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Welcome to Week Seven of The Master Key System and welcome to an extended and super-sized episode of the Master Key Coaching Teleseminars! We had to go longer with this call because Week Seven is where things really begin to get interesting. There is a lot in this section of the book: the Law of Attraction, visualization, faith, and how things are tied together.
In reading this section, you’ll also notice that this is the section that served as the source material for many of the movies about the Law of Attraction that have been released over the past few years. As you listen to this episode, you’ll also see how they completely missed the point.
While I like to keep my monologues short, I couldn’t help but going a little over time. Even with all of that, we still had time for a most enlightening Question & Answer session.
In this section of The Master Key System, Haanel outlines the method we use for visualization. As I’ve stated countless times over the course of these calls, this is one of the main points that one should learn from reading and studying this book.
How does Haanel define visualization?
Visualization is the process of making mental images.
Simple.
There are three steps to making (and using) these mental images.
1. Idealization
This is where you picture in your mind exactly what you want. It must be complete and unwavering, like a blueprint, which is an example that Haanel uses a couple of times in this section. I use the example of a business plan, which is an idealized plan for how a business will use the money it is requesting and the outline for its growth.
2. Visualization
Here you will see your picture completely. As you use your creative imagination to create your image, these thoughts will lead to actions and those actions will lead to results.
3. Materialization
In this step, you get what you want. It may take time, depending on the size and scope of the goal to which you’re aspiring. With persistence, daring, and work, it will happen.
In point #4, Haanel wrote
Work is necessary — labor, hard mental labor, the kind of effort which so few are willing to put forth.
Is Haanel stating that work is necessary and that things will not magically manifest for us?
In a word, yes!
In point #7, Haanel expands on the process he delineated fills in the blanks (that the movies, infomercials, and books left empty).
Thought will lead to action, action will develop methods, methods will develop friends, and friends will bring about circumstances, and finally, the third step, or Materialization, will have been accomplished.
Not only is this the process of visualization and attainment of our goals, it is also how faith is developed.
As we build our ideals and think on them, as we build our mental pictures and take actions to gather the means to attain our goals, we will experience our faith growing stronger. As our mental pictures become clearer and as we build and process the means for actualizing them, we experience a swelling of seeing how things are possible because we begin to understand more and more about how the world — and the process — works.
This is faith growing. It continues to grow as we take action and experience victories and successes.
This brings us to what has become the biggest topic in personal development — and the most misunderstood. It’s a concept that has been bastardized in so many ways that it’s become a quasi-religious concept to some.
It is, of course, the Law of Attraction.
Haanel wrote that the Law of Attraction is brought into operation by a three-step process.
- Earnest Desire
- Confident Expectation
- Firm Demand
Sound familiar? It should. You may have heard this stated as “Ask – Believe – Receive.”
Is that all there is, though? If we simply ask for something, believe that we’ll receive it, will we get it? Will we be like the young boy in the one infomercial who wants a bike and merely looks longingly at pictures of the bike he wants and receives the bike because it is bought for him by a creepy-looking guy? Do we have to do nothing and we’ll get what we want from some Universal genii?
Let’s see what Haanel wrote in point #27.
This does not mean that we are to sit down and do nothing; we will do more and better work than we have ever done before.
That’s a powerful statement! Review this section one more time. Re-read the points where Haanel says that “work is necessary.” Re-read where Haanel wrote that “thought will lead to action.” Finally, re-read point #27 in which Haanel states that “we will do more and better work than we have ever done before.”
We will take action, we will work hard, and we will work more.
That’s why if you even casually peruse the Forbes 400 and read the stories of the richest people in the world, you’ll quickly find that without exception the one thing they claim as the “secret” to their successes is hard work.
That brings us to a question that many people ask me: Why did (and still do) many of the books and movies and “gurus” continue to deny that action — “work … the kind of effort so few are willing to put forth” — is necessary?
Simply put, because it sells — and hard work doesn’t. I’ve been in the business of personal development for about ten years. One of the main things I’ve learned over the years is that this is, indeed, a business. Make no mistake about it. When it comes to business, people like to sell the things that, well, sell. What sells better than the concept of wealth without working?
The answer is not much.
So, that’s what gets peddled and that’s what people buy.
You’re not like that, though. That’s why you’re listening to these teleseminars. That’s why you made it this far — to Week Seven. Most people never make it this far. Most stop reading The Master Key System by Week Three. The vast majority of people never make it to the end. Even fewer than that truly acquire a deep understanding of it like the one you’re getting here.
Persist to the end, gain the understanding that only very few have, and you’ll experience success as few do.
That’s not only what I promise. It’s what I know.
That brings us to the exercise for this week: imagine a friend the last time you saw him or her. Imagine a conversation with your friend and in vivid and complete detail, imagine your friend’s reactions.
It’s a pretty straight-forward exercise.
In The Master Key Workbook, I wrote a method to help you in this exercise and in all the visualizing exercises in The Master Key System.
In order to visualize, you will be using mental muscles that you may have never used before this time, or the muscles may have been used incorrectly or only in a limited capacity. Some people find visualization easy, while others have some difficulty with it. In general, left-handed people tend to have an easier time visualizing. Why is that? It is because of the different parts of the brain that are being put to use on a daily basis.
Those who are left-handed use the right side of their brain more. The right side of the brain is the seat of creativity and mental pictures and feelings. Those who are right-handed use the left side of their brain more. The left side of the brain is the seat of logic and deduction and language.
To help you visualize your friend as you are asked to do in this Week’s exercise, write a description of him here, but use your opposite hand to write it. In other words, if you are right-handed (as most people are), then write with your left hand. If you are left-handed, then write the description with your right hand. This will serve to jump start the side of the brain that we do not exercise enough. It would be the ultimate goal to become ambidextrous, but that is not necessary. If you can, though, write with your opposite hand a couple of times per month so that you attain a decent level of competance at writing with that hand.
I learned this technique from a couple of art teachers that I had. It’s a powerful way for one to jump-start the side of the brain that they use less.
Try it. You just might like it — and get something good from it.
One question that we had during the Question & Answer session is something that I get asked a lot. It’s also something that gets bandied about the personal development field like an old toy.
Should we follow our passion as we choose what we are going to do?
It’s not an easy question to answer no matter how many “gurus” tell us that we have to follow our passions or that when we follow our passions the money will follow.
The latter is definitely not always the case and the former is nebulous at best.
Listen to our discussion on this. Let me know what you get from it. As I stated, choosing what we want to do is a more complex equation than merely following our passions. There are more things to consider.
Thank you for joining me on this week’s teleseminar. It is an honor and a pleasure to make them available to you.
Until next week when we discuss my favorite exercise in Haanel’s The Master Key System, please get for yourself the best of everything.