The new-agey idea behind manifesting is actually tapping into an immensely deep truth, a truth we Jews have understood for thousands of years. The practice of manifesting holds that like is attracted to like. If you embody a feeling of lack, you attract more lack. If you embody a feeling of abundance, you bring more abundance.
What does embody mean? It means to feel. If we want to manifest something not yet present in our time-based reality, we must access our capacity to feel beyond what is currently “real.” Want to be rich? Feel rich. Focus on the feeling of freedom, access, power, generosity, security, and approach everything with that feeling of abundance.
Or in other words…pray for it. But perhaps not in the way we normally think about prayer.
I believe that there is an optimal time to spend on each prayer of the Amidah. 19 prayers, each tapping into a different “lack” you may feel. The goal of the Amidah is to cycle you through 19 “embodied states,” beyond what you might normally feel, until those feelings become so normal, so engrained, that you begin to live them. Until reality (i.e. God), begins to shift in accordance with that feeling.
How long should you pray each prayer? Until you feel it. Usually, we say that about 15 seconds of sustained feeling is long enough to shift your emotional momentum. It’s about the time until the feeling takes hold and you no longer have to put any effort into feeling it…it kind of just takes you up in it. It’s like surfing. You need to paddle just until the wave sweeps you into its momentum.
Look at the structure of the Amidah:
- Blessing 1: An awareness of Hashem, our personal/historical/familiar connection to Him, and His might.
- Blessing 2: An awareness of Hashem’s individual action in each of our life and in this world, culminating in the end of the life/death cycle of this world.
- Blessing 3: An awareness of Hashem’s holiness (kadosh).
- Blessing 4: An awareness of the both the greatness and limitations of our intellectual mind. All of it comes from Hashem, making us Tzelem Elokim without limits. Yet, all of it comes from Hashem, meaning our very capacity to even understand is granted by Him.
- Blessing 5: An awareness of the power of teshuvah (and our complete capacity for it in every moment) and an awakening of our intense desire to feel close to God, His Torah, and His Mitzvot.
- Blessing 6: An awareness of God’s forgiveness and an allowance for our own forgiveness.
- Blessing 7: An awareness of Hashem’s power of redemption
- Blessing 8: An awareness of Hashem’s total capacity to heal. What would it do for us if we allowed ourselves to truly feel “healed” in those 15 seconds of prayer and contemplation?
- Blessing 9: An awareness of the blessing that Hashem is bestowing. It is also a chance to connect and unite with the infinite prayer of all living beings (and even inanimate objects) towards Hashem.
- Blessing 10: An awareness of the ingathering of exiles. An awareness of what it will feel like at the end of days. It’s also an internal state, so an awareness of the alignment of our whole being (or of our ego with our inner being, i.e. Neshama).
- Blessing 11: An awareness of true justice and righteousness. An awareness that this does exist.
- Blessing 12: An awareness that we have no enemies, that God will vanquish all who stand in our way. A reminder of the power of bitachon.
- Blessing 13: A reminder in the security of bitachon. What would it to say this prayer while feeling utter trust in Hashem, in God inside of you?
- Blessing 14: An awareness that Jerusalem will be rebuilt. What would it feel like to stroll up Bazalel on the day the Mashiach arrives?
- Blessing 15: An awareness of David and the flourishing of Hashem’s salvation. What would it feel like to have had such a personal connection with the Creator of the Universe?
- Blessing 16: An awareness in the power of prayer, and that Hashem hears every prayer (and responds to it).
- Blessing 17: An awareness that Hashem will restore His presence to Zion.
- Blessing 18: A gratitude meditation.
- Blessing 19: A chance to become aware of what true peace will feel like.
Imagine feeling each of these blessings deeply as you move through them. First you feel what it is to feel intimately aware and connected to God. Then you feel holiness, gratitude, abundance, healing, peace. You do this three times a day, resonating again and again and again in a new state, a new awareness, beyond the confines of your habitual thinking. To me, that sounds like the most powerful manifestation exercise imaginable.
You see, to request something is to jump through time and feel its deliverance. So to pray for something is also, in that moment, the reception of it – the introduction of something new. The breaking of a limiting belief (of mochen d’katniyut). It is the power behind the concept of Ani Tefilati. I am my prayer. My prayer is me. When I pray, I become that which I pray for. The idea of a berucha is the breaking of the block we have inside of us. Prayer bestows berucha.
As Rav Kook said, “A person who thinks that prayer changes God’s Will is blaspheming, while a person who thinks that prayer only changes oneself undermines the worth of prayer and all types of religious acts. However, a person who believes that by changing oneself, one changes the world – since all of existence is influenced by the transformation of one of its elements – this understanding of prayer will bring blessing to one’s soul and the entire world.”
Pray. Feel what it would feel like to have what you pray for, thus creating the kli. Then live as if your prayer was received (bitachon), and watch how Hashem (reality, the Universe) responds. Rav Kook further extrapolates: “Prayer causes an actual transformation inside a person, and one’s inner transformation eventually builds up and leads to a revolution in the entire world.”
This is why bitachon leads to joy. Because through prayer we actually use our “lack” to come closer to God, recognize his infinite love, and surrender to ourselves to Him to provide for our lack. Then we trust wholeheartedly that it is coming, experiencing peace and joy along the way.
What does it mean to surrender to Him? Surrender to your Inner Being. Surrender to Him inside of you. Surrender to doing things that spark your passion and joy. Do what feels right not because you think you’re supposed to it, or that’s what’s expected, but because you trust that Our God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Yaakov, gave you an internal compass that rings strongly anytime you’re walking the right way. That ring sends vibrations of joy, trust, gratitude, and excitement to your very core.
I think Maishiach will come when we all live as though Mashiach is already here, as though the Beit Hamikdash is already here. We can create such a momentum within us, each on our own, but powerfully together, that reality will actually change. Besides, the leap from everyone living and feeling the presence of Mashiach is not so different from the Mashiach being here. If we go deeper and understand that spiritually, beyond the confines of our linear time, Mashiach is already here. So in many ways, an awareness of Mashiach is actually much more true than our current, distorted reality. Make sense?