I’ve been into the Law of Attraction through the Abraham-Hicks work for a long time. I’ve read almost all of the Abraham/Esther and Jerry Hicks books, been to her workshops, and listened to dozens of her talks. The work has always uplifted and inspired me for long stretches, but then I’d get tripped up and be unable to use it for a while.
The stumbling block that used to cause me to stop working the teachings was always the same. I’d find myself depressed, anxious, or in some other negative state, and be unable to embrace a positive view of my situation.
Then I came across an Abraham-Hicks’ exercise called Pivoting, and everything changed for me. It taught me how to gently move negative emotions, bit by bit, so that by the end of a single Pivoting session, I would feel relief and much more positive.
I use aspects of this exercise often and find it very powerful. Below I take you through a typical pivoting session, but first:
A bit of background on the Law of Attraction (LOA):
Change the way you look at things, and the things you’re looking at will change
Abraham Hicks believes the physical world to operate largely on the Law of Attraction. It’s a kind of law like gravity is a law. Just as an apple will always fall downward if dropped, the LOA refers to an aspect of being that causes similar thoughts to attract each other. Like attracts like.
So, if you put out a positive thought about something you’re wanting, it will attract more positive thoughts. And when more thoughts on any particular issue come together, they eventually manifest in physical form.
The work teaches that exposure to what we see in the world creates beliefs in us that what we see is how things have to be.
But Abraham-Hicks believes that we’re all co-creators who attract circumstances (manifest realities) that match our vibrational being. In other words, if we can shift what we believe, we can create a different reality than what we see.
It’s an esoteric teaching to be sure, but great thinkers through the ages have touched on the same idea: Form springs from thought.
How pivoting works
This morning I found myself shaky about believing that I have what it takes to make my new website a useful place.
The guy I’ve been studying with about creating a website, says it takes quite a while for a new site to find its audience. He stresses focusing on continually adding useful content while also marketing the site online in different ways. Do that, he says, and it’s inevitable that you’ll find your readers.
So, although I believe this intellectually, I’ve had doubts about it lately. Can I compete with the hundreds of other sites out there? Isn’t the Internet already saturated with sites like mine? Can I learn to create all the social signals and SEO techniques that will support the site? Earlier this morning, I didn’t think I could.
But, I wanted to feel positive about the site and my work. I wanted to lose the mental nagging I’ve had about all the pieces of the puzzle that have to come together to make it work. I just wanted to believe in the process.
So, I did a pivoting session, and it helped so much! Afterwards, I felt a renewed enthusiasm about the site.
Below is an example of how pivoting works, and what I did this morning.
An example of pivoting
Start with what you want that you don’t have. Or, if you don’t know what you want, start with what you don’t want. For instance, ‘I don’t want to feel so defeated about creating my site.’ Then, write its opposite: ‘I want to feel confident about creating my site!’
That was close to what I wanted but I wanted to get closer. I was nagged by a lot of loose ends: Like that I want to be confident that I can decide on a schedule for posting to social media; find and post to certain bookmarking sites; join wellness Facebook groups; and a bunch of other marketing and technical things. So, I started to create statements that addressed each one, but that seemed tangential, unending, and it didn’t feel good.
I wanted to find an overall affirmation that would be the successful result of having accomplished all those tasks.
So, I thought and thought and came up with the following:
“My posts on Mind Body Dish attract about 25 comments a day from readers who are inspired and encouraged by them!”
And I wrote that in a circle in the center of a piece of paper.
I didn’t believe it yet or feel good or enthusiastic about it. It seemed far away and unreal at that point. So far, I have about 20 visitors a day, max, and nobody’s ever commented on the blog.
What you do next is where the magic begins
Conjure up a statement that supports your starting affirmation somewhat, but that you actually believe in.
I wrote “other people get tons of comments,” but that didn’t make me feel better, so I crossed it out. Then I wrote “I’m capable of change.” But that didn’t make me feel any better either, so I crossed that one out, too.
Then I used the old faithful phrase Abraham Hicks suggests: “Wouldn’t it be nice IF…”
And, I wrote, “Wouldn’t it be nice if my posts on Mind Body Dish attracted about 25 comments a day from readers who are inspired and encouraged by them?”
And that lifted me up, emotionally and vibrationally, and gave my body a little feeling of relief. So, I circled it as my first supporting statement.
Abraham Hicks calls this pivoting exercise the Focus Wheel. It’s written on a page with the ultimate affirmation in a circle in the middle of a page.
The exercise is to come up with twelve supporting statements like my ‘wouldn’t it be nice’ one. You write them on the page surrounding the central affirmation. The twelve statements need to make you feel a little better, a little relief, and closer to believing in your central statement.
One way to do this is to go more general in your thinking. In other words, there are things you already really do believe in, and if you apply them to the issue at hand, you can “jump on the wheel.”
My second statement was: “I will be so happy to connect with other like-minded people!” Well, that’s true, so I put it in the second circle around the central circle. (BTW, here’s a photo of this exercise, and you’ll see that it isn’t a perfect circle and I make quite a mess of it. But that doesn’t matter.)
Here’s a list of the next 10 statements I came up with. It took some doing. Some “threw me off the wheel,” as Abraham says, which means they made me feel bad, not good. So, I threw them out.
“Many people have loved my other writing.”
“I’ve always loved sharing what helps me to be healthier, so Mind Body Dish is a perfect outlet for me.”
“I believe in the power of my connection to source energy/God and the brilliant ideas and directions it opens in my writing.”
“I experience waking up with great ideas for new posts.”
“I am confident about and experienced researching stories and communicating complex ideas in clear and inviting ways.”
“I have been a seeker my whole life. I’ve always communicated what I’ve learned.”
“I feel relief and peace as I do this process now.”
“I can use the Internet to join a world-wide conversation!”
“I have all I need to create valuable site content that attracts a following of like-minded people.”
“I AM passionate about connecting with other thinkers through Mind Body Dish!”
And, that’s it.
By the end, I felt a whole lot better about my site.
The source material for this exercise is in Chapters 16 and 17 of the book “Ask and it is Given: Learning to Manifest Your Desires,” by Esther and Jerry Hicks.
Great piece, I can totally relate!