My friend KT added the book to her to-read list and its concept seemed to compliment other self-help books I’ve found useful lately, which show that one way to improve your life is to “trick” your subconscious mind into believing that your life is better already. Convincing the subconscious that circumstances are good can bring improvement in those circumstances. Improving your emotions and thoughts improves your life. What makes this book different is that it offers actual techniques for getting happy and staying happy even when current life events are discouraging and not what you want. The premise of all of these sorts of books is that you must focus on what you want, not what you don’t want.
Esther and Jerry Hicks set the stage with the ideas that we create our own reality with our beliefs and emotions, that we “vibrate” at a frequency that attracts events reflecting our beliefs, and that we can “raise our vibration” to attract better experiences. Next there are chapters on our bodies, homes, relationships, work, money, world, and government. Examples of common negative beliefs are given in each area. An “emotional guidance scale,” with 17 steps from powerless to powerful is used as a tool, the idea being to move up the scale.
Next are chapters on techniques for moving up the scale. The techniques are described, and the negative beliefs from previous chapters are used to demonstrate their use. In “segment-intending,” the subject looks forward to the next segment of her life, imagining what it will be like when the obstacle is gone. In another, instead of feeling bad because the subject doesn’t have what she want, she thinks “wouldn’t it be nice if” the thing she wants comes to pass. This gives the desire more light-heartedness instead of discouragement. In “turning-it-over-to-the-manager,” the subject turns her problem over to a manager, either her subconscious or the law of attraction, asking that the problem be solved, and thanking the manager for helping. The “focus-wheel” technique is my favorite because it involves making a wheel-like diagram and writing an encouraging statement on each spoke of the wheel, then heartily circling your intention in the middle. The “book-of-positive-aspects” has the subject writing or saying good things about the current situation. There are also techniques that are specific to healing the body and getting out of debt.
This book was supposedly channeled from an entity called Abraham. He answers some questions from audiences in the last chapter. While I don’t necessarily believe in channeling (nor do I disbelieve), or that unembodied beings know more than we do, I did find some of these techniques useful, regardless of their source. If you’re into self-help, it is well worth perusing the book and experimenting with techniques that appeal to you.