Honing Our Skills of Observation
One night about ten years ago I was sitting in a parked car with my love interest at the time, having a difficult conversation about our future. (Or rather, lack of it.)
In the middle of our challenging discussion we heard two gunshots nearby and then a car raced by behind us.
It was unnerving, but even more so was 15 minutes later when a cop knocked on my passenger window and asked why we were there.
Since we were doing the opposite of making out, I didn't know why we were getting hassled. But he went on to ask if we saw or heard any disturbances.
“Oh, yes!” I exclaimed. Now that you mention it, “we heard gunshots and then a car raced by.”
“Can you tell us any more?”
I couldn't offer any more details – two shots, maybe three. I wasn't sure. And then a car raced by. I was little help.
My date, though, who had been silent through the interrogation calmly spoke up to share details about what type of gunshot it was, how many minutes ago the three shots were fired, as well as the make, model and color of the car that raced by afterward. Also, how many people were in the car. And what kind of hat the passenger wore. And what direction they came from and where they headed. He even described their hub caps.
I was astonished.
That guy had skills of observation!
(It was disconcerting to wonder what he was seeing about me that I might have thought went unnoticed.)
Anyway, when I hear someone talk about skills of observation, I think of that guy. (He was amazing for lots of other reasons, too, I will add.)
But that's not the kind of skill Joe Dispenza meant when he said:
“Our observation has a direct effect on our world. If we keep it (quantum physics) simple, people can get about the business of beginning to practice the skill of observation.”
The kind of observation skills Joe's talking about are the kind that come in really handy in deliberate creation world.
He's talking about being able to see something other than what is, since reality unfolds according to our conscious focus.
Which simply means that if I want to experience something that isn't real yet, I have to find a way of seeing it first.
I have to VISION it into reality.
That's what I practiced last week when a cat fight woke me up at 2 am. It sounded like it came from the front yard.
I mentally ran through a list of my cats to make sure they were all safely accounted for inside.
Yeah, that couldn't have been any of mine – they're all tucked in safe and sound. I'm sure of it.
Except, maybe for … I hadn't actually seen one of my feral cats that day. Is it possible she snuck out while the back door was open yesterday? (Pit bull Joe sometimes lets himself in and doesn't close the door behind him.)
I tried to tell myself everything was fine, but couldn't get back to sleep. So I grabbed a flashlight and went downstairs to see if I could find the cat in question.
Which I couldn't. She was nowhere to be found.
Usually she sleeps right there with Sheba, but Sheba was sleeping all by herself in their bed.
I searched the rest of the house for the cat in question – no sign whatsoever. (And I checked all the hiding places.)
She was officially AWOL.
I went back to bed, but couldn't sleep because now I was truly worried. If that was her cat fight out front, was she hurt? How would she get back in? (She's feral, so it's not her natural instinct to head indoors, assuming she somehow made it out. And catching her wouldn't happen unless she was seriously injured.)
Eventually I realized I was visioning this cat AWOL and injured. Not cool.
I was creating her as “missing” by imagining her so, and by telling the story to myself about what might have happened that led to her escape and subsequent fight in the front yard.
(These are the not observation habits of a powerful deliberate creator.)
Once I realized what I was doing, I got my LOA act together and instead practiced seeing her home sweet home, safe and sound, tucked in her comfy bed with her best friend Sheba. I imagined her sleepy eyes lazily blinking at me as I woke her from a nap - clearly all was well here.
I practiced seeing those circumstances even when that did not appear to be the case.
To be able to withdraw from the vision I didn't want to create as reality, and tune into the preferred one – that took skills of observation.
- To see what wasn't “real” yet. (Oh, there she is!)
- To feel what wasn't “true.” (Ahhh, she's home safe and sound.)
- To relax before there was a reason to.
Each time I felt myself drifting back to worry and concern, I plugged back into the picture of her sleeping in her favorite spot, healthy and happy, safe and sound.
That's practicing my skills of observation.
The next morning I went downstairs and conducted myself like a person who knows that all is well. (And a person who knows that all is well doesn't have to go downstairs to confirm it – she KNOWS it.) A few hours later when I broke out into “It's a miracle” song after a cat threw up on the tile instead of the new carpet, I thought with that “miracle” vibe flowing it might be a great time to go wave hello at the safe and sound feral cat in the basement.
Sure enough, there she was – sleeping right where she wasn't the night before – blinking her sleepy yellow eyes at me without a care in the world.
Times like that I'm super glad for my ability to see what isn't yet confirmed in my reality; to make way for the truth that I prefer.
Those are observation skills that serve a deliberate creator well.
(Those who aren't aware of the power of our consciousness might explain that away by saying "cats hide really well" or "she snuck in when you weren't looking" or something along those lines. But those who do know that we get what we focus on will realize that my 2 am flashlight search focused me into a reality where the cat was missing, and the new thoughts afterward refocused myself back into a world where she was home sweet home.)
My question to you is, how are you using YOUR skills of observation these days?
If you're good at seeing not enough money, lousy lovers, an uncooperative body, or whatever else you don't want - it's time to hone your skills of observation.
And we do that with awareness and practice.
Remember that it is within your power to choose what you see, and that what you see is what you get.
We can manifest an AWOL cat (or money, or lovers, or health or career opportunities) with visions of worry or we can manifest them present and accounted for when we engage different thoughts. What are you observing into reality today?
Jeannette Maw is the Good Vibe Coach and founder of Good Vibe University. Find more of her manifesting inspiration at Good Vibe Blog