Is the Law of Attraction a Law? To answer, let's define the Law of Attraction. "I attract to my life whatever I give my attention, energy and focus to, whether positive or negative," says Michael J. Losier in his book Law of Attraction, The Science of Attracting More of What You Want and Less of What You Don't.

"We speak learnedly of the Law of Gravitation, but ignore that equally wonderful manifestation, The Law of Attraction in the Thought World," William Walker Atkinson wrote in his 1908 treatise Thought Vibration or The Law of Attraction in the Thought World.

Atkinson saw Thought as "a Force - a manifestation of energy - having a magnet-like power of attraction," and he claimed the reason life denies us what we desire is "we close our eyes to the mighty law that draws to us the things we desire or fear, that makes or mar our lives."

If we fall in love with whatever it is we desire to attain, if it becomes our ruling passion or desire, then the Law of Attraction, Atkinson believed, kicks in.

The Law, he assured his readers, will draw negative events to us if we're always negative and the things we desire if we maintain a positive state of mind and do not waver from our intended purpose.

Some people, including talk show host Larry King, have doubts about the efficacy of The Law of Positive Attraction because, it seems to bypass those born into awful poverty and starvation who will, no matter how positive their thoughts, probably die without a chance to ever raise themselves out of the circumstances into which they were born.

Witness what's going on in Darfur.

So is The Law of Attraction a Law as real as gravity or is it a work in progress - a "habit" of the universe rather than a ironclad Law?

Rupert Sheldrake, biologist with a Ph.D. in biochemistry from Cambridge University, has written more than ten books including A New Science of Life and The Presence of the Past. Sheldrake says most of the laws of nature, as well as the universe, are more habits rather than Laws.

He states, "There is no need to suppose that all the laws of nature sprang into being fully formed at the moment of the Big Bang, like a kind of cosmic Napoleonic code, or that they [these Laws] exist in a metaphysical realm beyond time and space."

Eternal laws make sense to us. Aren't they why the universe works? This would seem, at first glance, to be the case.

Sheldrake thinks differently. He believes the universe learns, just as we do. Nature progresses, the laws of nature also progress, just as human laws evolve over time. Sheldrake's years of research have led him to conclude that the Laws of the Universe, so-called, are habits it has learned over time.

The more habits are repeated "the more probable they become, other things being equal." Habits of past members of the species are transmitted, he says, "through a kind of non-local resonance, called morphic resonance."

"Many kinds of organisms have habits," Sheldrake writes, "but only humans have laws."

Through what he calls Morphic resonance "the patterns of activity in self-organizing systems [which we are; which the universe is] are influenced by similar patterns in the past, giving each species and each kind of self-organizing system a collective memory," which is then integrated into what we humans call Laws but are actually habits of the species - and habits of the cosmos.

If Sheldrake is right, and I'm not arguing that he is, his theories would seem to suggest a different view of the Law of Attraction. The Law of Attraction, therefore, may not be an eternal law but a habit progressing toward Law status. This "Law" may likely be a work in progress, not a final fact.

What does it mean when we hint that the Law of Attraction may be a work in progress and not an eternal law set in motion at the time of, or before, the origin of our universe, solar system, and earth?

The implications, actually, are pretty exciting.

In Self-Creation by George Weinberg, Ph.D., Weinberg indicates that "Every time you act you add strength to the motivating idea behind what you've done."

What this means is, "The act retypes the motivating message in your mind. When not acted on, the message becomes weaker as if fading from an electronic screen. When it is acted on it becomes brighter, louder, recharged, prompting more of the same acts." In other words, "Acting on any belief or feeling makes you believe or feel it more."

There is a two stage effect of any act, Weinberg says. "The immediate effect is to satisfy, assuage, reduce the motivating impulse behind it. The ultimate effect, however, is to strengthen it." The paranoid person, for example, who checks and rechecks the locks feels first stage relief, "and ultimate reinforcement of his paranoia."

How does what Weinberg is saying tie into our premise about "Law" of Attraction?

By the way, Self-Creation is not a book that mentions the Law of Attraction. It's about how our acts, our behaviors, intensify the motivating message behind the acts we perform which makes them, to a certain degree, habits - for better or worse.

Reading his book we discover that "Any acts of avoidance based on fear will entrench the fear,"

'Talking about our problems is the most impressive way a depressive keeps the depression going," Weinberg writes. "Start checking up on someone [you don't trust] and you'll become even more suspicious."

A man will never forgive you for the wrong he has done you," Weinberg says.

"That which I feared most has come upon me," Job in the Old Testament told his friends. Job blamed himself and his fears for his troubles. Doesn't Job's plight sound like the gravitation force of his fears, the "Law of Attraction" at work, making his worries visible? It would seem so, doesn't it?

It is a paradox that "Self-protection does not alleviate fear, it increases it."

"Love someone and they seem to become more worthy of your love," Weinberg writes. This how Law of Attraction advocates say the Law works. We attract the "vibrations" of other minds keyed to our thoughts.

In Using Your Mind For a Change, Richard Bandler observes that "Most people motivate themselves by thinking about how bad they will feel if they don't do something. A few people do the reverse. They use pleasant feelings as motivators. Those few," he writes, "live in an entirely different world than most people."

Is it possible that we, by our thoughts, actions, feelings, moods, and desires, for good or ill, are teaching the Habit of Attraction how to become the eternal Law of Attraction?

Might it be likely that all the wonderful things people who follow the "Law" of Attraction are doing - imagery, meditation, positive thinking, affirmations, cutting pictures of what they desire from magazines and creating Dream Boards - are showing the Habit of Attraction how, as a work in progress - to become a better, more dependable Law of Attraction?

If this is so, then the Habit of Attraction is Learning from us to become a better, more efficient, reliable friend and "Law" to our worthy desires, but it's also learning - from our human thought forms - how to create images on the screen of space colored by our inner fears and money worries as well as the images on our nightly network news.

Our thoughts are powerful Forces!

"Never lose sight of the great principle of autosuggestion," The great healer Emile Coue' told his patients who visited his clinic in Nancy, France, during the 1920's: "Optimism always and in spite of everything, even when events do not seem to justify it."

The Law of Habit of Attraction, learning from us and ever closer to becoming an eternal Law of Attraction - thanks to us - will, if we trust it - be a powerful ally.

"Then again he begins to set into motion the great Law of Attraction, whereby he draws to him help, and is, in turn, attracted to others who can aid him.," William Walker Atkinson writes. "This Law of Attraction is no joke, but is a great live working principle of Nature, as anyone may learn by experimenting and observing."

Whatever side you take in this discussion, it's always a good idea to remember the words of the comedian George Burns who said, "There's something to this thinking positive business!"

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