The Secret Is Wags

Yesterday, Greg, made some great comments about fear on the post, Still Complaint Free (Mostly). He quoted author, Guy Finley’s discussion of the way we embrace fear and make it our friend, thus allowing its power to unplug us from the divine energy that is meant to flow through us.

I had a realization when I read Greg’s comment.  I discovered that I am no longer fearful.

When I started this blog at the beginning of the year, I was terrified. I truly thought I was on the verge of losing my house and my way of life.  I had no idea how I’d get the money I needed to keep us going after the first of March.

I started this blog as a way to process my intention to find alignment with my nonphysical self, the part of me who knows everything is just fine and in fact has everything and is living everything, on a vibrational level, that I desire.

In the past few weeks, I have experienced huge shifts in the way I feel, and more positive experiences are flowing my way as a result.

We’ve received enough money, from writing coaching fees, a loan from my parents, and some blog donations, to keep us afloat into June. And am I afraid of what will happen after that?  Amazingly, no.  I know something will fall into place.  I don’t know what that something will be, but I know we’ll be okay.

So this is good.  I’m no longer fearful.

But …..

Yesterday evening, I was rushing to finish up some work so I could join Tim in the kitchen to fix our dinner, and I noticed I was tense.  When I got to the kitchen (it was about 7:30), I said to Tim (in keeping with our no complain rule, I was careful with how I chose my words), “I want to have a lifestyle where I can work at a comfortable pace and stop for the day before 6 p.m.  I want to work on my books, and I want to draw.  I have no interest in being a ghostwriter or marketer or writing coach.”

I really did try to keep my tone light, but my eyes filled with tears.  Why was I crying?

What was I feeling?

I stopped and checked in and discovered I was angry.  Very, very angry.

I am no longer fearful, but I’m angry about having to do the work I’m doing.  I am back in the internet marketing world, a world I deliberately walked away from at the end of 2007.  I am revamping websites, trying to drive traffic to a site, redoing sales pages, creating sales videos … all the things I consciously left behind because I didn’t enjoy them.

And now I’m pissed.  Really pissed.

How did I get back here?  Why didn’t our plans work out?

Okay, this doesn’t sound good, does it?  Doesn’t sound like vibrational alignment.

And it isn’t.  But it’s an improvement.

I’ve gone from fear to anger.  I’ve moved up some on the emotional scale.

The Emotional Scale

Abraham-Hicks’ emotional guidance scale, from the book Ask and It is Given, looks like this:

• Joy/Appreciation/Empowered/Freedom/Love
• Passion
• Enthusiasm/Eagerness/Happiness
• Positive Expectation/Belief
• Optimism
• Hopefulness
• Contentment
• Boredom
• Pessimism
• Frustration/Irritation/Impatience
• Overwhelment
• Disappointment
• Doubt
• Worry
• Blame
• Discouragement
• Anger
• Revenge
• Hatred/Rage
• Jealousy
• Insecurity/Guilt/Unworthiness
• Fear/Grief/Depression/Despair/Powerlessness

As you can see, anger is five rungs above fear, so I’m moving up.

Abraham talks often about finding relief a little bit at a time.  It’s inadvisable, they say, to try to vault from fear to joy.  Any time you can improve your emotions just a little, you’re moving into alignment.

I have spent a lot of time at the top of the scale lately.  I get these peeks at appreciation and love and joy more and more throughout my days. But sometimes, when I look too much at what is, I slip down again.

I’m not slipping all the way to fear, though, and I call that a victory, especially given the precarious “facts” of our situation.

Those facts don’t concern me anymore.

Choosing Better Feeling Thoughts

I’m creating a new story, and my anger has shown me I’m experiencing contrast that is spurring me to be even more specific in my story.

So since I won’t complain (whining about the work I’m doing would be my old pattern, but whining is just squeaky complaining, so I can’t do that), I need to choose new thoughts.  Here I go:

Although the work I’m doing right now isn’t my first choice, I’m grateful for the contrast it’s providing, contrast that’s showing me what I really want to do.  I know I hated this type of work in the past, but I could choose to find something good about it now.  I could clean up my vibration about internet marketing and find the fun in it.  I am enjoying the networking I’ve been doing on Facebook and Twitter.  I hadn’t expected that to be fun and yet it is, so maybe internet marketing can be fun too.

Going back through my e-book has given me a sense of accomplishment because I’m remembering just how much good information is in the book, and that is giving me more confidence to sell it.

The better I feel about the work I’m doing, the faster I’ll get to the work I really want to do.  So I’m going to find the positive aspects of this work.

One of the best positive aspects is that Ducky gets to hang out with me while I work and I can pet her as much as I want.  That feels really good.  I think I’ll just focus on that for awhile.  I can’t feel anger and focus on Ducky at the same time (except when she steals food off the counter; but that’s another story).

And just like that, I’m all the way up to contentment.

And moving on up ….

To leave a comment, click on the “comments” link (it will say “No comments or “1 comment” or more) at the end of the tags in “Posted in” at the end of this post.

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After my post, Amplify, Amplify, Amplify,  Mel commented, “Wow, what a difference a day can make.” She was referring to the fact that two days before, I had written about not liking any of the choices I felt like I was facing. My frustration clearly came through at that point, and two days later, my improved mindset was equally clear.

Fifteen years ago, I took medication for severe depression (bipolar). I was in treatment for about five years from 1992 to 1997. I was told then that feeling bad was chemical. It was something I couldn’t control. I had to take a pill to get past it.

In 1997, I decided that the medication (I was on 12 different ones over those five years) was doing me far more harm than good. My path of least resistance (though I didn’t call it that then) was to stop taking the meds and find natural ways to improve my mood. I embarked on years of experimenting with foods and natural supplements and meditation and visualization, all of which were far more helpful than all the psychotropic drugs the doctors had prescribed.

It wasn’t until I began studying Abraham-Hicks, though, that I was able to put the notion of being “bipolar” or a “depression sufferer” behind me. It was then that I discovered I had the power to shift my mood from bad to good in a matter of seconds, just by choosing different thoughts.

I began to see that by thinking of myself as someone prone to depression I had been attracting thoughts that matched up with depression. I also began to see that my energy level was directly correlated to what I was thinking. When I was thinking about lack, I felt despair and no energy (i.e., I was “depressed”). When I was excited about something I wanted or appreciating something I had, I felt energized.

In the last few years, I’ve had a lot of times that other people would label “depression.” But I no longer call my low energy times depression. I know that when I’m indulging in a funk, it’s happening because I’m being lazy about the way I’m thinking.

“What about the brain chemistry?” someone once asked me when I told her that she controls her moods.

I know our bodies generate different chemicals when we’re down than when we’re up, but those chemical changes aren’t out of our control. Our vibrations and thoughts are the catalysts for whatever chemicals roam through our bodies. Years ago, I read an example of this in a book (can’t remember which one) by Deepak Chopra. He said two people can look at a roller coaster, and one person’s body will generate an “upper” chemical. This person loves roller coasters. The other person’s body will generate a “downer” chemical. This person is terrified of roller coasters. These chemicals are real—they’ve been measured scientifically. But they were generated by a thought (either “roller coasters are fun” or “roller coasters are dangerous”).

Since yesterday, I’ve been totally calm, serene even, about my finances.

Nothing in my experience has changed, but where I’m putting my attention HAS changed. I have changed. And I did it in an instant.

That’s the power of a moment.

One thought, which attracts another thought and another and another. I’m drawing more and more feel good thoughts to me with each moment.

It’s in my control. And it’s in yours.

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“You’re picky about the car you drive. You’re picky about what you wear. You’re picky about what you put in your mouth. We want you to be pickier about what you think.” Abraham-Hicks.

I created this blog as a way to help me and others be picky about what we think. I wanted to see what would happen if I deliberately focus my thought on what is right in my life and what I want.

Instead, my intention to focus my thoughts this way has unleashed a torrent of thoughts about what is wrong in my life and about what I don’t want.

In other words, it has shone a spotlight on how far I am from where I want to be. I keep zeroing in on the mess I’ve made instead of the little pockets of wonder in the mess.

A reader posted a comment yesterday and included a link to a video that reminded me of what I need to screw my head on a little better and focus my thought much, much better. I’d watched the video before, but I’d obviously forgotten everything I heard.

Fast Tube by Casper

Focus on what’s right. That’s what Abraham-Hicks emphasizes. Instead of looking at the pieces that haven’t fallen into place, we have to look at what has fallen into place.

I have trouble with this. With so many pieces of my life out of place right now, finding what’s right seems the same as finding one small glass fisherman’s float hiding in the driftwood somewhere along a 50 mile stretch of beach.

It’s like looking at a pile of 3000 jigsaw puzzle pieces and trying to find the one that has the small yellow spot on it.

So hard to focus on the good when the good seems to be overwhelmed by the bad.

BUT …

We do it all the time. I do it everyday, actually.

As you can see from the header (and if you know me, you know this), I have this incredible, joyful Springer spaniel, Ducky. Ducky truly is pure grin-inspiring delight.

[Oh wow … and talk about law of attraction. Just as I wrote that sentence, Ducky burst into the room. She and Tim were out running errands, and I thought they’d be gone another twenty minutes.]

When I watch Ducky play, I am not thinking about anything except watching Ducky play. I don’t see the room around her. I don’t think about money. I don’t think about writing. I just focus on Ducky.

So I can do it.

Ducky knows how to do it too.

In the picture, Ducky is focused on a plastic practice golf ball. She has an overflowing basket of nice toys, but these little plastic balls totally delight her. She likes to throw them then pounce on them.

She likes to paw at them.

She likes to toss them and take whatever action is needed to go get them:

Ducky doesn’t care about anything else when she has one of these balls. It’s a focus on what’s right.

Today, someone who read my last blog post told me that she was like me, someone who wanted to be a writer but hadn’t been able to achieve her goals yet.

That comment took me aback. How did I manage to convey the idea that I wasn’t yet a writer?

I AM a writer. I’m a three-times published author. I’m an ex-newspaper columnist. I am most definitely already a successful writer.

Ah, but obviously, I don’t feel like one. My last post sure made it clear that I don’t feel like one.

So what is my attraction point? What am I lined up with? I’m lined up with not yet being a successful writer.

Enough of that. I’m going to be like Ducky. I’m zeroing in on what I already have.

And that’s the path of least resistance. That’s how we align with what we want.

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Today’s Abraham-Hicks quote is:

“It’s not your work to make anything happen. It’s your work to dream it and let it happen. Law of Attraction will make it happen. In your joy, you create something, and then you maintain your vibrational harmony with it, and the Universe must find a way to bring it about. That’s the promise of Law of Attraction.”

I’m attempting to find my vibrational harmony with what I want, and part of that process is being sure that I’m on “the path of least resistance.”

The path of least resistance, according to Abraham-Hicks, is the course of action that feels best.

Resistance is what keeps us from having what we want; it’s a vibration that doesn’t match with our desires. It’s those negative feelings that line up with things we don’t want.

When we’re on the path of least resistance, we’re aligned with our nonphysical self, and we’re moving toward what we want. Our vibration matches our desires so the law of attraction can bring those desires to us.

Sometimes, it’s easy to decide what we need to do. One choice feels awkward and uncomfortable, and the other choice makes our heart sing.

Most choices, though, aren’t so clear cut.

In my case, for instance, all my choices suck … or at least that’s how it feels to me.

For over 20 years, I have been focused on living a life of creative and financial freedom. I want to be an author. That’s the work I want to do. I don’t care if that work brings me money or if money comes in some other enjoyable way so I can spend my time writing, but I want to have the freedom to fill my days with writing.

And I want those days to have a leisurely flow to them.

My ideal day goes something like this: I wake up naturally between 7:30 and 8:30. I get up and take a long walk with my dog. I come home and work out. I shower. I have a little snack, and I sit down to write, sometime between 11 and 12. I write until about 6 and stop for the day. I spend my evenings drawing, singing, playing the piano, watching movies, training my dog, playing games and spending time with my husband.

Yes, I know this isn’t how society tells us we should spend our days, but there it is.

For many years, this was how I spent my days.

Then something went wrong. Though I sold three books to large publishers and made some money with my writing, it wasn’t enough to support me. My other financial resources started running out. I tried to sell more books and ended up having terribly negative experiences with agents, editors, publishers, and PR people.

Since I was getting the sense I couldn’t support myself with my writing, Tim and I turned to the internet. We spent the next two years attempting to build a profitable internet business and network marketing business.

At the time of these decisions, I’d kind of forgotten about the law of attraction (even though I did know about it) and the teachings of Abraham-Hicks. I wasn’t thinking in terms of paths of least resistance. Still, I was trying to follow my inner guidance.

Even so, we failed miserably.

I hated doing internet and network marketing. I truly despised it. I kept trying to tell myself to like it. I’d remind myself of the income potential and tell myself, “At least you’re writing” (because I was doing newsletters, articles, and e-books), but I knew I wasn’t doing what I wanted to do.

So I stopped. I took a leap of faith. Even though we were running on financial fumes, I started writing screenplays. I was so excited about the process (“in your joy, you create something”). I was sure I’d succeed. Besides, Tim had decided he was going to win a lottery. He took Abraham’s “it’s as easy to create a castle as it is a button” to heart. He knew he was a lottery winner.

But I didn’t succeed, and he didn’t win.

Then I read Twilight by Stephanie Myer. With all due respect to Myer, I know I write as well or better than she does. I knew I could write a great YA book. So I came up with what I thought was a great, unique plot line, wrote a manuscript and the synopses of all four books in the planned series.

I was sure I’d have it sold by now.

Not only hasn’t it been sold but the agent who was going to represent it decided (after getting me to rewrite it to address issues she had with it) it “wasn’t for her.”

And now we’re out of money.

So in the last couple months, I’ve been doing all this stuff to try and get money.

And I don’t like any of it.

So now, what is my path of least resistance?

We have 3 ½ months of money and no income at the moment.

Do I trust that money will come from someplace and just keep submitting my manuscript and doing things I love and not worry about generating an income in any logical way?

That was my plan at the beginning of this year. I was going to find ways to feel good and trust that the money would come.

Then friends started suggesting ways to bring in money: do editing for pay, look for freelance writing work, go out and get a job at McDonald’s.

I decided that made sense (it didn’t feel good, but it made logical sense). So for 6 weeks, I’ve been trying to get a freelance gig that pays something other than pennies per hour. I’ve submitted many proposals and haven’t landed a gig.

So I dropped my coaching rates really low and sent a promotion to people on my writing tips mailing list. Seven people decided to take me up on it. It helped me get some money, which is great.

But here’s the problem.

I really don’t enjoy writing coaching.

I have a couple clients I enjoy (one of you knows who you are ), but most of the coaching work I do is very tough work and I have to make myself do it.

Then there are the other avenues Tim and I are exploring. I don’t like them either.

We are submitting my manuscript, but so far, we’re just getting rejections. The submission process is slow (see how I’m aligning with what I don’t want??)

I find myself facing many paths of resistance:

1. Don’t do anything to create an income; trust that I will sell a book in time (the odds of that are something akin to winning a lottery).

2. Don’t do anything to create an income; trust that Tim will win the lottery as he vehemently claims he will.

3. Pursue one of 3 paths I’ve thought of so far to bring in money, none of which make me feel good at all.

None of these paths feel good. The first two sound good, but I have too much fear that what I want won’t happen in time, and so I know that’s not a place of alignment.

The last path has the potential for income, but at what price? Me spending my days doing things I don’t want to do?

As Abraham says, you can’t put a smiley face on top of an empty gas gauge and expect to be okay. Pretending doesn’t work. I can’t make myself feel happy about doing things I truly don’t want to do.

Anyone have any words of wisdom to share? Any experience with taking the non-action path and lining up with what you want so the universe brings it to you? Any experience with finding a way to feel good about something you currently feel lousy about?

I’d like to attract some ideas that can help me find a path of least resistance. I just can’t seem to get myself to skip gaily down any of the paths that lay before me now.

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What’s the thing you do that keeps you cut off from source, that thing you do that creates resistance and throws you out of alignment with your nonphysical self?

Today’s Abraham-Hicks quote was:

“The amount of time it takes you to get from where you are to where you want to be, is only the amount of time it takes you to change the vibration within you. Instant manifestation could be yours if you could instantly change the vibration.”

In other words, if we wouldn’t do that thing we do that creates resistance in our vibration, we’d have what we want … now.

I keep doing that thing I do.

Here’s how it goes:

I decide I want something, and I clearly visualize the way I want it to be.

Law of attraction teachers spend a lot of time talking about visualization, and I think they overemphasize it. Because I’m all over visualization. I visualize all the time. And I rarely experience the things I visualize.

Why?

I think it has to do with that thing I do.

This week, I bid on a freelance writing job. I’ve been bidding on jobs for over a month now, and I’ve yet to land a job. I have 25 years of writing experience, and I’ve published three books, and hundreds of columns and short stories and articles and I can’t seem to land a freelance job. I thought it was because I was bidding too high.

So this week, a job came up that I really wanted. It was exactly the kind of writing I like to do, and I’ve done a lot of writing like it. The bidding range was $500 to $1000. Because I really wanted the job, I bid $545. I figured the only way I wouldn’t get the job was if I was underbid.

Today I found out that the job was awarded to TWO other writers, one of which bid $750 and one of which bid $625. I looked at their profiles to determine why they were chosen over me. In terms of experience, I match one of the writers and outdo the other. And I underbid them both. I would have done the same amount of work these two will do together for less than half of what the client will pay.

Okay, I’ll admit it. I was really, really disappointed.

I could feel the discord between what I want and where I am now.  I knew I was low on the Abraham-Hick’s emotional scale.

The law of attraction efficiently brought me more matching thoughts: lately, all my work has been rejected; maybe I’m not as good a writer as I thought I was; if I couldn’t get this job, how can I hope to get any others … etc., etc.

And there’s that thing I do. I’m calling it extrapolation.

I extrapolate from the one bit of bad news and smear it across the board to every other thing I’m working on.

After Ducky plays with her friend, Dixie, in the forest (which she got to do today for the first time in a week and a half), her feet are dark brown with mud. We bring her home and wash them off.

The clear water touches her feet and it’s no longer clear anymore. A little mud permeates the whole tub of water.

That is what linking one bad experience to every future experience does. I’m letting my current reaction muddy up my future endeavors.

I think this is what’s keeping me out of alignment, keeping me vibrating on a match to what I don’t want (rejection and not landing jobs and not enough money).

So I’m working on finding a better thought.

For example, today, I said to myself, “Perhaps this isn’t the best job for me. It only looked like it to me. But maybe the universe has something better in mind for me. Maybe the rejection had nothing to do with my ability or what’s coming to me next.”

Did this make me feel great?

No.

But it made me feel a little better.

And that’s all I need right now. As Abraham says, “A little better then a little better, then a little better.” You climb up the emotional scale.

Now that I’m aware of that thing I do, I’m working on doing something different. I’m working on finding a thought that disconnects the current disappointment from what is coming in the future.

How about you? Do you know about that thing you do? Are you learning to do it differently?

If you have something to share about this, please leave a comment. Sharing our wisdom on finding alignment helps us all.

Oh, and I’ve made a couple additions to the Law of Attraction Evidence page. And I’d love to get your comments about any evidence you’ve experienced.

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I’m still baffled by Tim’s lack of success in spite of what he says he feels.  He says he feels like a lottery winner and he has felt that way for months, but here he is with no win yet and seriously dwindling funds.  This has hung me up.

But then, what if he’s not feeling what he thinks he feels?

Yesterday, on our walk, Tim got annoyed with me for a moment.  I read his annoyance in two bits of body language (a skyward look and blowing out air).

Tim has been trying to tell me for months that he feels the exuberance of being a rich man, but what I see is a rather blasé guy who shuffles through the day with not a lot of energy.  Sure, he’s relaxed, but excited about being a lottery winner?  He sure doesn’t act like it.

He’s been trying to tell me that he can feel that way without showing it.  I keep telling him that’s not possible.  The only way we can hide our true feelings is if we’re trying.  Otherwise, our feelings show in our body language—in the way we look, move, etc.  Why, I asked him, would he hide feeling exuberant, especially when he knows I would love to see evidence of him feeling like a lottery winner.  He says he’s not hiding it, but then, it’s not showing.

So what can I conclude?  He doesn’t feel as much like a lottery winner as he says he does.

I find this encouraging.  If Tim’s alignment hasn’t been as good as he thought it was, this explains why he doesn’t have money yet.

Conclusion: my experiment just might work.

So I’m going for it … again.

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I’ve spent most of this week in my bedroom.  Hmm.

A couple years ago, I was stuck in my bedroom for six weeks, in bed because of a broken ankle, leg, etc. (I couldn’t walk at all).  I didn’t want to be in my bedroom then.

Now I can walk anywhere, but I’ve been cocooning in my bedroom.

It all started with the freelance stuff.

God, I’m a broken record.

I get up and walk with Tim and Ducky in the morning.  I come home and take a shower, and then I get in bed with my laptop.  I’m not just sitting in bed doing nothing—I’m doing freelance proposals and blogging, but I can’t seem to bring myself to leave the bedroom.

I feel safe in here.

Even though I’m doing things I don’t want to do, there’s something comforting about doing them in my cozy, warm bed with Ducky at my side.  Maybe the bedroom is the lollypop doctors give kids when they have to get a shot.

I have a very well-developed inner child.  She tends to throw tantrums.

She’s NOT happy right now.

Twenty five years of writing and working toward a goal, and she’s scrounging for low paying jobs.  Waaaaaahhhhh.

This morning, I was dusting, and I found the purple amethyst crystal I put in the supposed money area of my home (according to feng shui principles).  It’s been sitting there for seven years.  My inner child wanted to pick it up and hurl it through the bedroom window.

I’m pissed.

That’s better than despair.  (Abraham-Hicks tells you not to try and leap up the emotional scale from depressed or despair to joy).  I can feel the relief in pissed, but I don’t want to stay here.

Maybe cocooning is okay right now.  But I’d rather feel invigorated and excited.  I’d rather want to join the world.

Right now, though, I’m pissed at the world.  So I think I’ll stay where I am a little longer.

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For two weeks, I’ve been dragging myself through applying for freelance jobs and not feeling good about it, and my inner wisdom has been yelling at me:  “This can’t be good for you because you can’t get someplace good from a bad feeling place!”

Here’s today’s Abraham-Hicks quote:

“You can never have a happy ending at the end of an unhappy journey; it just doesn’t work out that way. The way you’re feeling, along the way, is the way you’re continuing to pre-pave your journey, and it’s the way it’s going to continue to turn out until you do something about the way you are feeling.”

Like I said.

Everyday that I’ve worked on freelancing, I’ve felt tense and unhappy.  Yesterday, because I’d already put in several proposals and didn’t want to do more until I got a sense, next week, of whether I was going to get work from what I’ve done, I decided to “play.”  Ducky has been twittering.  I did a couple Joyful Springer posts.  I made my things I love list.  I made a batch of cookies.  I watched the rain.  I read a little.  I played with Ducky.  And I felt good.

Here’s the thing I’m seeing with freelancing.  People want high quality work very fast for very little money.  I bid on a job about dogs last week.  I have the expertise and the track record to do the work.  The job was to write two 160-170 page e-books.  I bid $3000 and said I could do it in a month.  I heard from the client, who thought a month was a little fast but agreed my price was reasonable.  I said I would take as long as the project needed but I write quickly.  I found out today, he awarded the job to someone with no book-writing experience, no dog background, someone with no portfolio of work examples, but who bid $1500 … to write 2 e-books!

I’m thinking I need to disconnect myself from the “real world” out there.  It’s a world full of panicked people willing to settle.

This week, I refused to bid on the jobs that would have brought me a couple hundred dollars.  And guess what I got today?  $140.  An expected windfall from a class action lawsuit against my city … one that was resolved years ago, but one that owed settlements to anyone who paid stand-by water and sewer fees during a certain time period.  I was one of those people.  $140 isn’t enough to live on.  But it’s money just falling into my lap.  I’ll take it!!

I need to create a happy journey, and that’s what this experiment was supposed to be about.  I’ve let myself get sidetracked with the idea that I have to find work.

Today, I’m going to do some brainstorming on other ideas.

It’s raining steadily (and remember, I love rain).  Tim and I cleaned the house (and I love a just cleaned house) and changed our sheets (I love clean sheets).  Life is good.

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I’m done messing around.  I’ve been flipping from feeling good to feeling lousy like a ping-pong ball batted back and forth by a manic player on PCP.

ENOUGH!

I made a decision today, one I’m going to STICK with!

I am going to feel good!  And I’m going to feel good no matter what it takes!  If it takes brownies, so be it.  Pizza?  So be it.  Foot rubs (with my husband’s cooperation, J)?  So be it.  Whatever it takes.

I’m going to feel good while I’m doing things I’d prefer not to be doing.  I’m going to find a good attitude about doing those things.

And it starts today.

Excuse me for crowing a little here, but I’m VERY proud of myself.  For over a week, I’ve been agonizing over going after freelancing work.  I’ve tried to look over the material required to take a test for one of the sites, and every time I did, I wanted to take a nap.

Today, I took the test and got 100%.  I also took 5 other skills tests and scored well.  I created a freelancing profile, a page of testimonials, and filled in my work history and educational information.

I haven’t started bidding on jobs yet, but I’m going to as soon as I get a few more samples of my work in my portfolio.

And here’s the fun part—I didn’t mind doing this work today.

This morning, on our walk, Tim and I talked about how to approach the next few weeks.  I suggested that we talk to each other as if we’ve already won the lottery.  We’ve been way too “real” about our lives, focusing too much on what is instead of what we want.  It’s time to get unreal.  We are lottery winners, excited about what’s coming because we’ve won.

So how do we go after freelance jobs and feel like lottery winners?

Tim’s doing it by turning his work into a game.

I’m doing it by turning my work into a challenge, a way to grow as a person.

Even as a lottery winner, I want to continue to grow and learn; so that feels good.

And look at the law of attraction in action on this.  Right after I found relief and felt SO MUCH BETTER, Tim went to the bank and came back and announced that our accounts are in better shape than we thought.  Instead of being down to two months of funds, we have three.  Still not ideal, mind you, but three months is WAY better than two.  A lot can happen in three months.  I can still get a book contract in that amount of time.  And in the meantime, I can start earning money as a freelancer.

Abraham says you can feel the relief when you turn toward your nonphysical self, turning downstream, entering the Vortex of the universal energy source, when you get ALIGNED!  And I can feel it.  It’s a surge of energy.  A lightening of being.  It feels great.

So here I am being unreal.  I’m a lottery winner.  All is well.  And just for jollies, I’m seeing what the freelancing world is like.  It feels so good.  Which is the name of the game.

Will feeling good bring me the financial freedom I want?

I can’t wait to find out.

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Many years ago, I had a dear friend named Mary.  Mary was one of the cheeriest, friendliest, sweetest, smiliest people you’d ever want to meet.  In novels, you see people’s voices described as “musical,” but in real life you don’t hear that many musical voices.  Mary’s voice was musical.  Full of lilt and verve, her voice could wipe away a bad mood.

I first met Mary through her job, and I thought she had to be the most positive person in the world.  So much sunshine in one human package.

Then Mary and I became close.  We had a standing weekly lunch date, an hour and a half a week that we filled with gab.  Mary loved Muggins (my dog, who died in October).  Muggins liked people to hold her paw, so she’d sit next to Mary, and Mary would hold her paw while Mary and I talked.

It was during these talks that I realized that underneath Mary’s sunshine, something dark and fearful lived.  Mary was a terrified woman.  She was afraid of being alone, afraid of going places alone.  She was afraid, mostly, of getting cancer.  Every little ailment Mary got, she’d say, “Oh, it’s probably cancer.”  One day, she told me that she had been praying, every night since she was a little girl, “Please God, don’t let me get cancer.”

Why cancer?  Did someone she love die of it?  No.  She didn’t know why cancer scared her so, but it did.

Most of the world didn’t know this, though.  Only those very close to her understood that the Mary façade—the smiles, the sing-song voice, the warmth—was a cover for the fear that was her constant companion.

Mary died in 2001 … of cancer.  She was only 42.

Even as I mourned her, I was aware of the gift she left behind for me.  I’d just started studying Abraham-Hicks, the law of attraction, and creating your reality.  Mary showed me the gut-wrenching truth of what I’d been studying.

Abraham says that in every subject, there are two parts—the wanting of it and the not wanting of it.  So you can say, I don’t want cancer or you can say, I want healthy cells.

It is by your attention to a subject that you draw that subject/experience to you.  You can be saying, “I don’t want ____________  (fill in the blank).”  But by the very fact that you’re thinking about BLANK, you’re pulling it to you.

Mary created her cancer.  I have no doubt of that.

She seemed to be a feel-good person.  But she wasn’t.  Vibrations don’t lie.  Energy doesn’t lie.  You can’t pretend to be happy.

At the moment, I am aware that I’m pretending to be happy.  I’m working way too hard at this.  It feels like I’m treading water.  Yesterday, I was enthusiastic and energetic about treading in this pool of mine.  By the end of the day, I was getting tired.

I keep telling myself I want to look for freelancing work.  I keep telling myself I’m happy about it.  I’m lying.  I can feel the truth of that lie sizzling through me like acid.

Tim has been looking into data entry jobs.  I asked him last night how he feels good about that and keeps to his vision of winning the lottery.  He says he sees the data entry as fun, a challenge that intrigues him.  Oh, how I would like to be like him.  Try as I might, I can’t seem to see freelancing in the same way.  I’ve tried bribery (rewarding myself if I do the thing I don’t want to do).  I still don’t feel good.

Today, Tim’s been practicing his data entry skills.  He’s a great typist, but his number keypad work isn’t what it needs to be.  Did he let that discourage him?  Nope.  He saw it as a game and spent the day practicing and practicing to get better.  A smile on his face.  And it’s real.  I know this man.  I know when he’s pretending.  He’s really having fun.

Me?  Not so much.

I think I may be a Mary sort of feel-good right now.

And I know that pretending doesn’t work.

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