Most people realize the deleterious effects of negativity in the workplace; whining, complaining, anger, and general nay-saying create obvious barriers to accomplishment. Whether it’s an individual complaining that the system “won’t let me succeed,” or someone piping up to insist that a creative idea “simply can’t be done, so let’s not even talk about it,” negative attitudes stop miracles in their tracks.
While the power of negativity is clear to most everyone, the power of vigorous positivity receives short shrift in comparison. Positivity is more than the absence of the negative; it is the presence—through thought, word, and action—of the positive. In other words, simply not being negative is not enough. If we’re interested in creating miracles, in invoking the most powerful creative manifestation, we must proactively be positive. There are three types of positive attitude that make all the difference: positivity about other people, positivity about possibility, and positivity about ourselves.
LET’S BEGIN BY looking at positivity about other people. After all, few of us achieve anything by ourselves. An array of employers, employees, colleagues, associates, customers, and so forth form a matrix of relationships at the heart of any worldly success.
Think of your work life, therefore, not as separate from your spiritual life but as central to your spiritual life. Whatever your business, it is your ministry.
Every relationship either gives energy to us or withholds energy from us, according to what we give to or withhold from it. And it’s not only our behavior toward others, but our very thoughts about them, that builds and/or destroys relationships. Since all minds are joined, everyone subconsciously knows everything. Thinking positively about those we work with (or would like to work with) has a miraculous power. When we think of someone with love, we are making soul contact, thus invoking the expression of that person’s highest self. That in turn increases the possibility that he or she will meet us on the level of our own highest self, bringing greater chances of high-level synergy and creativity between us.
Thinking lovingly about someone is a far more sophisticated measure than simply visualizing a positive outcome of a business relationship. In fact, that’s not even so positive, necessarily, unless our core intention is service to the other. Thinking positively about someone spiritually means blessing that person, praying for his or her happiness, and praying that we be an instrument of greater good in that person’s life.
No matter what situation brings people together, on the spiritual plane every relationship is an assignment. We’re brought together by an intentional universe for one reason only: the enlightenment of all concerned. Whether our connection is through work or family, a casual encounter or a lifelong involvement, the purpose of every relationship is the healing of the world.
The ego would separate our thoughts of work from our thoughts of the sacred, positing that work is material and God is spiritual, and therefore the twain do not meet. Since the world itself is merely a projection of our thoughts, however, there is no ultimate separation between our spirit, i.e., loving thought, and anything that we do. Separating our thoughts of work from our thoughts of spiritual devotion is thus personally disempowering, because it throws us out of the spirit mind and into fear. In fear, we forget who we really are. Forgetting who we are, we forget Who lives within us. And in forgetting Who lives within us, we lose conscious connection to our power. Through remembering Who lives within us, and dedicating ourselves to His purposes, we achieve miraculous results.
Think of your work life, therefore, not as separate from your spiritual life but as central to your spiritual life. Whatever your business, it is your ministry. Every relationship, every activity, every circumstance is part of your ministry, to the extent that you think of it that way. Such devotion uplifts the vibration of your thinking, thus improving the experience that others have of you and that you have of them.
Through our physical eyes, a group of people working together are seen as discrete and separate entities, related only through the sheer coincidence that they happen to all be working at the same place at the same time. Indeed, if this were a random universe, then that would be so.
But it is not a random universe, and everyone is wherever he or she is through divine assignment. That assignment does not necessarily mean that the situation should remain as it is: sometimes love’s lesson is learning to say no. But one way or another, there is meaning to everything that occurs. Lessons come in many different forms, and for everyone in a situation, the lesson is different. For one person, the lesson might be to contribute more. For another, the lesson might be to be kinder. For one, it might be to listen more. For another, it might be to speak up more. For another, it may even be to leave. No matter what the circumstance, however, working together is an opportunity for growth for everyone involved. And all growth is a conduit of miracles.
I once attended a business meeting with a group of people trying to get a new project off the ground. The conversation centered on money: Where were they going to get money? How would they raise money to fund the project? How could they get people to invest?
Sitting with the group, I kept thinking how much hidden gold was right there at the conference table. The gold was simply not mined—in fact, no one seemed to realize it was even there. Every person at the table carried within them priceless treasures in the form of ideas and creativity. How do I know this? Because as children of God, we all do.
Modern civilization hasn’t scratched the surface of truly liberating our human potential, because an overly secular worldview doesn’t recognize the deepest human potential. As a consequence, we continue to project onto external sources—money and what it can buy—the idolatrous notion that we need those sources in order to create success. In fact, it’s the other way around. It’s when we open the doors to true success—sharing our passion and ideas in service to a higher good, each person invited to express his or her unique contribution to the whole—that any material means necessary to support the work will be miraculously brought forward by a self-organizing universe. Once the energy is potent enough, the business deal will arrive by itself.
Energy can create wealth, but wealth of itself cannot create energy. No amount of money, technology, or strategy can equal the value of passionate people brainstorming new possibilities. Material wealth emerges from the nonmaterial source of human imagination and passion—passion for an idea, a purpose, a possibility of something as yet unseen. Such passion cannot be bought, but only inspired. A salary alone does not generate human enthusiasm, at least not for long. Human enthusiasm isn’t created by money so much as it creates money.
Yet there was no container at that conference table into which people could pour their hearts, much less their ideas. No one was asking them about themselves, or their deeper creative visions. What was missing, ironically, was something that costs no money at all: the consciousness of genuine concern. That concern is the essence of true leadership. A real leader is not the top dog who merely shouts down orders. A leader is one who holds the space for the brilliance of others.
Many years ago, a young man who worked for me spoke about his job this way: “We’re over there across the street, making the audiotapes, and no one ever comes over to ask us how we are or even notice that we exist.” I was stunned. An elephant had been sitting next to me that I hadn’t even realized was in the room.
What had I been thinking, exactly? If someone on my team could be that unhappy, that untended to, how could I think that this enterprise was really going to produce in the world? In the words of Mahatma Gandhi, “the end is inherent in the means.” No company or organization filled with unhappy people will ultimately rise to its highest potential.
We’re all selective with our application of spiritual principles until we’re not, and for years I failed to see the ministry aspect of the workplace itself. I had a profound concern for my audience and their needs, yet a twisted view of what I owed or didn’t owe to people who were there to help me serve them.
Our workplace can be the ego’s lair, or the spirit’s sanctuary. It can be an easy home for attitudes of disrespect, entitlement, arrogance, laziness, exploitation, disloyalty, and greed. But the workplace can also be a beautiful home for the most positive energies, should we proactively choose to express them. Our egos are more vigilant in monitoring the sins of others than in identifying our own; we’re quick to point out where we think others are making mistakes and sometimes slow to look at our own. The employer finds it easier to blame the employee; the employee finds it easier to blame the employer. The seeker, on the other hand, seeks no blame at all, but simply understanding and transformation.
As for the young man who told me I didn’t seem to care whether or not he existed, his comment opened up a floodgate of realization on my part. I had failed him as an employer, and I knew it. It took me years to understand that every workplace should be a positivity team. Every employee has a right to feel appreciated for his or her gifts, and every employer has a right to expect the highest standards of excellence.
How might the leader of the business meeting mentioned above have mined the gold of his employees? Before he went into the meeting, he might have said a prayer for everyone who was going to be at the meeting, or saluted them internally in whatever way was true for him. During the meeting, he could have looked at everyone in turn, thinking, “The love in me salutes the love in you.” (Obviously, it wouldn’t have been appropriate to say such a thing aloud!) No one would have known, on a conscious level, that anything at all had occurred. But on an invisible, miraculous level, everyone at the table would have been lifted into a higher psychological and emotional alignment. Having been inwardly saluted, the group members would have felt invited to share their gifts.
If you’re interested in building a positivity team, let’s start now:
Write down on a piece of paper every person with whom you’ve worked in your past—employees, employers, coworkers, customers, agents, clients, and so forth. Closing your eyes, allow them to appear in your imagination like a queue of people waiting in line at a movie. For that’s exactly what they were, except that they weren’t lining up to see a movie; they were lining up to be in a movie: the movie of your life!
As you think of those individuals from your past, remember that every relationship is an assignment, in which people are drawn together because they represent a maximal and mutual opportunity for soul growth. Whether you liked particular individuals or not is irrelevant; whether they liked you or not is irrelevant. What is relevant is that you see now whatever lesson you might have failed to learn before, so that you will have no need to repeat it.
Within the inner space of your mind, bow before every person standing in the line. Within your heart, bless, apologize, and forgive wherever necessary. And complete forgiveness is necessary, if we’re to attract and produce miracles. Thank each person for the blessing he or she gave you, even if the blessing was in the form of a lesson learned.
With each one, ask yourself, Did I do my best? Could I have done better? Could I have acted differently? And then place each relationship into the hands of God.
Now see another line of people, some of whom were also in the first line: everyone you’re working with or could be working with now. Inwardly, bow before the spirit of each one. Acknowledge their gifts and thank them for what they have done for you. Fill your heart with an attitude of appreciation. Pray to be a vessel of love that invokes their fulfillment and joy.
Now imagine the people you would like to work with: people you would love to collaborate with or work for. Know that they may or may not be the actual ones who are meant to be on your path in life; they may simply represent an image of the kinds of people who are doing the kinds of projects you yearn to be part of. Whatever the vision, honor it and surrender it to God. Pray that your energy expand to such an extent that it would be natural for you to find yourself in a room with such people, working and creating with them. The only barriers that exist are the barriers within your mind. Seek to remove your barriers to love, and miracles will replace them. The barriers will disappear into the nothingness from whence they came.
Perhaps you can pray with your work team, but perhaps it wouldn’t be appropriate. Either way, you can pray each day for the happiness and fulfillment of everyone you work with or wish to work with. Having done that, you will have done your part. Miracles will follow.
THE SECOND TYPE of positivity concerns how we view possibility. A man named Jonathon came to me one day quite depressed about money problems. He always seemed to just scrape by, he said, and he wasn’t even doing with his life what he really wanted to do. He worked as a carpenter, yet he longed to be a musician. He was always putting out financial fires—in fact, he was now facing a tax bill larger than he could pay—and he never seemed to get it together as a musician.
He said to me numerous times as we spoke, “I have an issue about being taken care of. I never think that there will be enough.” My eyes usually glaze over when I hear such explanations—first, because they’re self-fulfilling prophecies, and second, because the miracle is never in the past but in the present. In God’s universe there is always enough.
The more I inquired about Jonathon’s circumstances, the more I discovered that he was not just a carpenter, he was considered an excellent carpenter; yet he turned down most jobs he was offered. He did this, he told me, because he really wanted to be a musician and he didn’t want to give the universe the wrong message. He figured that if he did too much carpentry work, his possibilities of a musical career would dry up.
I pointed out that from what he was telling me, there were no musical opportunities at the moment, yet there was a tax bill! Metaphysically, it didn’t make sense to argue that if he worked to make money to pay his bills, the universe would reward him by closing doors. Quite the opposite: any time we show up for life with integrity and impeccability, doors open.
The part of the story that most caught my attention was the fact that while he had been praying for money, he had been turning down work! It’s like the old story of the man who found himself in a storm, with floodwater rising around him, and prayed to be rescued, yet turned down offered rides in a car, a boat, and finally even a helicopter, claiming, “God will take care of me.” Soon he drowned and went to heaven. Upon meeting God he upbraided Him, complaining that in his hour of need God had not been there for him. To which God responded, “What do you mean, I wasn’t there for you?! I sent a car; I sent a boat; I sent a helicopter . . . !”
Jonathon, it seemed to me, had an odd concept of “being taken care of.” We are taken care of, but as the saying goes, “God helps those who help themselves.” It’s a cliché because it’s so often said, but it’s so often said because it’s true.
Native Americans recognized that wherever there was a poison in the forest, an antidote to the poison could be found within several feet. Usually, what we’re looking for is on some level right in front of us. The universe is wired to give us what we need, yet we have to show up for the experience of life with a positive attitude in order to experience its gifts. I’ve known people who seemed to think that waking up in the morning, driving to work, and showing up at their desk should be enough. Well, it’s not. Our attitude—a willingness to bring all our emotional, psychological, material, and intellectual resources to a job—makes all the difference. It’s not just what a job brings to us that matters, but what we bring to a job. “I’ll do whatever it takes”—and yes, even sometimes “I’m willing to do windows”—is the attitude of a winner, not a loser.
Jonathon saw carpentry as somehow beneath him, not recognizing what seemed to me to be an obvious gift that had been laid in front of him. His succeeding as a carpenter wouldn’t limit his possibilities as a musician; carpentry was a way to make money, pay off his bills, and have some cash so he could support himself while he pursued whatever dreams were in his heart. By disparaging his own work, he was limiting the possibilities in front of him. That shift in perception would be his miracle.
It doesn’t matter whether we’re contributing to the universe as a carpenter or a musician, a teacher or an artist, a janitor or a caretaker, a parent or a salesperson. What matters is our consciousness while we’re doing it: our willingness to be of service in whatever way is presented, seeing nothing as either above us or beneath us, yet important because it’s in front of us.
We should never say yes or no to anything without reflection and contemplation. For the higher purpose of a situation is not always obvious, but it is always there. In a universe where God’s handwriting is everywhere, we never have to worry that life will lead us away from our greater good. It will always lead us into our greater good, as we proactively and positively bring to it the fullness of ourselves.
THE THIRD TYPE of positivity concerns how we look at ourselves. A Course in Miracles tells us that all the children of God are special, and none of the children of God are special. We’re all imbued with the same potential brilliance, because we’re all imbued with the spirit of God. Thinking that your talent or your abilities make you special will produce fear, because such thinking posits a separation between you and others. Separation between you and others means separation between you and God, and separation from God produces not power, but rather a hidden hysteria. “I’m better than anyone else” is not actually a success-oriented thought form; “I’m personally no big deal, but I’m here so I guess I’m the one who’s supposed to be channeling the genius of God in this particular situation” is better. It’s humble, not arrogant, to realize that the genius of God lies within you. Just remember that the genius itself is not in you any more than in anyone else.
Our job isn’t to create our genius—we couldn’t, by the way—but to make ourselves available to God’s. Yes, we must work at what we do, make efforts to improve our skills and so forth, for spirit can channel only through a prepared vessel. But once we’ve made the preparations we’re called to make, we can surrender the ultimate performance of a task and allow the Holy Spirit to flow through us.
Our power as miracle-workers in the workplace is to pray that we be used—that our hands, our feet, our minds, and our behavior be of service to a greater good. That we be empty vessels through which God will produce His extraordinary wonders. We’re simply here to serve a higher plan for the enlightenment of the world, and therein lie our happiness and success.
A friend of mine is a brilliant television writer. I’ve read her scripts and I’m blown away each time. But when she talks about having to pitch one of those scripts to a TV network executive, you’d think she was about to get twenty cavities filled with no Novocain. It’s one thing to work like the consummate professional she is, on the writing itself; that, I admire greatly. But the angst and nervousness before every pitch meeting; that, I question. For the One who sourced the writing will also lead the meeting, if she will let Him! In A Course in Miracles, it’s written that we should be less concerned about our own readiness, and more consistently aware of His.
There is a story in the Gospel of Thomas in which Jesus tells his disciples to go into the countryside and “teach the gospel” (by which he meant simply, “demonstrate love”). Wanting more specific direction, they ask him what they should say, to which he responds, “I’ll tell you when you get there.”
Think about that story in light of my scriptwriter friend. Her most powerful preparation for a meeting with a TV executive would be, obviously, to write the best script possible. But after that? Surrender the meeting. Pray for whoever is going to be there. Ask that everything that happens in the meeting serve the highest creative possibility for all concerned. Know that she doesn’t have to decide in advance every word she’s going to say at the meeting, because He Who lives within her will reveal all things with a miraculous quality she can’t possibly formulate with her rational mind.
Her greatest power lay in emptying her mind of all thoughts—aiming for the Zen “beginner’s mind”—and praying that they be replaced by His. Once she’d done her work and had all the information she needed in her conscious mind, her subconscious could take it from there. Her mind could formulate a pitch, but only her spirit could be inspired and inspire others.
In summation, there are four rules for miraculous work creation: Be positive. Send love. Have fun. Kick ass.
Amen.