by Joe VItale

I’ve learned at least two things about achieving goals: There is an easy way and a hard way.

The hard way is to work night and day, stay obsessed, rarely sleep, and never give up.

Since everyone talks about the hard way, I want to address the easy way. After all, why struggle if you don’t have to?

I’ve used the easy way to create bestselling books, lose 70 pounds in 8 months, find my ideal mate, get healthy, increase my wealth, and much more.

Obviously, it works.

Here’s the formula in brief:

1. Be grateful for what you already have.

2. Playfully declare what you would like to have with positive emotion, feeling as if it is already achieved.

3. Act on the nudges and opportunities that appear.

That’s it. In my latest book, “The Attractor Factor,” I explain a 5-step formula for getting what you want. It’s useful for those times when you don’t feel grateful, or can’t decide on what you want, or don’t understand the concept of letting go while taking inspired action. It’s also helpful when you have issues about money, or deserving, or feel in any way blocked from your goals.

But the bottom-line for me is this: Declare what you would like with no attachment and plenty of good feeling, feel grateful for what you already have, and act on what appears. The result will be the manifestation of a happy life.

Let’s explore this in depth.

1. Feel grateful now.

It doesn’t mater where you live or what you have.

If you’re reading this, you’re most likely living like a king or queen compared to people in third world countries. You may even be living better than kings or queens from history, as they often lived in cold, violent, frightful times. You’ve got it made.

2. Choose what you want without attachment, feeling as if it is already achieved.

There’s magic in saying “Id love to—(fill in the blank) but I won’t die if I don’t have it.” Since the world is simply energy taking form, when you declare you want something, you begin to attract it. But when you say you need something, the need pushes it away. You want to select your desire, and feel the joy of already having it, without feeling any desperation. Need will push it away; Desire will attract it. If you feel as if you *already* have it, then you *will* have it.

3. Act on your opportunities and intuitions.

You may get offers, calls, or who knows what. Act on them. You never know what will lead you to your goal. Your ego cannot see the big picture. Intuition and opportunities will come to you from the larger view, and your job is to act on them. As you do, you will be taken to your goal, even when it appears you are being blocked away. Trust is key.

Is that really all there is to it?

Again, the fuller procedure in “The Attractor Factor” will take care of any snags in the process, but the basic process is simple. Let’s walk through it:

1. Look around your room. What are you grateful for? Make a list. Get into the authentic feeling of true gratitude. In other words, be happy now. You don’t need a reason to be happy. But if you want one, find something, anything, to be grateful for right now. When you’re grateful, you’re in a mental place that will attract more to be grateful for.

2. Look around the playground of your mind. What would you like to have, do, or be? What would be fun? Write it down. As you do, feel what it would be like to already have it now. Pretend you won the lotto. What would you want for yourself or others? What would be fun? The key is playful non-attachment while experiencing its completion *now.*

3. Now pay attention. As you go about your life, listen to your hunches and act on them, and pay attention to the opportunities and act on them. You never know what will take you in the direction of your goal. Your job is to take inspired action. You may have some work to do in this step, but the work will be from your heart, and will take you in the direction of getting your goal.

Why not go through the steps right now?

Write them down, experience them, and then check back in a few weeks and see how they are doing. You may surprise yourself by how easily and quickly your goals are achieved.

If you find yourself doubting the process, thinking negative, or in any way not enjoying the simplicity of the easy way to attain your goals, then consider learning the 5 step process in “The Attractor Factor.”

Above all, have fun. Keep smiling. Be playful. Stay grateful. These are all elements of the new secret to manifesting your goals.

Remember the words of a famous song that also perfectly summaries this new way to achieve your goals: “Don’t worry. Be happy.”

Dr. Joe Vitale is one of the experts featured in the documentary Beyond Belief: www.beyondbeliefthemovie.com

Short video by Jack Canfield.  See more wisdom from Jack in the innovative film Beyond Belief

Short video produced by Stewart Emery and Mark Thompson.  Stewart shares more of his wisdom in the film Beyond Belief: www.beyondbeliefthemovie.com

Short video produced by Joe Vitale, on the secret behind Think and Grow Rich.   Joe reveals even more insight in the film Beyond Belief.

by Dr. Joe Vitale

October 26th, 2008 www.MrFire.Com

During dinner the other night, one of the people in our group looked at me and asked the question I didn’t want to hear -

“How did you become homeless?”

By now most people have heard my story of being on the streets of Dallas in the late 1970s and struggling in poverty in Houston for many years after that. Some of it is explained in my new audioprogram The Awakening Course.

But I had never explained exactly how I ended up in such dire circumstances.

When I answered the question at dinner, everyone at the table stared at me.

The woman who asked the question sat there with her mouth open and eyes un-blinking.

She asked, “Why have you never said this before?”

My friend Mark Ryan was sitting there, also staring, and said, “As long as I’ve known you, you’ve never told this story before. It’s riveting. This changes everything.”

Changes everything?

Riveting?

They all said I had to tell the story now.

“Given the current financial crisis and with people losing their homes and their jobs, this story needs to be told more than ever before,” Mark said.

I heard them and realized I agreed.

So here’s the story…

I knew I wanted to be an author when I was a teenager. I wanted to write books and plays that made people happy. Everywhere I looked I saw un-happy people. I believed I could help them with humor and stories.

During that time of the mid-1970s, I watched sports. I don’t today but back then the Dallas Cowboys were the rage. Roger Staubach and Tom Landry were heroes. I got caught up in the excitement and felt the place for me to make my name was in Dallas, Texas.

I lived in Ohio at the time. Born and raised there. I worked on the railroad as a trackman, doing heavy labor all day long, working weekends and summers since the age of five.

I saved my money, packed up my bag, and took a bus to Dallas. It took three days to get there.

I was lost in the big city, of course. Being born in a small town in Ohio didn’t prep me for the hustle and bustle of a city the size of Dallas.

Before long, I wanted out.

But I still wanted to be an author.

At that time major companies were building oil and gas pipelines in Alaska and the Middle East, and offering to pay big bucks if you were willing to go to either place.

I wasn’t keen on going to a foreign country and doing more labor, but I saw a chance to make money, save it, and then go on a sabbatical where I could write for a few months or even a year.

It seemed like a brilliant strategy.

I answered one of the newspaper ads that promised to get me pipeline work at a extraordinary hourly wage. I went in their office, met an upbeat sales person, and ended up giving him all of my money – my entire savings, about a thousand dollars at the time – based on his promise that I’d have overseas pipeline work in a week or two.

You might guess part of what happened next – but you won’t guess all of it.

Within a week or so, the company that took all of my money went out of business.

Their doors were closed, no one answered the phone, and no forwarding addresses could be found.

Shortly after that, the company went bankrupt.

And not long after that, the owner of the company committed suicide.

There was no one left to try to get my money back.

I was alone.

I was broke.

I was in Dallas, far from home.

I confess that my ego got in the way here. My family back in Ohio would have taken me back in and welcomed me back home. But I was head strong and determined to somehow survive.

Well, I did survive – by sleeping in church pews, on the steps of a post office, in a bus station.

It wasn’t an easy time, as you can imagine, and I never used to talk about it. It was too embarrassing.

When I told this story at dinner, everyone agreed I had to share it with you.

They said that people are finding themselves in the same situation – they trusted a government, or a corporation, or a person, or a bank, and now they are losing their homes and their jobs.

Hearing that I went through the same thing three decades ago and not only survived but prospered to a level that the Joe Vitale of thirty years ago could hardly imagine, ought to be inspiring to you, too.

I got off the streets and out of poverty by constantly working on myself – reading self-help books, taking action, scrambling at times by taking whatever work I could find, but always always always focusing on my vision: to one day be an author of books that helped people be happy and stay inspired.

If you’re in a place right now that doesn’t feel so good or seem too safe, I urge you to remind yourself that this is only temporary.

This is the cure for despair.

As I say in my book, The Attractor Factor, this is simply current reality, and current reality can change.

You can help it along by doing what you know and need to do.

But remember, the sun will shine again.

It always does.

Your job right now is to focus on what you want and keep it in sight.

Yes, keep taking action;

yes, stay positive and surround yourself with positive people;

yes, be of support to others.

But remember, if I or anyone else can survive homelessness, poverty, job loss, or any other hard time, then you can survive it, too.

Please hang in there.

One last thing:

I admit that there were times I wanted to throw in the towel and get myself out of this life.

Thank God I stuck around. Had I left early, I would have missed a life of magic and wonder, success and fame I never dreamed of before, priceless relationships and experiences, and more.

I have no idea what wonderful good is headed your way – and neither do you.

What you have to do is stay the course and follow your heart.

And remember -

Expect Miracles.

Ao Akua,

Joe Vitale
 Founder of the movement to end homelessness
www.operationyes.com

Joe Vitale is one of twenty four experts featured in the documentary Beyond Belief: www.beyondbeliefthemovie.com