Opinion: A manifesto for manifesting things
Long before it became a big thing on TikTok and other socials, the art of manifesting was much beloved of life coaches across the world. Over a decade ago, a close friend would keep urging me to close my eyes and manifest whatever it was that I needed `the universe to do,` assuring me it would happen soon enough. Hesitant to hurt her earnest feelings by confessing that manifesting seemed a bit woo-woo to me, I demurred and kept demurring till the topic was dropped.
Manifesting experts will clue you in on the fine print, tell you what you need to do. The key apparently to believe in abundance, to employ your higher self, and hey presto…
There will also be people more than happy to provide personal testimonials about how they wanted something to happen — say a change of job, an ex-partner coming back to them, getting over a lingering ailment — and how sustained manifestation indeed, brought the ideal state about.
Given that we live in chaotic times, and are hard put to understand all the things that are happening around us, manifestation holds its own allure. It is a kind of magic, after all. We wish hard, we hope hard and we magic something into happening. We use the power of our mind, harness it to achieve a physical or emotional transformation.
Too good to be true? Well, new studies suggest that just might be the case.
Improbable, implausible
Dissenters have long scoffed at the whole blind-belief angle, terming it fringe psychology. Some academics have openly derided the process, deeming it unscientific, a misuse of confirmation bias and a problematic notion of how the world works.
Author and podcast host Amanda Montell, in her New York Times bestseller, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, points out that getting beautiful, getting rich, getting that guy to propose, all by sleight of mind sounds wonderful but is improbable on the ground. She concedes that manifestation holds a powerful appeal to us in these uncertain times, but avers that wishing upon a star, as it were, can also bring about a diminishing of our self-worth, and severe disappointment when things don’t manifest the way you expected them to. Usually, those who fail at manifesting immediately blame themselves and their limited beliefs for things not working out. When we finally wake up to the fact that something has not manifested, we either go into aggressive denial or fall into despondency. This naturally leads to a state of well-being far from ideal for the concerned individual.
Manifesting then, can be viewed as a form of wishful thinking that could benefit a troubled individual up to a point, give them agency and some amount of control of their own lives. It is when the individual starts to sink all their energy and money into ways to manifest more efficiently that a dangerous pushback begins, which can well demolish the individual`s self-worth.
Rather than oversimplified conclusions about cause and effect, it would be far more practical to work towards one`s goals, harness the power of positive thinking without going overboard, factor in all the internal and external components that come into play in getting richer, healthier, more good-looking, more powerful, more successful. That way, one rides the wave when it crests but will not go under when it troughs.
Final takeaway? The universe has neither got it in for you nor is it working for you. It just exists.
This ran in the TNIE Sunday Express Magazine of 9 March 2025.
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Sheila Kumar • March 9, 2025