Slow and steady wins the race when manifesting the perfect life

“Never discourage anyone…who continually makes progress, no matter how slow.”
~Plato (427 BC - 347 BC)

For years I believed that manifestation, the metaphysical process of bringing into reality the desires of your heart, was something that was supposed to happen quickly once you had set your intention and let go of your limitations. What I have come to appreciate more recently is the process part of manifestation. As part of this an appreciation for the element of time has also evolved.

Let me give you an example:

For years my husband has hated his job. He works in a university library and for a long time he enjoyed helping faculty and students with research, analysis of materials usage, and ordering new materials. Then a new dean of libraries came in with a new vision, one that included using librarian as sales reps to hawk the library’s programs to faculty rather than continuing to focus on the “old fashioned” skills of research and collection management. Husband bitched and moaned. We talked for hours. And over time we slowly built a picture of what his ideal job in the “new” library would look like—continuing to be the “go to guy” for research questions, being not only valued for but specifically given the job of doing complex analysis of materials usage to aid in purchasing decisions, helping with troubleshooting projects for the online catalog. The picture we painted together of this “perfect job” was wonderful, but we could never see a way for it to happen.

Finally out of depression and desperation Husband started talking about early retirement. About the same time a new department manager was hired, a woman who had worked in the library before and who Husband has always gotten along well with. He was able to talk with her about his frustrations, about his inability to be a sales person due to anxiety issues, and his desire to be valued for his unique skills. A few weeks later, New Manager tells Husband that she has created a new position just for him! He is now the go to person for all research questions, asked to do detailed analyses of use records and help his colleagues make purchasing decisions, and helps with troubleshooting. He had just been handed his perfect job on a silver platter!

From the time we started imagining the perfect job and the time it was given to him, Husband and I had spent almost five years manifesting this change.

I have learned several important lessons from this experience:

#1 Manifestation works! Yay! But not always on the time schedule you think you want, or you think is best; the universe has its own time schedule. It would be easy to insert a “DUH!” here , but the truth is that as spiritual beings in human form we tend to forget that time is limitless. We get, at best, only 80-100 years in each body, so we tend to want everything good right now. We forget that we are often unable to fully appreciate “good” things received at a “bad” time.

#3 Non-attachment creates flow! I don’t think that Husband would have been able to fully appreciate this opportunity even a year ago. Until recently he was still too tied up in knots about judging the new dean’s abandonment of services he feels are central to “good librarianship” to be able to relax and let the universe do its work. The new job came within just a few weeks of his finally letting go of this, and other, job-related attachments.

#2 Being nice to yourself is a source of great power! My belief that manifestation “done correctly” should happen quickly was a limitation on the universe that constricted the flow of energy both around the issue and within and through me. It became a source of self-judgment, and ultimately of self-doubt, both of which limit our powers of creation. People who are confident, self-loving, and open to possibility will find manifestation easier because they are likely to be more centered, better grounded, and more open to the flow of universal energy.

I’ve probably learned lots more good things from this experience, but these are the ones that are sticking with me most strongly. We are both very grateful for Husband’s new opportunity and these lessons. Hopefully we can put them to good use on manifesting more good things!