7 Steps to Getting What You Want
Four years ago this month I was living in a trailer on a farm in a small town outside of Boulder, Colorado. I hated it. Rather, I loved the trailer, hated the situation. I’d ended up in Colorado after leaving my home of Southern California following a wildfire in Santa Barbara which fried my house and possessions to a crisp. A year prior to that, a wildfire in Malibu had fried my house and my possessions to a crisp, prompting the move to Santa Barbara. I’d moved to Colorado in hopes of finding a slower pace of life to begin to heal — which I did — and a safe space from the threat of natural disasters — which I did not. Four years into my stay in Colorado it started raining one night and didn’t stop until the town of Lyons — where I’d found sanctuary — was under water. The flood instantly earned me another FEMA number, stripped me of what security I thought I’d built up and left me, once again, to start from scratch.
Lucky for me, these boots were made for conjuring. I remember clearly the day I bought them because they were the first item I was able to buy for myself following the flood that wasn’t directly related to my survival, and that I did not have to borrow money or accept as a gift in order to own. It was six months after the flood, and three years into my departure from corporate America and I had recently begun to play guitar on street corners in Boulder. As I walked back to my car each day, I was lured by the call of these elusive moccasins in the window of a shop. Elusive because when one goes through three rapid fire natural disasters, luxury items like $100 leather moccasins become a distant dream. Nevertheless, each day, I fixated on the boots, closed my eyes, visualized myself wearing them and expressed to the universe that I was ready for them. I mean…it’s Boulder. Why not?
“Ask for what you want and be prepared to get it!” — Maya Angelou
One night at a brewery happy hour gig where I sang regularly, a table of especially rowdy businessmen-gone-wild had dominated most of my play list throughout the evening. As they left, they one by one took their turns coming up to tell me goodbye and tossing cash into my tip jar, the rowdiest one of all being the last to go and throwing in a dollar bill and the cheesiest wink I’ve ever seen to this day. I laughed to myself, that the rowdiest, loudest, most Nickelback-y song-requester of the bunch was the only one of the fellas to throw in a single dollar. I took my money out of the jar and out of the dollar bill fell a crisp new hundred, with a post-it note and a smiley face. Boom. There it was. I raced back to the shop in Boulder minutes before they closed and bought the boots. That night, before I went to bed, I thanked the universe. Since the table was hot, I went ahead and expressed that I was ready to return to my home in the mountains by the ocean. As I drifted to sleep, I imagined myself on that mountaintop, my body filling with a sense of calm and my mind combatting any defeatist thoughts with the belief that I *would* make it back despite the fact that I’d be driving out in a ten year old car with over a quarter of a million miles on it and $600 to my name. The next morning, I woke up to an email from a friend, asking if I knew of anyone looking for work in the exact place I wanted to be. I told her I’d be there in two weeks. And I was…
These past several years have been focused on rebuilding but every so often I have a meltdown and begin to cry to the same generous universe “WHYYYY did this happen to me???”. In each instance, it takes me less and less time to remember that one day, in 2007, I sat in meditation on a mountaintop in Malibu and asked the universe for a healthy relationship to attachment, as I’d identified that as the root of my suffering and a block to the spiritual progress I had begun to seek through meditation and yoga. Within days, my first house burned down. I was forced into detachment, with no going back. And then it happened again. And again. And not only am I still standing — but I am literally standing in the exact place that I wanted to stand to begin with. Had I denied what was happening or fought to stay in place, I’d never be the person I am now — the person who has what it takes to do the things I wanted to do to begin with. Ironic that I’m now staring at my worn out boots- boots that have carried me on countless adventures through the southwest, helped me set up my first tent and build my first fire as I drove solo across country, pounded the Los Angeles musical pavement to find traction in a crazy world — unable to detach from them, despite the fact that I recently celebrated the ease with which I purchased a brand new pair. But in order to make room for the new, keep the flow going, and strengthen my ‘letting go’ muscle, away they must go!
“The greatest discovery of my generation is that human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitudes of mind.” ~William James
What these boots, and countless items and situations in my life, have taught me is that there is a very clear way we can interact with the universe in order to create a harmonious journey for ourselves and those around us.
- Meditate — this is the only way to quiet our mind enough to listen to what our soul is trying to tell us. We live in a reactive society and are so busy responding to stimulus, that we forget that we are capable of and expected to contribute our creative energy to the universe. Everyone can do it. Everyone MUST do it. Do it every day.
- Ask for what you want and be specific — this is pretty straight forward. Who are you asking? It doesn’t really matter. Ask the universe, ask Mother Nature, ask your God, ask your Highest Self…just throw it out there. But BE SPECIFIC.
- Visualize the end result — do not worry and stress about how to get there. This is hard. Do it anyway.
- Allow yourself to absorb the feelings that go along with visualizing and believe that you are already in possession of the thing.
- Trust — Know that the universe will deliver it. Understand that the path may not look like the one you imagined, but trust that you will get there. It may take two weeks, it may take two decades. Let go.
- Gratitude — thank the universe for every situation. No matter how uncomfortable the situation is, by the time you have worked up to gratitude, you will have signaled to the universe that you are ready to move forward.
- Return to #1. Meditate every day. Meditate twice a day. Find peace in your mind to gain clarity on what you came here to do.
