiencing myself writing this article partly because I was born human which contributed to my need to express myself and basically do a great deal of chattering. My writing of this article is also due to my history of reinforcement, which includes the attention I receive from readers of my writing. Given the right information, one could predict that I would be writing this article at this moment (several days after it is due, as it so turns out). Just as one can predict that the moon will continue to travel around the earth. The moon’s behavior is based on some things that must have occurred many moons ago, so to speak. And it continues to move around the earth because of the laws of physics. (Please don’t be troubled by the question of what created the laws of physics. A law of nature simply refers to something the cause of which we cannot explain. I guess it is science’s version of faith? Wait, this is screwing up my whole analysis! Never mind.)

In my intellectual world, everything that happens has a rational explanation. Everything that is real makes logical sense. We may not know all the mechanisms at work, yet. But there is an outside reality that is largely independent of what anyone may have to say about it. Right!

Now enter my subjective, illogical, emotional experience of the world. I have had experiences that my skeptical mind has no choice but to reject. I have experienced moments of synchronicity where coincidence decides to dress in very flamboyant colors. In addition to my synchronicity experiences, I have “manifested” things by visualizing exactly what I want. Logic, anyone? Skeptical mind doubts the veracity what I just wrote. It says that I need to operationally define my terms and prove that these experiences are repeatable. Skeptical mind takes itself way too seriously!

Let me give you an example of something that I “created” by mere thought. (Please don’t laugh. I think it’s crazy, too.) When I was moving to Port Townsend two summers ago I was having a terrible time of finding a place to rent. I knew every place in town and didn’t like any of them. One night I decided to use the woo-woo concept referred to as the Secret, sourcing, manifesting, or the Law of Attraction. I visualized what I wanted in some detail. Here is what I picture my house to be: across the street from a playground, wood shakes, vaulted ceiling, wood floors, interior wood “accents”, a trampoline that my son could use, oh, and just so I knew it when I saw it, I want a stained glass window as part of the architecture. The very next day my son and I decided to park on Taylor Street and just walk around. There was a man working on a concrete pathway going up to a new house who explained that the main floor was to be an office and the upstairs was an apartment. He invited us to take a look. This dwelling was across Lawrence Street from the Community Center playground, wood shakes on the upper half (my half) of the house, vaulted wood ceiling, cork floors (I fell in love!), many wood “accents” including visible wood structural cross-beam, and a stained glass window above the hall entry in the wall partition. But no trampoline. Oh well.

The next day I met with the couple who owns the apartment and they explained to me that every summer they put out a trampoline in the back yard for the kids and that my son would be welcomed to use it. My face must have turned white. My skeptical mind had so easily rejected the notion that I had created my own reality because the trampoline was such a glaring omission to my vision. Woo-woo world gave skeptical mind a slap in the face!

So what gives? I have “manifested” other things, too. A friend asked me if I created the apartment or if I merely sensed its existence. I said yes. How should I know?! Maybe there is some kind of primordial knowing that is stored in every atom and is accessible to anyone who knows it is there? Maybe there is some sort of particle/wave pattern that can be perceived by people if they get quiet enough to “hear” it. Maybe there is a collective unconscious that can be tapped at will. Maybe coincidences happen quite often and the odds are good that you will stumble across one if you start playing Nostradamus with your life. It all sounds pretty crazy like magic and witchcraft. But I bet fire was a pretty freaky experience for early people. I bet they thought it was impossible and unexplainable. There was no knowledge to back up their experience and therefore it was probably the workings of some deity or sorcerer. (Hmmm, “source-erer”.)

Let’s suppose for the moment that these experiences are merely coincidence, except for the fire thing because I think we have some pretty solid theories about how that whole thing works, now. Even if we cannot create our reality with our thoughts, it seems much more likely that we will get what we say we want if we pretend that we can create our reality. If you have a solid vision of what you want and live from the certainty that you will get it, aren’t you much more likely to have it come true than if you get the jump on turning your back on it before it can turn its back on you? Many people say they want healthy love relationships but seem completely unwilling to behave as though the possibility even exists. What would happen if such a person went out into the world curious as to when they would meet the person they had solidly imagined? I am guessing that this person’s whole energy and way of being would be different and that something decidedly different would happen to them than the usual. One of my favorite mentors is fond of quoting his mother, “If you always do what you always did, you’ll always get what you always got.”

What would you like to create with your thoughts? The first step is simply to be open to possibilities beyond what you know. The next step is to create a compelling vision and reserve a space for it to happen in your life. I am visioning that you experiment with this idea and find value in applying it to your life.