We’re all familiar with the Laws of Attraction. What you put out into the universe is what you attract back to you. Ho’oponopono isn’t exactly the same, however, as you may have noticed in our previous articles on the topic. But there is a correlation – and for those who don’t take the time to pay attention to what they put out into the universe, the frequency on which their very soul is vibrating, the world can be a very dark place.
Take the case of two good friends, Graham and Eddie. The following conversation (and the people involved) are fictional, and while their thought processes may seem familiar, they’re not meant to be any particular people, living or dead.
“Hey Graham, whaddaya think of this half-time band?”
“Eh, they’re ok.”
“Ok? Just ok? I think they’re fantastic!”
“Oh, you think everything is fantastic, Eddie. You get excited by everything! You always keep saying how grateful you are for the sun, the moon, clean water, rain, energy, your health, your family and friends, and now this band! Blah blah blah blah blah. The band is ok, alright? I don’t get excited by much anymore. I’m always disappointed by most things, so I don’t allow myself to get excited. That way I don’t have to keep being disappointed. Prepare for the worst, so when it happens you’re expecting it, you know? I hate being caught off guard by crap.”
“And how does that work for you? It sounds boring and more than a little dark.”
“Maybe it’s boring and dark, but I think I’m protecting myself from being hurt again and again by just remaining neutral. I can avoid feeling anything painful.”
“Graham, that also means you never get to feel anything joyful! You’re always protecting yourself from yourself.”
“I’m not protecting myself from myself! I’m protecting myself from things outside myself that always hurt, annoy, or disappoint me.”
“In other words, you’re letting things that disappointed you in the past color your present and make it impossible for you to be happy living in the now. The past is the past and it can’t affect you today unless you allow it to. And that makes the past events seem so much worse than they were when they happened!
“We live in here – in our head and brains. Our individual worlds are formed by our perception – ours only and no one else’s. Something that disappointed you in the past might have delighted someone else because they saw it from a different point of view. You were upset it rained last week, but for someone growing a garden that rain was a blessing.
“Yes, I look for the pleasure and the positive in everything that comes my way. You mock me for it because you don’t see how I could possibly actually be happy. But giving gratitude for all the little and big things in life only gives me more to be grateful for all the time! What we exude into the universe is what comes back to us. You know the old laws of attraction that I’ve told you about – you can’t get away from them. And I like being happy. Wallowing in misery is just not my thing.”
“It’s not my ‘thing’ either, which is why I avoid feeling anything at all whenever I’m able.”
“But you’re depriving yourself of the happiness that comes from being happy! I know you’ve told me before that you don’t believe the laws of attraction work for you, but they do. The laws of attraction are more than repeating mantras or affirmations and magically whatever we’ve repeated will happen for us. We have to believe. We have to vibrate into those mantras what we really feel – you can’t just repeat words and expect the vibrations to match any frequencies ‘out there’ until you ‘feel those vibrations real.’ Does that make sense?”
“Not really, Eddie.. You’re talking about making yourself feel things you don’t in order to “believe” them. 
I can’t just change the way I feel by pretending I feel different. For example, I can’t get past the fear of dying no matter how hard I try to stop fearing it. I’m terrified of dying every day.”
“Whoa, Graham, that’s the best way to make sure you’ll die as soon as possible! I’m serious – somewhere I read that more people have killed themselves by resisting and fearing dying than any other known way.”
“That’s crazy. All it means is that I’m always cautious so that whatever I’m doing won’t kill me. I’m not seeking death out!”
“Keep resisting and one of those things just might kill you, no matter how cautious you are. Whatever is in our mind constantly – the good or the bad – whatever we focus on is what comes to us by way of those old, annoying laws of attraction. Do you have any idea what might have first caused you to fear dying? Did something happen to you or someone you loved?”
“Yeah, I fell off the roof when I was a kid and broke my arm. My mom screamed at me and was so angry at me for getting up on the roof, and that nearly scared me to death. She kept saying ‘You could’ve died!’ and that scared the heck out of me, too. I hate thinking about it but it always rears its ugly head, almost every day. So now I’m afraid when I get in the car, or have to fly or go anywhere high up. Some days it feels like just about anything can scare me and I hate it.”
“You know that whatever we hate gives us more to hate. Whatever we fear gives us more to fear. So keep it up and yeah, the whole world will terrify you. But it’s not the real world that’s terrifying you. It’s your perception of the world. Your fear has made you see the world as something that’s out to get you, basically.”
“Exactly! I always feel like someone or something is out to get me. I’m tired of it. I don’t think I deserve to be so miserable, but circumstances just seem to make me unhappy most of the time.”
“I know you don’t want to hear it, Graham, but you’re the one choosing to be unhappy.”
“But I don’t want to be unhappy!”
“Then don’t be! Shift your focus from ‘the world is a miserable place’ to ‘wow, life is beautiful!’ and you’ll be surprised at how fast you can be happy. If you don’t want something but you focus on it, then you’ll get more of exactly what you don’t want.”
“I’m getting a headache here, man. I want to understand what I’m doing wrong, but what you’re saying just doesn’t ‘click.’”
“You know, Graham, when I’m scared I allow it to flood over me, and I concentrate on breathing deeply and evenly. I look at what is frightening me and welcome it into my space and don’t fight it. In fact, I greet it and talk to it, and tell it that it can stay as long as it needs to, and that I find it interesting, and wonder how big it’ll get this time. After a few minutes, it just fades away. Like greeting a growling dog with kindness and a treat – the dog can’t be angry anymore, and so it either becomes your friend or leaves.”
“Now that, I bet I can do. I’m tired of being scared of my own shadow.”
“Hey, everything that’s scared you in your life hasn’t managed to kill you yet. You’re more powerful than you give yourself credit for.”
“Thanks, Eddie. You’re right. I’m going to focus on the positive – starting with believing our team is going to win this game!”
“That’s the spirit!”
For Eddie and Graham, their two different attitudes in life have set them in completely different mental places. Eddie is positive, hopeful, and understands the laws of attraction and ho’oponopono, but Graham is fearful and constantly uncomfortable because of what he’s been vibrating out into the universe. That fear is reflected back to him and as a result he is living in a constant state of terror – fear of death, fear of pain, fear of disappointment.
If fear is what we vibrate out into the universe, fear is what we’re going to get back. However, if we vibrate out nothing but the positive, the positive is what will return to us. Try it this coming week – when you catch yourself feeling fearful, depressed, or concerned, take a moment to step back. Identify what it is that is making you feel this way. Greet it with love and thank it for being here. Let it know you aren’t afraid of it, and that it can stay as long as it needs to. When you greet the negative with the positive, it’s like the dog in Eddie’s example – it either decides to befriend you (in which case you can’t be afraid of it anymore – it’s just a thought), or it leaves because you’re vibrating on a higher frequency and it can’t exist in the same space. Either way, you have successfully changed a negative vibration into a positive one. Try it! Your life will be infinitely happier for doing so.