Practical Magick Series No. 3
If you have ever read Napoleon Hill’s book Think and Grow Rich, you already understand the power of intentions when attempting to accomplish goals. I’ve understood this on an intellectual level for a while, but recently was exposed to the actual practice of it in a way which impacted me profoundly.
To say that the power of our minds impacts our physical bodies is not an unheard of concept within the magickal community. People have been setting intentions to assist in healing their bodies for centuries. Even the conservative and ultra-scientific medical institutions cannot discount or attempt to explain to healing process which takes place during blind tests with placebo therapies. But just how far can this technique be developed and what exactly are the limits of our physical bodies when it comes to intention setting?
A recent experience of mine, served to astound me in such a way that completely blew away my concept of what is or is not possible when it comes to the malleability of our physical structures. By practicing a simple but intentional thought, I was able to accomplish a goal which I had previously deemed impossible based on both my past experiences and the laws of physical science.
My experience centered around weight loss. I have put on a few pounds in recent years and am currently in the process of getting back into shape via healthy eating and daily exercise. I’ve been on this journey before and my body has a certain rhythm when it comes to losing weight and the amount of my losses tend to be very predictable based on my behavior. However, being the magickal gal that I am I decided to experiment with something new this go around when I found myself struggling a bit with plateaus in my weight loss journey. Everything is vibration, especially our bodies and our thoughts affect vibrations so shouldn’t it go to say that my thoughts are able to affect the rate of my weight loss? On a whim, I decided to put it to the test.
I’m part of a weight loss program where I track my eating and exercise activities each day then have my weight taken and recorded each week. The guidelines of the program are provided to us, but it’s up to us to follow them for optimal success when we weigh in each week. Because I weigh in on Saturday mornings, I typically will have a nice weekend which may involve one or two “splurges” which I will have time to recover from during the remainder of the week. This had been working for me quite well until I hit a block which I couldn’t seem to break out of. I was at the point where I was following the plan perfectly without any splurges and still not seeing the weight loss I should. I figured I might as well throw some magick at it to see if it made a difference. My technique was simple. I stuck to the plan with maybe a splurge or two, but was otherwise strictly followed the plan. The only change I made was to set an intention for the weight I wanted to be on the day of my weigh in. It was an attainable goal, but a little on the ambitious side especially given my recent struggles with plateaus. I made no other changes.
An important note I feel necessary to mention is that I did not waver in my faith that I would meet my intentionally set weight. This proved true even when I took a sneak peek at my weight midway through the week only to discover that I was far away from my goal to the point of it appearing hopeless. I simply shrugged it off and said to myself “Nope, I have absolute trust that I will weigh my desired weight by my weigh in day”. With astounding success I met my exact goal each week I performed this exercise. There were some weeks that two days before my weigh in I was 4 or more pounds away from my goal yet somehow I miraculously still hit my goal by eating normally on the plan.
This leads me to believe so much more is possible with our physical bodies than we give them credit for. If I have a strong deeply imbedded belief that eating a piece of chocolate cake will not make me gain weight, then I think it’s very possible that it won’t. Unfortunately for myself, my deeply embedded belief is of the opposite which has been hammered into me since childhood. But in knowing this, it is conceivable that I could change this with some reframing work. How many people on our planet that have the belief that they simply have bad genes or a slow metabolism could work to turn around their physical limitations with intentional thoughts? It opens up the question of how much can our bodies heal and what is the true determination of our pre-disposed genetics. Is it nothing more than internal programming which we have bought into as a supposed “fact” about the nature of our bodies? Going back to the chocolate cake example – how many skinny girls have we all met that can eat anything they want an not gain weight? I now wonder what their internal programming looks like and how it affects their metabolisms. It’s very hard to change our core beliefs once we have physical data to prove their truths but if we can shift into knowing it’s the belief that cements in reality, and not anything external of our thoughts it completely changes the game. I think it is a very exciting concept to explore and one we should continue to play with and see just how far into our greatest versions of ourselves it takes us.