Most everyone I meet tends to hallucinate daily. They aren’t dropping acid or doing drugs. They aren’t indulging in ayahuasca or peyote ceremonies. They aren’t residents of a metal ward in some hospital. They are just average people envisioning their health, wealth and happiness daily. They are business executives envisioning sales revenue without marketing expense. They are marketing executives spending too much time on too many ideas. Most of these people have read The Secret or attended one of the hundreds of workshops on “willing things into being.” “They” could even be you.
The reason I’m suggesting you may be hallucinating daily is because of one simple observation: VISION WITHOUT EXECUTION IS HALLUCINATION.
Yep, anyone and everyone can envision health, happiness and prosperity. You can read The Secret and attend workshops until you run out of money or brain cells to absorb the rhetoric. Author Rhonda Byrne claims that positive thinking alone can create life-changing results such as increased health, wealth and happiness in The Secret, which was published in 2006. The book went on to sell over 21 million copies and was translated into 44 languages even though it was nothing more than an afterthought of a movie produced earlier. The magnitude of the success is a testament to the truly globalization of capitalism as well as a marker for the desires of millions of people globally. You want to be healthy, wealthy and happy especially if all you have to do is “think” about it.
In 1937 author Napoleon Hill wrote, “Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, he can achieve” in his book titled Think And Grow Rich. Mr. Hill was one of the first to pontificate the visualization movement, but it also came with a strong prescription that somehow got lost over the years and reinterpretations.
Hallucinate or Execute
How many times have you heard some say that someone else “stole their idea” or that they “invented something now hugely successful first”? How many times have you had to endure people bemoaning their plight of not living their bliss but continuing to run the gauntlet of mainstream business economics? How many times have you witnessed people who just expect things instead of doing what it takes to make those things become real?
Mr. Hill starts with the idea conceived in the mind of man (your latest brilliant vision), and then extends the premise to the requirement of truly believing it. Not believing in just the result but the steps necessary to achieve that result. Believing that you have the means, cunning and perseverance to actually take the steps necessary to not only start, but also complete the journey necessary to make your vision a reality. And yes, the journey is as important if not more important than the destination as we have discussed in previous blogs.
This segregates the average person into two camps: those who expect (hallucinators) and those who do (executioners). When I describe hallucinators, I don’t want you to picture someone wasted beyond acceptable limits thanks to pharmaceutical or plant “medicine”. Instead just picture everyone you have ever met who bemoans their current fate but seem to be unwilling to take all (or any) of the necessary steps to change that. Similarly, when I describe executioners in this context, do not picture the black-hooded figure holding a huge single-bladed ax. Picture someone who can, and does, execute the steps necessary to create.
What may be the most interesting observation in comparing the success of The Secret and Think And Grow Rich is the timing of each book’s publication. Mr. Hills’ book was published during the height of great depression of the 1930’s and Ms. Byrne’s book was published at the height of the great recession of the new millennium. People need hope and both of these books provide that but with very different perspectives once you actually read the books versus the Cliff Notes. I would further observe that we came out of the great depression because, as a society, we were willing to roll up our sleeves and do the hard work necessary to rebuild. The ultimate question for these modern times is are we willing to do the hard work again or are we just expecting it to manifest?
Vitamins Versus Drugs
“People need vitamins but want drugs.” I’m sure I read this somewhere at sometime but don’t remember who I should credit it to. It is the ultimate metaphor for this particular blog. You want “The Secret” but you need “Think And Grow Rich”. You want to hallucinate but need to execute.
I invite you to dream. I invite you to envision a present and future full of health, wealth and happiness. But more importantly I invite you to also envision, truly believe and TAKE ALL OF THE STEPS NECESSARY to actually bring that vision into reality. I invite you to be an “executioner” not a “hallucinator.”
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