Okay, I’m only going to say this one time (though I may repeat myself and/or be redundant):

Quantum Physics has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to say about ANYTHING OTHER THAN QUANTUM PHYSICS

And even then, what it “says” is often hotly debated.

Quantum Physics provides no insight into:

• human psychology
• religious philosophy
• new age theory
• getting what you want
• Bea Arthur

Remember, that Quantum Physics was developed when the physical laws that we see every day, right in front of our non-Quantum faces, weren’t working when examining of sub-atomic “particles” (while particles is not the most accurate word, let me assure you that VIBRATIONS is completely not accurate).

SUGGESTION #1:

If you are not a physicist and you’re talking about any of those topics, or anything else that IS NOT QUANTUM PHYSICS, please remember and remind your listener that you are using your ideas about Quantum Physics AS A METAPHOR.

For example: QP does NOT say that “we are all connected.”

If you want to be a bit more accurate, try this: In Quantum Physics, there is a highly unusual experiment that shows, again under highly unusual experimental conditions, the likes of which which we’ve never seen in nature and can barely sustain using millions of dollars of precisely tuned scientific equipment, that certain particles, which we create using even more expensive and complicated scientific instruments and which we don’t see isolated in nature, exhibit peculiar and currently inexplicable (so inexplicable that when/if we *do* find an explanation, it may undermine the theories of Quantum Physics) connections over an infinite amount of time and space (though we’ve only actually tested this phenomenon over finite amounts of time and space)… poetically speaking, if those infinitesimally small particles exhibit that kind of connection, don’t you love the vague and not-inherently-logical leap to suggest that we do, too!?

Similarly, our observing something does NOT change the composition of the thing.

Most people pull this one out of their hats by saying, an electron is either a particle or a wave, depending on how you look at it.

Excuse me while I apply standard physics to map the trajectory of my projectile vomiting.

An electron is not a particle OR a wave… when examined in a particular way, we see particle-characteristics. Examined another way, we see wave characteristics. This, in an of itself, is pretty wacky. And, perhaps, we’ll find another way to examine electrons and see it exhibiting yet another type of “behavior” (or “behaviour” if it’s observed in the UK). Frankly, we have no frickin’ clue what an electron “is” or even if “is” is the right word (proving that Bill Clinton was also inappropriately bringing in Quantum Theory when discussing a sexual relationship whose pushing and shoving was, clearly, Newtonian).

Also, that, mathematically, a sub-atomic particle COULD BE SAID TO exist everywhere in the universe, that does not mean “we are all one.”

The probability that any SINGLE particle is anywhere other than exactly where it is (and don’t get me started on how we can’t really know where that is), is so close to ZERO that it may as well be ZERO. And that’s for a SINGLE PARTICLE (I was hoping that the initial capitalization would make that point, but again, as I said before, I may be redundant). Add together enough particles to make, say, a basketball, or a Lexus, or JUST TWO PARTICLES… and, trust me, whatever you’re looking at, sitting on, driving, wearing or eating will not suddenly disappear only to be found on the other side of the galaxy.

Oh, and for those who say that our observation creates the universe we experience, let me just ask two stupid questions:

1) And so, after we all die, the universe will cease as well? (let me answer: Uh, yeah, right)

2) Well who is aware of, and therefore created, the observer?

Anyway, let’s continue…

SUGGESTION #2:

If you are not a physicist and you’re talking about any of those topics, or anything else that IS NOT QUANTUM PHYSICS, please remember and remind your listener that you are using your ideas about Quantum Physics to demonstrate that your cranium might be mislocated somewhere in your anal orifice.

I’ll let the physicists argue that they don’t have a case of rectocephaly, but let’s talk about physicists for a moment…

Remember the guys in high school or college who majored in physics? (I know there were girls who did, too, but if you were a female physics major you will soon understand why I’m leaving you out of this example.)

Think back for just a moment (or go back in time because, remember Quantum Physics can’t see why time only moves forward) to those physics guys… what names did you call them then?

Nerds, geeks, dweebs… shall I continue? (And do I need to reiterate and repeat my point?)

Do you honestly think that a PhD or Nobel Prize in physics magically confers superior insight into metaphysics and the human condition upon people who couldn’t get a date for the prom and were unable to dress without the help of GrrrAnimals?

Now, clearly, I don’t believe that all physicists are unable to grasp emotions and philosophy and, instead, have to be home at 6 for Wopner. But, look, just because someone is smart, doesn’t mean they aren’t stupid!

That is, we’re ALL prone to making silly leaps in logic, believing in magic, landing on AN answer without knowing it’s the WRONG answer, and confusing something that “feels true” with something that IS.

Let’s turn this upside down for a second… when Einstein (who once said, “Even *I* am no Einstein”) came up with the theory of relativity, many physicists thought he was a bonehead and wrote him off with, “Yeah, right. Like an assistant patent clerk can solve a problem that has perplexed us real physicists for decades.”

If they were so wrong about him, then why do we think they’re so right about how we “create reality” with our thinking?

I can’t help but end this rant by paraphrasing the really cool, incredibly witty, quirky sketch artist, bongo player, safe cracker and Nobel Laureate in Physics, Richard Feynman, “Anyone who thinks they understand Quantum Physics doesn’t understand Quantum Physics.” And let me add, “And if they tell you ‘Quantum Physicists say…’ then they’ve clearly never been to a physics conference, where there are often more opinions than there are attendees.”

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to get into my wormhole so I can go back in time fix the rift I made last time where I accidentally caused my grandparents to not meet in that coffee shop, resulting in the non-birth of my father and, therefore, me and… hey, if you’re reading this, I guess it worked!

I’m starting a new campaign that all humans should wear diapers.

No more limiting this revolutionary article of clothing to the very young and very old. We should ALL wear them!

And not because of the combination of convenience and entertainment value that we would get by being able, say, to interrupt the negotiation of a Kosovar arms treaty with, “Could you repeat that, General, I was taking a leak.” And not because it would replace the stress of trying to find a clean bathroom in 3rd world countries with a self-satisfied and self-reliant smile.

But because, as far as I can tell, no matter our age, we haven’t really grown up. And we may as well admit it and demonstrate it with the symbolic act of replacing boxers with Depend undergarments (full disclosure: as soon as I make this post, I will find the company that makes/owns Depend and buy their stock).

While I could site seemingly countless examples of how we haven’t grown up, today I’ll focus on just this one: that the arguments over most serious topics facing our world today devolve into: “You are rubber and I am glue; whatever you say bounces off me and sticks on you!”

Athiests criticize those with religious beliefs… and are then criticized by being “religious” about their atheism (they’re actually being “passionate”).

Those who attack Islam for being intolerant are re-attacked as being intolerant (actually, “critical” does not equal “intolerant”).

Christians who scream that we should allow prayer in the school and then scream louder about how their children are having science shoved down their throats (I don’t even know where to begin on this one).

Speaking of science, opponents of “intelligent” design (btw, it’s more accurate to put quotes around the I-word and not the whole phrase) as not giving a actual answer to how things began are opposed by those who say, “Well, you don’t know, actually, what happened at the moment of the big bang, do you? Nanny, nanny, boo, boo.” (sometimes they leave out the last part… but they don’t seem to understand that not have a complete counter-answer doesn’t give credibility to a meaningless answer).

The US government says it refuses to be made fearful by the threat of nuclear attack… and then threatens nuclear attack on those who made the original complaint (this might be less a “rubber/glue” issue than a debate about the blackness of pots and kettles… but it still warrants diapers).

I could go on…

So, I’m going to propose that until we learn to argue, debate, and negotiate like adults, we show our true colors with the wearing of a comfortable absorbent layer of pillowy freshness.

Oh, and on a similar note (don’t ask me HOW it’s similar; I haven’t thought it through that far. It’s just the thought that appeared next in my mind so it MUST be similar): I don’t understand why people are shocked when someone lies about an affair. When’s the last time you heard THIS conversation: “Are you sleeping with that fire-eating circus freak?” “Well, in fact, I am! I’m so glad you asked!”

I’ve tried, I’ve really tried.

I’ve tried to be removed from every mailing list that sends me emails which make me scream. I’ve even set up filters to automatically trash email that comes in with subject lines that make my blood turn into liquid nitrogen at room temperature (a.k.a. “boil”).

But, like messages that will allow me to get a mortgage that’s cheap enough so I can afford a house big enough to hold my gigantic new “manhood”, with a spare room for all the herbal V1agyra I’ll need to use it, somehow a few “You can have/manifest/attract anything you want” emails make it into my inbox every day.

Yes, every day.

There are so many people pitching this idea that, despite my best efforts, I get 3 or 4 emails assuring me that the universe is just a big Sears catalog waiting for my telepathic order, that “SCIENCE” has proven we are put on this planet to be abundant (if , instead of “so wealthy you would pick up that tab at a lunch with Bill Gates and Warren Buffet,” you’ve defined “abundant” as “obese”, then a trip to the mall actually supports this position), or that once you know the way rich people think differently than you, you too will become skinny and tanned and spend all your time posing next to your imported Italian sports car or laughing in the wind while steering your new yacht.

The problem with this message is that it’s so compelling, it plays so well into our 100,000 year-old “how do I get what I want” brain, that when we hear someone suggest that it’s true and that they can teach us how to do it, we turn off our rational thinking process faster than we’d turn off a movie that advertises “Starring Paris Hilton!”

We ignore that we’ve never met or even heard of one human being who has “gotten everything they wanted.” (And that the ones who have seemingly come closer than we have aren’t really much happier.)

We don’t notice that the teachers themselves seem to want more and more and more… and apparently include in their list of wants: divorces, bankruptcies, children they barely see, and critics who think they’re morons.

And then we reach for our wallets when the teacher tells us the price for this incredible (literally) knowledge of how to do what has never been done.

I have only one message to pass along to the “You can have everything you want” teachers:

Call me when you have cancer

That’s my provocative way of saying, “No, you can’t.”

There are times where we get what we want, and times where we get what we don’t want. There are times where we don’t get what we want, and times where we get things we never imagined.

I don’t care how much I want to be the richest man in the world, the way that occurs require the confluence of so many factors that are beyond my control, it ain’t gonna happen. Hell, I could win Powerball every week and STILL not crack the top 10 in the Forbes 100 Richest People list.

It doesn’t matter how much I want to be the greatest golfer in the universe, there’s only one Tiger Woods, and even the people who are #2 and #3 behind him, who practice all day long just to beat him… well, they aren’t Tiger Woods either.

But back to the cancer thing.

This whole effort to try to get what we want, to get what we think will make us happy, seems like it’s just a way to pretend we aren’t going to die… something that most people REALLY don’t want. And, I’m not sure if these teachers have noticed but, so far, everyone who has ever really wanted to live… has died. But only every one of them.

At some point, nature will be stronger than anything we to do bend it in our favor.

So, to the “you can have everything you want” teachers: call me when you realize that you’re on the losing side of that game… let me know how your visualizing, vibration raising, goal-focusing, universe-requesting, unproven treatment-taking — but HIGHLY PROFITABLE — magical thinking is working for you.

Personally, I now know too many people whose last days were made miserable by their continued efforts to get something they wanted — more days — when there wasn’t any one or any thing that cared about their wants.

I can only hope that in the end you can enjoy the truly magical thing about the universe, that it’s WAY beyond our ability to comprehend, let alone control.

And now, please excuse me while I Feng Shui my office in an attempt to repel these unwanted emails.

After getting the umpteenth email about how to eliminate the blocks in my life, I am here to inform you that:

You do not have BLOCKS!

That’s right, absolutely NO BLOCKS to success, weight-loss, health, millions of dollars, your soul-mate, the perfect home, the ideal pet, winning the lottery, finding a parking space, working 4-hours per week, or becoming a finalist on American (or British) Idol.

I’m serious here. I don’t care what you THINK or what you FEEL about “blocks.” You don’t have them. 100% Guaranteed.

“Blocks” is a made-up concept, invented by naive-but-well-meaning or manipulative-scumbag (your choice) people whose goal is to:

• sell books about the “blocks” and how to “clear them”
• sell tapes about the “blocks” and how to “clear them”
• sell coaching services about the “blocks” and how to “clear them”
• sell seats in a workshop about the “blocks” and how to “clear them” (where you’ll also be able to buy books and tapes and coaching services)
• sell membership into the “advanced” course about…

Get it?

What’s interesting to me is why we’re such suckers for this idea.

Let’s play the home version of our game and find out:

PART 1

1. Think of something you want, but don’t have. Could be that fur-lined car, or the fat-free house, or the job where you get paid for playing solitaire on your computer (For many, if they’re honest, that’s what they’re getting at least 25% of their current salary for that already).
2. Now think about your current situation.
3. Okay, now pay attention to, and feel, the gap between NOW and the IMAGINED future. If you don’t know how to get from “here” to “there”, see if you can feel that something must be in the way. Something MUST be blocking the passage. Feel how that “clearing up” that something would create a direct path to what you want.

Okay, now shake that off for a sec and go on to…

Part 2

1. Think about the city you live in… I’m in Boulder, so that’s what I’ll pick.
2. Think about some other city, a few states away. I’m using Washington, DC (since I’m going there soon for my mother’s birthday).
3. Notice that, while you can “feel” the distance between the two, there is no feeling of a “gap” or a “block” or something that needs to be “cleared up” to get you from here to there.

Let me ask you a question.

Would you ever even consider taking a workshop from someone who suggested that to get from one city to another, you needed to:

• Listen to subliminal tapes that said, “You can get there! You travel with ease!”
• Spend an hour a week talking about your childhood until you understand why you haven’t hopped on a bus
• Focus on being in the other city, as if you were already there… but this time with EMOTION, or PURPOSE, or while having an orgasm
• Evolve to a new level of consciousness, where you can buy an airline ticket without your ego
• Hyperventilate to clear out astral demons who are tying you to where you currently are
• Have some sadist dig her/his elbows into your muscles until you release what’s holding you where you are
• Scream, beat pillows, rearrange the furniture in your home, wear crystals, get a colonic, get a makeover, chant, meditate or do anything else besides MOVE YOUR DAMN BODY FROM HERE TO THERE

Of course not.

Well, what’s the diff?

Simple. One is a real trip and the other is a fantasy trip.

When we engage in the fantasy, we feel a “gap” because where we are NOW is real… and the imagined future is IMAGINED. We feel a “gap” between here and there… because there’s no way to get from REAL-here to IMAGINED-there. There’s no there there!

We sense the “block” because our problem-solving mind can’t figure out how to do the impossible — build a bridge between (that we’ve told it must exist) between the REAL and the IMAGINED.

When we compare reality vs. imagination, or try to bridge the two, the EFFECT of those actions is a feeling that we could describe with words like “gap” or “block.” But that doesn’t mean there IS a gap or a block. It’s just a feeling. A feeling that follows imagining something that doesn’t exist and wondering why we’re not living in Barbie Dream House.

Just because we feel something doesn’t mean it’s true.

Next time you have the chance to go to a workshop about your blocks, remember that if feeling something meant it were real, you wouldn’t be able to drive to the event because of the traffic caused by all the unicorns and monsters that little children feel are real.

Every now and then the “check oil” light on your car’s dashboard turns red… so you add a quart of 10w-40 and go on your merry way… or your grumpy way… or whatever way you were going.

Some time later, the light lights, you toss in another quart (unless you’re driving in Europe, where you would add a liter, which, thanks to Schoolhouse Rock, I know is a little more than a quart).

Then, one day, you go to the shop for them to, oh, whatever mechanics do at the shop — calibrate the servo-trans-turbo-anti-locking-carburator thingy or something (it doesn’t matter WHY you’re at the shop; that’s not the important part of the story) — and the mechanic says, “Hey, I just noticed that this oil light of yours is broken. It’ll just go off at any old time for no reason.”

What would that knowledge to do you?
Your car was broken, but you had no external indication of the problem. Would it even occur to you that the oil light was faulty? Of course not.

This, by the way is a more tame version of the thought-experiment … the more National Enquirer version is: What if you just found out that your “mother” is really your grandmother and your “sister” is actually your bio-mom? (And let’s add that as you scan your history, there is NO INDICATION at all that this was the case.)

Does this change your thoughts about who you are?

Regardless of your answer, consider this:

What if your most fundamental decision-making mechanism was broken and you didn’t know it?

Not that you were unable to make decisions, nor that every decision you made led to some unpleasant circumstance. But what if, say, it had a short-circuit so that any time you were deliberating or trying to decide between some options the “YES” signal went off totally randomly, having nothing to do with any sort of rational thinking process, and you just went with that YES, because you had no reason to think it wasn’t the result of a faulty YES-meter?

And what if, I’ll say this again to highlight it, you had no objective indication that this was happening? Sometimes the YES worked out well; other times not so well.
Would you be able to tell that your YES-meter was broken?

Nope.

And this problem is bigger than your car issue, because if you wanted to examine your decision-making mechanism, guess what? The only tool you have is the broken decision-making mechanism. So, if you start looking at the “data,” and played with theories about whether it was working or not, you could get a big random YES that “confirms” a theory that’s completely not true.

That is, you can’t use your damaged analysis tool to determine if you have a damaged analysis tool.

What difference, if any, would you expect to experience in your life if it turned out that, all along, ever since you were born, your decision-making analysis tool were broken and you just found out?

You can probably guess why I’m suggesting this line of thinking.

It could be true (though, again, if it is, it would be almost impossible to determine!)

Wrap your brain around that for a bit and let me know what you find… or take a gander at On Being Certain: Believing You Are Right Even When You’re Not  by Robert Burton, and let’s chat 😉

Even though I stopped buying self-help and spiritual books a long time ago, there seems to be no escape. Even non-spiritual and non-self-help books can’t seem to avoid repeating New Age nonsense.

This morning I was reading a book about stretching for athletes. Pretty not-New Age-y, don’t you think? But, over and over, time and time again, repeatedly and redundantly, for page after page (have I made my point?), it kept harping on this idea:

Commit to doing the stretches every day for 21 days, because science has proven that it takes 21 days to make a new habit.

Grab almost any self-help book and you’ll hear the same mantra. I mean, it has to be true: “science has proven” it! And, it sounds reasonable, doesn’t it?

Well, even though it sounds reasonable, that doesn’t mean it IS.

If it sounds reasonable enough, though, you’ll take it at face value and ignore the decades of personal experience you have where you may have done something new every day for 21 days… and haven’t done it since. I promise that the only thing you will have gotten after three weeks of doing what you think will be a new habit, is the ability to make 21 X’s on your calendar.

Some would argue, “Oh, but once you stopped for 21 days, then you made a NEW habit of not doing it!”

Good try. But, first, if it’s a habit it’s a habit! It shouldn’t even be possible to stop! Second, there’s no way you made the same decision and commitment to STOP that you did to begin. “Okay, now that I’ve developed this habit of eating only foods that begin with the letter “P”, walking on my hands and quacking like a duck for 1.2 miles per day, and no longer trying to give pedicures to people on the subway… I now COMMIT to reverting to my mildly brain-damaged ways for the next 21 days!”

Oh, and back to that “science has proven” nonsense. Science hasn’t proven this and, in fact, I’ll make a bet:

If someone can give me a respected, published scientific study (that can’t be effortlessly debunked because of bad or no control groups, too small a sample size, or other obviously stupid study design) that demonstrates the proof of the 21-day habit building technology, I’ll give you $100!

By the way, I know my money is completely safe in the same way that I knew it was safe when I made this bet about the “goal-setting study.”

You’ve probably heard it (I heard it from hundreds of teachers): We know that writing down your goals makes them happen thanks to a “study” of the 1953 Yale graduating class where, 20 years later, 3% of the class was more successful than the other 97% COMBINED… and the only difference between the two groups is that the successful ones wrote down their goals.

When I heard this “quoted” for the umpteenth time, I first just thought about it intelligently: Writing down goals was the ONLY DIFFERENCE? Yeah, right. Can you find me a group of more than, oh, THREE, where you can find only ONE DIFFERENCE between the people? And if you can, it ain’t “This one wrote down that he wanted to be the CEO of a major company and have his third heart attack by 45.”

I also did the math… literally calculated the ways this could be true or not true… suffice it to say, the odds were just as good that the 1953 graduating class contained the son of the Sultan of Somewhere who, the day he matriculated, was already worth more than what the rest of the class would be worth combined, forever.

One of the teachers who quoted the “goal setting study” was someone that I knew had an encyclopedic memory for things like this, so I asked him where he saw the study. He said, “Hmmm… I can’t remember.”

That was the last straw. I knew it wasn’t true and I made a bet that nobody could show me the study. Nobody has. And, even better, Fast Company magazine debunked the whole thing.

After you start questioning some of these “truisms,” you can start to hear the ring of nonsense, like hearing a bad note in a song. There’s a semi-indefinable flavor to the premise that sends up a red flag of BULLS&*T.

I’ll let you debunk some of these popular “studies” (oh, I’ll chime in, no doubt 😉 )

WARNING: For some of you, prepare to have your toes stepped on.

• Fish are raised in a tank with a clear divider in the middle of the tank. Remove the divider and the fish never swim to the other side.
• Fruit flies are raised in a jar with a clear plastic lid. Remove the lid and, as if they were fish, they never jump/fly higher than where the lid was.
• Put a frog in warm water and slowly heat the water. The frog will not jump out… and you’ll have dinner prepared at the end of the experiment.
• Take a glass of water from, oh, the Los Angeles harbor. Make some ice crystals of it, showing how horribly contaminated it is. Tape a piece of paper with the word LOVE written on it and, after some time, check out ONE ice crystal from the glass… and it has magically become BEAUTIFUL!
• Professional basketball players who spent 20 days, for 20 minutes a day, VISUALIZING making free throws improved as much (or more!) than those who actually practiced for that same amount of time.
• Quantum Physicists have PROVEN that you create reality by observing it (I’ll give you a hint here: the word “create” is used indiscriminately and inaccurately as a synonym for “observe one aspect of “… and, by the way, who “created” the observer?!)
• Those same QP’s have PROVEN that we’re all connected and we’re all one. (I can’t help myself here; I’ve got to prime the pump: The “connected” idea is a bastardization of “strange action at a distance,” which is only observable under highly unusual conditions where, unlike reality, the things that are connected never interact with anything else. And the “we’re all one” is a confused version of the idea that an electron is, mathematically, just a probability wave that extends to infinity… but the probability that it’s HERE and not in the 3rd stall of the men’s room of the rest stop off Exit 12 of the Jersey Turnpike is, essentially ZERO… and multiply that once you add more than one electron until, really, things are where they are and nowhere else. Or maybe I got my “proofs” backwards… trust me, it doesn’t matter!)

Got any others?

A recent survey revealed that a LARGE percentage of Americans don’t think of themselves as religious, but do identify themselves as “spiritual.”

When I heard this, my first question was, “What’s the diff?”

Okay, if you’re spiritual you don’t go to a mainstream church or synagogue or mosque… though, ironically, you may spend as much time as you want in a Buddhist temple without having to call the polling company and change your answer.

And, if you’re spiritual you typically still believe that there’s someone or something that made everything come into being and controls or, at least actively guides, whatever happens on the Earth and in the cosmos.

I’ve seen the word “spiritual” used in interesting places, like “Spiritual Marketing,” in which the word “spiritual” is a synonym for “metaphysical” which is a synonym for “some theory that we have no actual proof for so, instead, we’ll use personal stories and anecdotal tales in lieu of proof, even though we know this is the least reliable evidence ever created.” Similarly, believing you can control the molecules in the universe with your uncontrollable thoughts is often referred to as “spiritual.”

The other question that popped into my head (and if I believed in channeling, I could say that I was receiving this question from a highly advanced spiritual — read: imaginary — being) was:

“What’s the point of being spiritual?”

Seriously, what’s the value, what does one get out of it?

Years ago, I used the word “spiritual” to describe myself. But I think my justification for using that label was that I did a lot of meditation.

I also noticed that when I, and other people I met who called themselves “spiritual”, would say, “Oh, I’m not religious, but I am spiritual,” there was an air of superiority and arrogance that came with the statement. Okay, not an “air”, but an overwhelming putrid odor that could knock out a cow. Clearly, being “spiritual” was so much more evolved and intelligent than being religious.

But is it?

Buddhist art is spiritual, but Warhol isn’t?

Sedona is spiritual, but the noxious fume-spewing ports of New Jersey aren’t?

Eckart Tolle (or the Dalai Lama or Matthew Fox or — insert your favorite person here) is spiritual, but George Bush isn’t?

If a person makes those distinctions, how is that any different than some mainstream religion’s teachings about good vs. evil?

Spiritual people might argue that they don’t believe in “good vs. evil” but, how is “higher vs. lower” or “clear vs. confused” or “this vibration vs. that vibration” or “meditating vs. playnig pinball” really any different?

Come on, a judgment is a judgment.

Spiritual, more often than not, it seems, is just religious without the silly clothes and paid holidays. Oh, and you have more than one book to read for guidance. For many spiritual people, the hotel room for a weekend workshop has replaced the temple.

But, again, what’s the point? Why be spiritual?

If it’s to find some sort of happiness or contentment or calming explanation for our existence, then guess what? You can be happy, be content, and not feel any need to explain why we’re here without having to believe in, well, anything, let alone that you’ll be a better person if you listen to Enya instead of the Bay City Rollers (I hope you’re now unable to NOT think: S-A-TUR-DAY-NIGHT!).

Of course, the real joke is that you can’t even use a word to describe “having lost the urge or need to divide things into spiritual vs. mundane” since:

a) If you called yourself by that word, you would just be another arrogant, obnoxious whatever-that-word-is, and;

b) If you said that’s how you lived, people would just accuse you of being REALLY spiritual!

Harrumph.

Humanity is at a critical junction. One path is to chaos and destruction. The other is to a level of peace and harmony and abundance that is far greater than you can even imagine.What determines which path we take?

There are powerful energies that are beginning to become apparent, energies that can be harnessed to tip the scales in the favor of a new age.

The very fact that you’re reading this post means you are one of the people who is, or will soon be, accessing these energies, and evolving and raising your consciousness. Maybe you’ve been aware of these energies, maybe you’ve just been feeling that something is trying to shift inside of you, maybe you just have a feeling that something has been missing from your life. All of these are signs that you’re ready to be part of the most important time in human history. If enough of us awaken to our true potential, we can guarantee utopia in our lifetime!

Ever see or hear anything like this?

It probably sounds familiar to anyone who has read a New Age book or, lately, listened to Oprah and her new BFF, Ekhart Tolle.

It’s a common message. One that’s been taught for thousands of years.

And, in all the ways it’s been told over the millennia, it has never been true.

This one, in fact, I made up off the top of my head. Total fiction. But it has that “ring of truth” about it, doesn’t it?

The reason it has that ring is NOT because there’s anything true about it, but because it’s deliberately designed to make you feel included, special, and important. Link that feeling to a compelling story — good vs. evil in this case — and, viola, “ring of truth.”

Making people feel special (also known as arrogant and more cloying than patchouli) and part of an important universal mission is one of the best sales pitches in existence. Once you get people are on this ride you can, quite literally, sell them anything.

There’s a newly-popular teacher in the non-dual crowd who does a variation on this theme. He doesn’t have the “universal mission” part but, instead, uses the “inner circle” version. It goes like this:

People begin searching for happiness outside themselves, in jobs, relationships, money. But when they realize that doesn’t work, they then turn inside and do something similar, looking for spiritual experiences. But after years of collecting experiences with no benefit to show from it, you start to wonder, “Isn’t there something more? How can I truly get what I want?” And then we come to someplace like this, to finally find the Truth.

Can you hear it. It starts out with “THEM” and what those less evolved people do. And then it becomes “You,” and then “We.”

You can practically hear the warm blanket surrounding the crowd, seemingly validating their path and assuring them that their feelings are proof they’re part of this special crowd who will now experience “The TRUTH,” whatever that means.

The pitch is so comforting that, once we believe it, once we think, “Oh! I’m part of the cool crowd,” we ignore the reality our own experience. We are still the Them and the You. Our experience that tells us, “Well, actually, I still *do* think that more money and a better job and the right guru would make me happier. And I still do think that I need some different experience or, honestly, I wouldn’t have come here.”

In fact, the irony of the “you’re special” pitch is that it’s actually an insult!

It’s telling you that your NOT as special as the teacher, who has fully realized what you’re only beginning to understand. And that is the pitch… because if the teacher REALLY gets it, and tells me I can too, well, then, it must be true.” And then you search outside of yourself — to the table full of books and tapes and to the upcoming workshop — for some new inner experience that you believe the teacher is talking about (especially if it’s a “non-experience”), so that you can REALLY be one of the hip, happenin’ spiritual people… who, by the way, are necessary if we’re going to survive this pivotal time.

I’d say more about all this, but I have to go vomit now.

If I get one more email with information about how to Attract more money, more clients, the right relationship, a better job, a new car, or anything else for that matter, I think I’m going to scream (actually, I just got THREE of them, which made me scream, and then write this post).

Here’s another option, if there’s something you want, why not DO SOMETHING that will, with a high degree of confidence, increase the probability that you can GET IT.

I call this the “Shampoo School of Living.” Instead of lather, rinse, repeat, it’s Orient in the direction of what you want, Take a simple step that moves you in that direction, Re-Orient and repeat.

Do this and I GUARANTEE one of two results:

1. You’ll get what you want!
2. You won’t get what you want.

I can’t tell, in advance, which of those will happen — nor can anyone else — but, I assure you, it will only be one of those two possibilities.

You may have noticed something with my formula: There is no guarantee that you’ll get what you want. Or, just as true, there’s no guarantee that if you get what you want, you’ll be happy.

(There is, though, a guarantee that if you find a million people who’ve gotten what you want and were no happier for it, you’ll think you’re special and that you would be unlike all of them — “I’ve never heard of anyone becoming permanently happy as a result of becoming wealthy, but when I become rich, I’ll be different.”)

Want a guarantee of getting what you want and being happy? Well, to paraphrase the Buddha, move to a different universe.

They don’t sell those guarantees in this one.

Oh, wait, they do! It’s all the crap about “Attracting” what you want that clogs my inbox every day!

If it’s possible to “attract” new clients from the comfort of my own mind, that’s so much easier than writing a good advertisement, or giving free lectures to potential clients, or cold calling, or asking for referrals, or, well… anything!

And, hell, if you weren’t going to get what you wanted, wouldn’t you rather have not put out any real effort than busted your hump only to be thwarted by factors out of your control?

Personally, I’d rather do something tangible, something that you could see me doing on a video tape (okay, it’s 2008, a DVD or on YouTube). I don’t want to try to “attract” something to me. I want to move toward it! The odds are, I’m more mobile than whatever I think I want.

The joke, of course, is that if you want to control the universe, there’s an easy way: Get up off your attracting-something butt and do something. Guaranteed that when you do, the universe will change.

If you seem to be progressing, keep going. If you seem to be going in the wrong direction, or in circles, either do something different or, maybe, recognize that what you’re trying to do isn’t possible… like making some un-measurable inner change that will magically cause you to become a “magnet to” what you think you want.