Shut up, I’m manifesting

We live in a world where the main change people seek is more and more money. Illustration by C Y Gopinath using Midjourney

How to make your wishes come true: a layman's guide to manifesting, apparently based on the Upanishads.

STEP 1: Know what you want. Be specific. It's like making wishes to a genie. Example: don't wish for "a well-paying job". Go for "CEO of Tesla by April 2024"!

STEP 2: Ask the universe to grant your wishes. While you wait, believe and act like you already have it. Amplify your desires using the 3-6-9 method.

- Pick 3 things that you really want.

- Wish for them vocally 6 times a day.

- Fantasise about your wishes for 9 seconds daily.

Your wishes will manifest after 21 days.

STEP 3: During the waiting period, actively work towards that CEO job. The universe only helps you if you help yourself.

That is more or less straight from a post titled Manifestation: A Tutorial from a Hindu, on a website called Fever Dreams. Its author, Mandira Gowda, claims that manifestation, or the ‘science' of making your dreams come true by systematically fantasising about them, also known as the Law of Attraction, was shamelessly stolen by the West from India's Mundakopanishad and the Chandogya Upanishad.

Since claiming Indian origin for just about everything is part of the new India, let's ignore that and instead ask: can you really make your wishes come true by visualising them with positive thinking? Could I just dream myself into the Forbes list of the world's billionaires? Could I get an 80-foot yacht by thinking hard about it?

Ajaya Mishra, better known as Awesome AJ, of the Big Manifestation Academy, would say yes. Rahul Jain, who teaches manifestation as part of his Business Mastery Programme, would agree. So might thousands of life coaches, personal growth gurus, godmen like Sadhguru, film actors, celebrities and CEOs.

Vikram Dhar would agree vehemently. He is the coach who, with prize-winning humility, says this about Vikram Dhar in a Medium post: "One name that stands out in this field is Vikram Dhar, a renowned expert in the realm of personal development and the Law of Attraction."

Separate figures are not available for manifestation coaching but it is a chunk of the $4.56 billion life coaching industry (2023 data). That was a 62 per cent jump over the 2019 numbers.

That should be a clue. The pandemic created uncertainty about the future, and people felt out of control, at the mercy of invisible powers, like politicians and viruses. Daily life was a struggle. That's fertile soil for snake oil salesmen with miracle cures.

Google searches of manifesting went up 600 per cent. On Instagram, over 15 million posts appeared with hashtags #manifest and #manifestation. On TikTok, views of manifestation-related content have crossed 9 billion. One Cara Delevingne posted that she was manifesting a baby. Shut up, I'm manifesting became a meme.

Flavours of manifestation techniques began to pop up like so many ice creams: Passionate Manifesting; Effortless Manifesting; and Money Manifesting, in which you dream about money and it shows up. A particularly sly one is called Tathastu Manifesting, which tells you that inevitably things won't work out but for a fee, they will teach you how to convert challenges into millions.

"I manifested a 1994 Toyota Supra. The MK4 Supermodel is a pretty rare car. I got it for $500 at a raffle," says one Federico.

Another willing victim, Rainy, says, "I manifested a home and a daughter for myself. I lost 23 pounds."

How the dickens did they manifest all this? Sounds perfect, right?

Manifesting is sound - philosophically. After all, the Taj Mahal started as a thought in Shah Jahan's head. Then he manifested it. The original works on manifesting spoke about manifesting a better person, and therefore a happier person through visualising the change you sought.

But we live in a world where the main change people seek is more and more money. Here's a question: If imagining lots of money is how you get lots of money, why isn't everyone a happy billionaire?

According to the World Inequality Report 2022, the poorest 50 per cent owns two per cent of global wealth, while the top 10 per cent owns 76 per cent of it. The top one per cent owns 38 per cent.

Something isn't manifesting.

Meanwhile, the manifestation coaching is booming. To create a millionaire lifestyle, you must pay big bucks to learn the art of manifesting stuff. The courses don't have action points. You are mainly required to wish like hell, fantasise that you've made it before you make it, think positively and pay up when told to.

Like all such gimmicks, manifestation courses have an escape hatch. You can't ask for a refund if you don't become wildly rich. You'll be told you didn't wish hard enough. Or you were greedy. You salivated. You were insincere. You should have followed the instructions on the carton.

Clearly, enough people believe the bullshit because the cash register hasn't stopped ringing in the money manifestation coaching business. While you wait for your EV Tesla and a mansion filled with playmates to materialise, those coaches have been laughing all the way to the bank.

They've manifested the hell out of your hard-earned money.

You can reach C Y Gopinath at cygopi@gmail.com
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The views expressed in this column are the individual's and don't represent those of the paper.