In the divine drama that is reality, we’ve seen that the stage, the props, and even the characters are all part of One God, striving for self-consciousness. And we, as part of God, are creating the drama, too.  With our share of God-consciousness, we are actually writing the script along with God.  

In other words, we create our own reality. 

This is a fairly radical idea in these “poor me, it’s not my fault” times. We live in the era of the victim, and we spend a lot of time on a therapist’s couch, discovering how many of our problems can be blamed on Mom or Dad -- or in a lawyer’s office, demanding compensation because we took up smoking and became ill.  

We are supported in our feelings of powerlessness by traditional ways of looking at the world. From the dualistic point of view, everything unfolds according to God’s mysterious will, and who are we to question God’s wisdom?  We have no choice but to submit to it. 

Meanwhile, from the materialistic point of view, everything is also determined, although not by God.  Events unfold due to biological and environmental “causes,” with events falling like dominoes along the causal chain, and sweeping us along with its momentum.

Those of us who have grown tired of feeling helpless before the whims of fate will hear idealism’s assertion that we create our own reality as glorious news.  We feel immediately liberated, immediately empowered. 

There’s only one problem:  The concept of mind as matter has always been subject to diverse interpretation.  There is a Hindu interpretation, an ancient Greek interpretation, a Cartesian, a Theosophical. There is also a New Thought version (see Ernest Holmes), the channeled version (see Jane Roberts or Neale Donald Walsch), and the science-based version (see Fred Alan Wolf).

Still, though the details of each interpretation may differ in its details, all are in agreement on one thing:  Because we create our own reality -– on whatever level, and in whatever way that happens -– we are each responsible for our reality. 

Manifestation mania

In the New Age, the most common interpretation of you-create-your-reality is hard to miss. It’s known as “manifestation” and dozens of New Age gurus and teachers churn out books and travel the country to teach seminars on the subject.

These teachers tell us that we can manifest whatever we want in our lives by thinking correctly. Money, love, health, long life -– God wants us to have everything we want for ourselves. It is, they say, our divine right.

Money, like everything else, is energy. Just as the proper flow of divine energy within in the body is believed to lead to good health, so the abundant flow of divine energy through our thinking is believed to lead to prosperity. 

On the other hand, a sluggish flow of energy  -- called scarcity thinking -- will keep us locked in poverty.  If we don’t have a free flow of good things into our lives, it’s only because we haven’t learned to manage our thoughts correctly.

This basic reasoning was the foundation of the harmonial New Thought religions that gained prominence in the early 20th century. Ernest Holmes’ Religious Science and Mary Baker Eddy’s Christian Science were both built upon the assumption that by putting ourselves into spiritual harmony with the universe, not only will we enjoy happiness, we will also enjoy perfect health and financial success.

Both religions claimed to discover an impersonal divine Law that works with mechanical accuracy.  “We do not will things to be done,” wrote Holmes. Through our thought “things are brought into being, not by will, but by the power of self-assertive Truth.” As soon as we truly understand this, then “we shall reap a harvest of fulfilled desires.” 

The pagan religion of Wicca and other magickal belief systems are likewise based on the principle of harmony. Although they may add specific rituals to our carefully-directed thoughts to help us better “align” ourselves to divine power, they also assert that the ability to create desired outcomes is ours by divine right.

Explaining the unexplainable

Because the New Age movement shares the same idealist underpinnings as New Thought and magick belief systems, it has also eagerly embraced the idea of thought as literally creative through divine law. 

The inner workings of this divine law are sometimes vaguely explained.  One channeled entity posited “mental enzymes” which waft from the skin and enter the atmosphere and thereby mold reality. Another stated that a thought repeated a great many times will eventually grow heavy enough with “collective energy” to attract the reality.

Others go into much greater detail.  The more science-minded, for example, might take the well-known “observer effect” of quantum physics, in which subatomic particles do not exist in any specific location until they are observed by a perceiving consciousness, and build up from there. (See Mind into Matter)

Add in the “Many Worlds” interpretation of physics, in which all possibilities exist as actualities in parallel universes, and certain writers explain that a shift in thought or focus can cause a shift in one’s reality.  One merely changes tracks, so to speak, and heads into a parallel world.  

Most, however, are content to allow the workings of thought-as-reality to be essentially “unexplainable,” or a “divine mystery.”  Fortunately, the knowledge of how it works is not a necessary component of the manifestation equation.  Only one’s personal readiness and persistent belief are required.  If more people don’t take advantage of it, it is only because they don’t know they can or they aren’t spiritually ready to be limitless.  Either that, or we’re not doing it “right.”

One popular writer suggests that we err when we first desire something, because within that desire is the belief that we don’t have it yet, and of course, that is the belief which is made real. The trick, he says, is to circumvent the law and be grateful in advance.  We have to “know” that we already have what we desire (even though we don’t).  If that doesn’t work, it’s only because we secretly harbor the belief it won’t work.  Failure to tap into our divine power is our own responsibility as much as anything else.

The kid in the candy store

Still, despite these pesky technical questions, the ego wants to believe.  The ego hears the New Age message of manifestation and shouts, “Goody!”  Like a kid in a candy store, the ego asks, you mean I can have anything?  Yes, anything, says the smiling New Age guru from the cover of his book, all you have to do is believe.

And so we do believe, because it is so wonderful to think that we can be spiritual and acquisitive at the same time.  We go faithfully to work at directing our thoughts, saying affirmations until they wear ruts into our mind.  There is a feeling of great peace in knowing your wishes are about to be granted.  It really isn’t all that difficult to believe in magic, not when you want something badly enough.

Oh yes, the New Age guru adds, don’t forget not to be attached to results.  But it’s too late.  With all that thinking and believing and expecting, we have become very attached.  And when the desired reality doesn’t show up -- as it very often doesn’t –- we can be left feeling bitter, guilty, ridiculous.  Not to mention a little crazy for talking ourselves into the cognitive dissonance of “believing” in things that aren’t there.  I have found myself caught in this trap more than once and left feeling that not only had my spiritual principles failed me but that I had failed myself.

But what really disturbs me is how would I be left to feel if and when true disaster befalls?  If I happened to get cancer, or if I got into a car accident where someone I loved was seriously injured, I’d be tossed into terrible anguish, wondering if I had somehow “created” such an event with my own thoughts.    

The majority of manifestation gurus would insist that yes, I did create such an event, and probably even planned it out sometime before incarnating in this life as a way to learn a particular lesson.  The other people involved in my events also either agreed beforehand to participate or agreed on a “telepathic” level as it was happening. 

Thus, a murder victim is sometimes said to have “agreed” to be murdered, a child who is abused is said to have “agreed” to the abuse, and six million Jews are said to have “agreed” to walk into the ovens at Nazi concentration camps, all for the valuable learning opportunity.

I am of the opinion, however, that true learning is not a pre-arranged exercise, but a spontaneous connection between cause and effect. If a murder happens because of an unknown decision made years ago, then cause and effect do not unfold organically, in this moment, as we know they must. And, if the murder was agreed to beforehand, then that agreement was clearly the “cause” of the murder, and the only thing to be learned is that one shouldn’t make such ridiculous agreements in the first place. 

Fortunately, most all experiences, even the negative ones, prove instructive.  Perhaps only by taking a sidetrip into manifestation mania can we more fully understand the illusion-making skills of the ego.  And perhaps only by digging through the treacherous depths of our desires will we uncover the desire to understand reality as it is, rather than how we wish it could be.

Spiritual materialism

The idea that we literally create our own reality, said Ken Wilber, is an “ungraceful interpretation” of basic idealistic premises.  He then went on to point out the obvious: Only psychotics believe they can create their own reality.

Indeed, no matter how many mental somersaults we are advised to perform, all empirical and rational experience shows us that believing doesn’t make it so. The destitute woman in the mental hospital who fervently and sincerely believes she is a millionaire will not suddenly find her bank account overflowing.  The convicted murderer who sits in prison and thanks God in advance for his release is not likely to see the gates open for him no matter how great his faith. 

Perhaps it’s unfair to expect the creative law to work for criminals and the mentally ill, but what about children?  Children, more than anyone, have complete faith in magic and only vague knowledge of limits, so it should follow that children would be the most accomplished creators of reality.  But, in fact, children prove to be the most helpless over their fate.

The Tibetan teacher Chogyam Trunpa warns that any interpretation of spiritual principles which claims to deliver the ego’s desires is an example of “spiritual materialism.” 

In this common malady, the ego insinuates itself as our spiritual advisor and bends spiritual principles to its will.  Spiritual materialism, Trungpa adds, whispers to us with such sincerity, such rational justification, that we rarely become suspicious of what the ego is up to.

We Americans, born with an infamous sense of entitlement, are especially prone to spiritual materialism. Indeed, the typical manifestation interpretation of mind as matter appears to be unique to privileged societies such as ours.

Genuine idealism does not encourage us to seek riches; instead, it asks us to let go of the old paradigm, the old value systems and its external validations such as money and status.  

Idealism tells us that power over one’s life is not the ability to conjure up gold, for if the gold is lost, then so is the power. Power over one’s life is the ability to think freely, act freely, and love freely, no matter what happens. And responsibility for one’s life comes not in the creation of particular circumstances, but in the ability to choose how we react to circumstances.

Today, whenever I see another create-your-own-reality book that makes my ego itch to buy it and try it, I stop and ask myself:  Would the Buddha or any other enlightened person sit down to say affirmations for greater prosperity?  I think not.  An enlightened soul is completely self-sufficient and has no need for anything other than the here and now experience. 

Esse est percipi

Then what about the idealistic notion that mind creates reality? If one cannot exert conscious control over the process with one’s thoughts, is this principle still valid? And if we do not have control, then how can we still be considered responsible for what happens to us?

In Western idealism, mind as matter means that the mind, through the act of perception, dictates how reality appears to us. What reality might be outside our perception of it we cannot possibly know.  As the 18th-century philosopher George Berkeley famously phrased it, esse est percipi, to be is to be perceived.  Thus, mind creates reality.  Or to be more precise, perception creates the look, the sound, and the feel of reality.

At first glance, it would seem that we have no choice in how we perceive the world.  The sky is blue no matter how many different eyes look upon it, and that is a fact.  Yet, as we move into the more complex realm of human experience, we find that “facts” begin to slide all over the place.

Although we may see the same things, we each experience it in our own unique way. Our egos mold our experience of the world – selecting which sense information to bring to the forefront of the conscious mind and which to ignore.  This means we perceive things not as they really are, but as we are. The outer world is always a reflection of the inner reality.  We take all we encounter and fill it into our preconceptions like a paint-by-the-numbers set, and so largely see what we expect to see.

Reality is therefore a personal phenomenon, which the mind contributes as much by its molding forms as does the outside world. And it is this self-created reality in which we operate, and on which we base our decisions and choose our actions.  

For example, if I believe that human beings are essentially selfish, then when I look at the world, I will see plentiful evidence of selfish people. I might perceive the driver who changed lanes in front of me as rudely cutting me off. I might perceive the woman applying for welfare aid as looking for a free handout.  The ego forms a preconceived “frame” through which we view all events. Anything that happens contrary to my preconception will be reinterpreted or ignored.

The ego, however, is not a solid entity.  With a little work, it can be changed. We change it by changing our thoughts and beliefs, by changing our maps of reality.

When we redirect our expectations and transform our preconceptions, we automatically “re-frame” reality.  We change how it looks to us, and what it becomes to us. More importantly, by changing our beliefs, we change our actions, and it is through our actions that we take reality in hand, so to speak, and mold it anew.

By changing our thoughts, we quite literally change our world. And although it may happen in a more practical way than the manifestation gurus sometimes suggest, it does happen, at least according to the interpretation of idealism put forth by Western philosophers.

From the Eastern point of view, however, this interpretation is incomplete.

Creating reality

In Eastern idealism, mind as matter is much more than the molding of appearances. In the East, mind as matter is interpreted to mean that matter itself is a mental image, dreamed up in the mind of God. And each of us, as one with God, are dreaming the dream along with God. One might even say the dream would be impossible without us, for we bring it into existence through our awareness.

If we feel we are merely passive observers of this process, responsible only for what we do and not for what happens to us, we are mistaken.  As Alan Watts explains, human are not stand-alone organisms.  Each of us is inextricably linked to our environment, one with the whole.  We are each, he said, an organism-environment, a “do-happening.” 

All is One and if we pretend we are not responsible for the “happens” half of the equation, then we play a game with ourselves known by the Hindu name of avidya, or ignorance.

“Basically,” Watts continues, “the place in life where you are is where you have put yourself.  Everyone is in their true place.  In whatever language you say it, everybody is a manifestation of the divine, playing this game and that game.  Your not knowing it, if you do not know it, is part of the game… It is all happening because you are doing it.”  We are each “doing” it. 

We are each dreaming the dream, we are each creating the universe through our awareness. (This ancient Hindu idea has found support in the most unlikely of places: modern physics.  See Mind Into Matter.)

Of course, few of us are aware of our creative involvement in the universe, for it exists far below the noisy ripples of thought that froth up on the surface of our daily consciousness.   And that is how it is meant to be.  To try and drag such creation into the conscious world would be like trying to dream while awake.  It is a contradiction in terms.

As in dreaming, we create reality not by controlling what happens, but by observing what happens, allowing what happens, experiencing what happens, feeling what happens.  As soon as we try to direct the dream or exert control, we wake up, and the dream ends. 

Our dreams unfold beyond our choosing. And yet we are, without a doubt, still the “creators” of the dream, still the ones doing the dreaming, and therefore still responsible for the existence of the dream. A lack of control does not mean a lack of responsibility. 

In the same manner, each of us creates the universe through our mind, through our share of consciousness. And each self-created reality is reflected in the whole.  Indeed, this is how the whole is seamlessly created, my reality, reflecting yours, reflecting his, reflecting hers, and on and on, each of us dreaming the world into existence. It is all happening because we are all doing it. 

The New Age thus challenges us to take responsibility for it all. The New Age, with its many interpretations of mind as matter, asks us to examine our own encounter with reality, to observe how the beliefs we hold in our minds come to life before our eyes. It dares us to step into our role as co-creators of the universe and create a reality that is a welcoming and supportive environment for all.

Go to The Riddle of the Self.