We hereby define a new term used to describe our “strategy” in life. Are you a giver, a taker, a lover, a fighter, macho guy, sensitive guy, Madonna, slut, etc – it’s all really your GPS.
If evolutionary psychologists are right – and they do seem to be gaining credibility and attention these days – then our personalities are largely endowed to us by Mother Nature during the process of evolution. In fact, your personality is simply an adaptation created and managed to help you navigate your environment and successfully proliferate your genes.
Notice we talk about a gene proliferation strategy – not a sexual strategy. We all have a sexual strategy (and not the “ok, you go up to her and start talking then I bust in after like 10 seconds and ask you if you want a drink and then I’ll just ask her and her friend if they want something to drink, and then we’re in”), but this is a subset of our gene proliferation strategy.
To explain – we do not need to have sex to proliferate our genes. Sure, we largely prefer it, but because our genes are also in our family members, expanding the gene pool goes beyond sex, and even child rearing, to encapsulate altruism and good old-fashioned brotherly love. My aunt has never had children but in a way, she ensures that her genes get passed on by giving me 20 bucks on my birthday. That’s part of her gene proliferation strategy but has nothing to do with reproduction.
Let’s explore the gene proliferation strategy.
Lots of personality
We are an expansive species. So much variation in our gene pool – unlike crocodiles; they’re pretty much all the same. But there are all kinds of people, personality-wise. And this variation, this range of personalities, was simply developed to allow humans to expand as a species. One sort of person can live within a range of environmental circumstances and another sort of person can live under a slightly different range of environmental circumstances. Put all the different personalities together and we’re covering a good bit of environmental circumstances. And indeed humans are doing well. We’re friggin’ everywhere and it is the variations of our personalities which have allowed us to do so.
And just what are the various personalities? I guess we all know them, but they remain tricky to define. Jung called them “archetypes”. You’ve got dominant people, meek people, introverts, extroverts, friendly, hostile, emotional, stoic, principled, loose, athletic, awkward, etc etc. These traits are largely inherited but nature has given you some flack to play around with. Shy? You can develop yourself to be less shy. But in the end, your genetic proliferation strategy will be in line with that of a shy person.
To understand the strategies, we must first take a look at the “game”. Relating this to football – there’s no point in explaining the strategy of “passing to the side lines when there’s little time on the clock and you’re down” if you don’t know what those 22 people are doing on the field in the first place. So, take a step back to understand what we’re doing on this planet.
Right. I’ll try to keep it short and completely remove any philosophical, religious, or existential underpinnings and start from the level of biology. We are on this planet to proliferate our genes. No other reason. Everything we do is somehow related to this. Go to work, go to school, have sex, raise children, pick your nose, jog a mile, drive a car, go skiing, even taking drugs is related somehow to gene proliferation. You may not understand how smoking pot contributes to gene proliferation, and it is indeed a stretch, but rest assured, it does. Note: I do not encourage anyone to smoke pot – especially if it’s shwag and you got it from a sketchy source.
But if we can continue in agreement with this goal, all this does seem to fit together. So, genetic proliferation is the game, and we each need to play a role in that. Some do it by raising a family, some do it by promiscuous and commitment-free sex, some do it by joining the priesthood. And all of these options can be seen as strategies – strategies which are linked to certain personalities in order to execute them. Obviously, it takes a certain type of person to do any of the aforementioned. And each one of us can take a look at ourselves and match up the way we are and the things we do with possible genetic proliferation strategies.
Let’s take a few examples of stereotypical personality types and see how their personality lends to gene proliferation.
Men and women being the two sides of the coin obviously have very different strategies for gene proliferation, so we’ll split the types between them.
Women
The untouchable beauty – yes, she’s a bitch but if she were nice, the guys would never leave her alone. Her bitchiness is a survival mechanism. They all want her and the goods go to the highest bidder. Anyone who isn’t up to par is held at bay with a cold shoulder and a stoic gaze. The strategy is to be cold and aloof, get some rich guy to adore her and take care of her and the kids. She will probably be doomed to an unstable life since her husband – being the highest bidder – has a lot of bidding material to throw around. Conclusion: Nature wants her to “win the jackpot” getting a huge amount of resources from one man to raise her kids. She will effectively do this and ensure her progeny will also follow the “high road” by enrolling them in etiquette school.
The awkward, shy type – she will most probably find love, usually from a warm and loving man (we’ll get to him in a second). She’ll be a good mother and raise her children with love and care. Were she to not get a family of her own, you can bet she’d be a great support to close family members with their own offspring. Conclusion: Nature wants her to have kids of her own and a fairly mundane existence. Barring that, she can simply lend a hand taking care of her family’s kids
The slut – she probably looks pretty good but feels pretty bad about herself. This leaves her with the possibility to be with lots of men but her low self-esteem will not allow her to stay in a lasting relationship. She is sweet, yet frail and insecure and constantly seeking appreciation. Since being with one man for a longer period is not working out, she will pass on her genes by seeking the “support” of these sooters – getting little bits of support many many times. Conclusion: Nature wants her to have children and get fleeting support from the men she sees.
The prude – her sexuality has been repressed and she is pushed into the role of caring mother. A few kids taken well care of will suffice in getting those genes to future generations. Complete devotion will be expected of her man and he will not be the pick of the litter, but what he’s got her gives to her. Conclusion: she will settle for the doormat type of man, squeeze the life out of him and kill his sexuality accordingly.
The bitch – “help is hard to come by”. This belief means she struggles to get anything. Her interactions with others are largely hostile. Her intimate relationships will also be a battle, but she will squeeze out what she needs to raise some kids – bitchy kids… Conclusion: Nature wants her to “take what she can get” and push away those trying to take from her.
Men
The jock – athletic, right? this lends him to genetic credibility and makes him attractive to potential mates. He gets around. He feels no real need to settle with one woman. He takes on an alpha-doggish dominant personality and operates on an unsophisticated level – which proves effective to a certain point. Conclusion: Nature wants him to bone excessively. Either he’ll eventually settle down at an age well past the national average and be faithful, or he’ll marry early and continue his sexual destiny with extramarital affairs. Women will have a love/hate relationship with him – adoring him for his manliness and loathing him for his…manliness.
The comic – gets along with everyone and keeps the groups laughing. Of course, this is mostly done out of insecurity and fear of hostility. This is perhaps slightly dishonest. This can be interpreted as a lack of strength – were he strong enough, he wouldn’t have to care what the group thought. This lack of strength is translated to half-ass attempts at relationships and sexual congress. The fear and edginess can be translated as suppressed sexual energy. Conclusion: He will joke his way into the pants of a really nice girl, masturbate often in his regret that he wasn’t a leader type, and steadily shink over the years as the weight of the group bears down on him. He’ll be a pretty good father and provide well for a few polite children.
The nerd – though it sounds like an insult, the archetype can be the potential “intelligence jock”. Of course, there are nerds ranging from the classic computer geeks with glasses to the Hardvard professor with the tweed jacket and pipe. What unites them under one category is their lack of success with women. They excel on a group level – not an individual level. What I mean is, their gift is to the group, whereas the jock’s gift is to some lucky gal. So, nerds will not enjoy the adoration of women, but rather of groups, institutions, and governments. they are smart, so the game plays out in their head. This makes them laregly introverted and distant. Conclusion: Nature wants them to serve the group, and not get too distracted with women or even family. They’ll be decent dads but less decent husbands. Nice people but no one you want to spend too much time with.
The leader – Again, a testament to the diversity of personality. No need to have good genes for physical strength or even intelligence – just need to get shit done. Coordinating and getting results do wonders for your gene proliferation. Confidence is a must and it is attractive to both the group and the fairer sex. But they walk a tight rope between their instinctive drive to spread their seed and the moral standards of the group they are serving. You’ll find a fantastic example in Bill Clinton. Conclusion: Nature wants them to impregnate many and serve the community – and their personalities are built up to just both. Screw being a dad. These are some lovable charismatic people, but their families can barely stand them.
The doormat – just trying to keep everyone happy and on his side. Low self-esteem and a confused sense of purpose keep him in dire need of others. He’ll say yes to everyone and everyone senses his desperation and treats him like the doormat he subconsciously professes to be. Conclusion: Nature wants him to get a decent wife, have kids and live his life as a slave to work and family.
The skirtchaser – not necessarily good looking yet somehow attractive to women. Confidence is key and he’s got tons of it – largely in the “I just don’t give a fuck” sense. If he had confidence in another sense (ie competent and virtuous), nature would push him more in the role of leader. He actually has low self-esteem and dislikes his place on earth so is simply out to “go get his” by nailing every chick he can. Conclusion: Nature wants him to lay lots of pipe and impregnate as many women as possible. Finding proper support for raising the children is the women’s problem. So, he is the love ‘em and leave ‘em type. Hearts will be broken but genes will undoubtably be passed on.
The bad-ass – the male equivalent of the bitch. He’s angry and ready to show it. A low self-esteem and continuous struggle in this world leaves him with nothing to lose. He what he needs is a big hug, but he’d kick your ass for suggesting as much. He gets want he wants by force or intimidation. Would rather people just gave it to him courteously but that’s just not in the cards. Conclusion: Nature gives him no freebees, so demands that he take what he can get. He will have children to he same way as he has everything else. His genes will be passed on to the next round.
Stop stop stop before you comment on how this is a tremendous generalization. I know this and embrace it. These are just some of the “primary colors” of personality – indeed we are all tapestries. And these are just a few examples. But from this, I hope you get a rough understanding of the “game” we all find ourselves in, the strategies (ie. personalities) which are being used to succeed in the game, and where your personality fits into it all.
There you have it – a slightly new definition of personality. So, what do we do now?
Disclaimer
Evolution has been used as a justification for a good bit of hate and violence over the years, so let me take the first paragraph to state that this is a joyous and hopeful article about evolution which is meant to point out the positive aspects of this wondrous subset of evolution in which humanity currently finds itself. You see, we no longer evolve physically as a species, we evolve culturally. We learn all about evolution as a process for physical change in a species via genetic mutations over a period of time, but there has since been a definition of cultural change over a period of time. This is Cultural Evolution.
What is a Culture?
Culture is a set of beliefs, values, abilities, and rules which help people to live and grow together. Culture is about how we operate socially and is itself an evolutionary adaptation which allows us to work together to accomplish common goals. Laws, language, and all facets of communication, beliefs, agreements, bits of knowledge, etc all together make up a culture. Culture is as much a part of humanity as the opposable thumb and just as much a part of evolution too. All systems have rules and assumptions for the subsets to work together, but the rules and beliefs in certain systems change from within – and this is ultimately what evolution is. My car is a system with rules and assumptions set up so that all the parts work together to get me from A to B. But these rules and assumptions will not change on their own; they need an external force (i.e. mechanic or car specialist) to make the changes to the system to get the car to work better. So culture, because it changes on its own, follows an evolutionary process.
The cool part of this is that a culture is that the scope has been steadily increasing over time. A long time ago your culture was only really of value to you in the scope of your tribe. But the tribe has gotten steadily bigger over time and we now have a fully global tribe. Your culture is no longer only defined by where you live where you were raised, but also by what your individual beliefs and values are. Currently the beliefs and values of the world are evolving – the physical part has stopped. Why did it stop? We reached a tipping point as a society that we were no longer at the mercy of our environment and no longer needed to adapt to fit our environment, we were able to adapt our environment to fit us. Cultural evolution has been around since humans were living together, but about 10000 years ago it became the only form of evolution active among humans.
The Big Deal About Beliefs
Beliefs are what guides you and as such can be seen as adaptations. Birds in the wild believe I’m going to catch and eat them, so they fly away at the slightest provocation. Pigeons in New York belief I may give them food, so they allow me to get closer than if they believed I was only out to catch and eat them. This belief is an adaptation for city pigeons – since the ones who hang out closer to humans have been able to enjoy the bounty of their crumbs. Different beliefs will lead to different experiences in the world, and nature has allowed you to change your beliefs to help you best in your current situation.
How Gene Proliferation is a Common Goal
One of the biggest misconceptions about evolution is that it takes place on an individual level. In fact it takes place on the level of the gene. Interestingly enough, my genes are in a lot of different people. And since my genes want to be passed on, I want to see the holders of my genes prosper in life. This gives altruism an interesting twist. This explains why some people give their lives for others. We are not “living for ourselves” in this world; we are living for our genes. My kids have more of my genes than some random stranger on the street, but he does have some of my genes and it is a natural instinct to want to see him happy.
Culture as the New Evolutionary Currency
At some point in our evolution, beliefs became such important adaptations that they were valued by individuals and groups almost as much as genes. The right beliefs meant your genes would flourish and the wrong beliefs meant they were doomed. The theory then became: support your beliefs and you will be supporting your genes. So, those who shared the same beliefs were better able to work together and cooperate and thereby better pass on their genes. Evolution thereby made it such that cultures were as much a part of the survival struggle as the genes themselves. Joseph Giovannoli refers to cultures in this sense as psychogenes, in his book The Biology of Belief.
The more people who support your beliefs, the stronger your beliefs become and the more effective they will be in supporting your survival. Imagine your beliefs are like a weapon and the more people who share them, the stronger the weapon becomes and the more it will aid you in your survival and quest for gene proliferation. Of course, the belief itself has to be viable. If you believe killing your children will aid your gene proliferation, it won’t matter how many people support this belief – it will not help your gene proliferation. A more relevant example would be a religious belief like believing in Christianity or Judaism. Them more people who believe in Christianity, the stronger the Christians become and the better chance they will have of passing on their genes. The genes of the Christians may be quite different from each other, but by believing the same thing, they help each other pass on their respective genes.
Culture and Countries
We usually think of culture as something pertaining to a country. And despite the fact that you are largely free to share cultural common ground with people from all over the world, you are still led by the leaders of your country. A country may have many cultures within its borders but for the most part, it is operating from a single cultural and political standpoint. This standpoint may be a politically devised set of compromises and strategic declarations which enable it to operate in the world and not a real reflection of the myriad of cultures it really holds. Example: Americans largely disagree with the way its leaders are handling themselves, yet the American leaders are still the ones interacting with the rest of the world politically. So, the cultural standpoint of the United States of America does not seem to accurately reflect the cultures of the American people. But America, like all other countries, has a particular culture – its way of interacting with the rest of the world – which changes and shifts from time to time. These cultures, too are adaptations and can be compared with each other as more effective or less effective than other cultures with respect to how well they are helping their parent country survive and proliferate. A culture of hostility may serve a country well or it may not… It used to work quite well back when imperialism was the flavor of the month, but does it fare well today?
Survival of the Fittest Culture
So, culture operates on many levels – depending on the size of the organizations it is defined for. Survival of the Fittest Culture means that some belief systems are better suited to their environment than others. And on each level, there are cultures which fit well into their environment and cultures which don’t fit so well into their environment. And natural selection will see to it that the cultures which are most suited to their environment will be passed on, and those which are less suited will eventually die off. A more detailed explanation of this process is defined by the term “memes” – the cultural equivalent of genes. A good and relevant example of a meme which is doing quite well for itself is environmentalism. It’s all the rage and you see that cultures (on all levels) which are embracing environmentalism are doing well in today’s sphere of influence. I also remember a bumper sticker which proclaimed “mean people suck”. Indeed they do, and we can analyze all these memes and see where the trends are going. How will mean people as a culture continue to fare in the world? Will they proliferate or will their numbers die off? Do not confuse “mean people” as an actual group of assholes but rather as a cultural attribute. Cultures change within and across people’s lifetimes. You may be mean now but maybe your environment pushes you to adapt a new belief system in your lifetime.
The Best Beliefs and Values as Defined by Cultural Evolution
I’m just interpreting here and, in doing so, I’m suddenly aware of how I’m presenting evolution’s ideas much like priests present Jesus’ ideas – there may be a big discrepancy between what the interpreter is saying and what the source really means. Anyway, in studying nature and the trends humanity has undergone in the past 100000 years, we can make assumptions on how certain memes will fare in the future. This actually leads to a conclusion on what the most desirable attributes are for a culture. A pretty big deal if you’re accurate.
I’m not going to conclude on them here but a speculative example would be fun. Here goes: cooperation is a clear trend in the course of humanity. We have only gotten more interdependent on one another and have been forced to find ways to make ourselves happy and prosperous by making others happy and prosperous. This operates on the level of intimate relationships, like a husband and wife working together to raise a family, all the way up to global entities, like the European Union agreeing on a set of rules to help each country work together for economic and social growth. Want to have an effective experience in the world? Then be a cooperator. See how you can work together with others to achieve a common goal. If you’re not a cooperator, you can learn how to be one – thereby changing your culture. If this conclusion is accurate, then we see that the cooperators will be the survivors in the future, much like the fast cheetahs were the survivors. This should apply to cultures on all levels – for individuals as well as countries.
So, how to be a cooperator? That’s another article. For now, you know that some cultural trends, ie beliefs, values, and rules are adaptations, and as such, some are more effective than others so take a good look at which ones you think are contributing to a better life for yourself and the world. Thinking about which ones naturally feel good and which ones naturally feel bad should point you in the right direction – despite whether you currently share these beliefs, rules, and values. We said that cooperation is a “good” value (I believe), but doesn’t necessarily mean we are all cooperators. But just getting conscious of it should help you down that road. Ultimately, we should be excited about this perpective since we can now analyze the trends and put ourselves in line with them. It may be frightening to find the results – like “what if brute hostility turns out to be an increasingly successful meme?”. We may just have to put faith in the universe that the trends are leading in a positive direction. Don’t worry, we’ll try to prove that in another article too. 
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I’m a big Bill Maher fan, so I’ll take a page from him. “New Rule: you can’t say that God created all the good things in the world and all the bad things were created by Man.” Science tells us that Good & Evil are human, conscious constructs and the Universe doesn’t have an opinion. “Why are there bad people in the world”, “Why does God allow all this suffering”, “How could they change the original Chex Mix recipe”. These are all questions that people ask in an attempt to understand “the mind of God”. In doing so, you assume that God has a conscious mind and made things the way they are for a conscious reason. But in answering these questions from a religious point of view and within the bounds of western religious teachings, one is forced to take on the position that God made good things and men made the evil things – which is just silly.
God made everything
And just why are there bad people in the world? I don’t know and I’m not going to address it in the scope of this article, I just want to make the point that God – or nature or whatever you want to call it – made everything. God made murderers, thieves, rapists, bitches and assholes, just as much as he made Tom Hanks and ice cream. And that the labels Good and Bad are something we define based on what we want and what we do not want as a society – not as characteristics inherent to a thing regardless of whether humans are around or not. Murder was not Evil in the time of the dinosaurs. Murder is not evil today when a lion kills a zebra – even if it’s a baby zebra who was just born and is still too weak to stand and whose mommy had a really rough pregnancy and the father left her for a younger, more attractive zebra. It only becomes evil when humans are observing. OK, murder only applies to humans, but you get the point.
The Evolution of Good & Evil
Yes, even morality evolved – that’s how powerful and all-encompassing evolution is. Religious pundits often balk at the idea that morality is just a set of rules we all put together for society to function properly. The argument is mistaken in thinking that these rules were set up consciously. I agree with the priests that a group of people did not sit down one day and brainstorm over a list of rules. Rather, these rules are built into us as much as our desire to eat. A long, long time ago before humans, even before cavemen, you could pretty much do anything you wanted. But at some point creatures started teaming up in the ever increasingly competitive environment. As we know from game theory and systems theory, any cooperation or organization needs rules – it’s inherent in the very definition of these two constructs. So, rules were set up on a subconscious level. And by that, I mean that evolution, through trial and error, subconsciously puts systems in place which allow our genes to be passed on – so morality was just another evolutionary adaptation to help us proliferate. This is why morality has been around long before religion and the most atheistic people can still be morally superior to religious zealots. Think of it this way: a tribe of people with no rules will prosper and proliferate less than a tribe of people with a set of rules which better enable them to work together and take on their surroundings. Rules like “let’s not kill each other” – simple things which can lead to big gains in the gene pool. A cheetah also developed a flexible spine to be able to run faster – the difference here is that cultural evolution is happening across a set of individuals instead of within an individual.
Your conscience and You
The built-in mechanism for morality is indeed your conscience. Freudians call it the super ego and Pinocchio calls it Jiminy Cricket. And now you know where it came from – it’s an adaptation nature created so you already know how to play the game and what the rules are. It’s stronger and more effective in some than in others just like some people are physically stronger or smarter than others. But just as any adaptation, the better it is the better you should help you fare in life. Just like working out or brain puzzles, you can develop your conscience as well. Start by listening to it.
No absolute truths? What do we do now?
So there are no absolute truths. But this need not worry you. This is not a call to throw morality out the window – I just want a proper definition of what morality is. So what if God didn’t invent the labels Good & Evil, that people did, and that it’s no longer holy? It still makes for a good working society and nature did a good job of creating Good & Evil to support human proliferation. Not as magical as the 10 Commandments, but isn’t it like 1000 times more real and impressive? And there is rationality behind the morality – not just someone telling you not to have sex with no real explanation why. And let’s not call them Laws or Commandments, call them guidelines. If life is a game, these guidelines will not tell you how to win the game (cause life is not a competition), only how to have the most pleasant, fulfilling experiences. “Don’t have promiscuous sex” becomes “Having promiscuous sex may be fun on one level, but empty on another. Scientists and psychologists show that the most sexually fulfilled people are those in a monogamous, loving relationship. And indeed, a fulfilling sex life is an important part of a healthy, balanced life. But if you feel like you need to hump a lot to get some stuff out of your system, go right ahead. I’m not mad at ya. At least now, you’re making an informed decision.” The second example just feels better, right?
Embracing morality
Let us embrace the morality that living in societies has made for us. Not because it’s written in scriptures, but because we’ll have a better life for it.
- No killing – it just doesn’t make for pleasant living. Ever want to kill someone? It’s not a nice feeling. I can’t even imagine how bad it would feel if you actually killed someone.
- No lying – it may get you want you want in the short term but long term, the weight on your conscience is enough to give you a hump back by the time you’re 40. And your reputation usually suffers beyond any short term gain. Be honest for a good night’s sleep.
- No stealing – ok, so you stole a tube of toothpaste, but how do you feel about yourself right now? Like “I can’t believe I just stole a tube of toothpaste. I’m a horrible human being”. Getting a job to pay for the toothpaste may be a pain in the ass, but you’ll feel fulfilled on another level and you can begin the process of working for more money and finding nicer jobs.
- Be nice to people – being a dick makes you feel like a dick. Nature has ensured that the nice people, in general, get good standing in a community. You may say “it’s better to be rich and powerful” and I won’t argue that right now, but being poor and nice gets you more points than being poor and nasty.
- Don’t be such a slut/male whore – aside from genital delight, sex often gives people a sense of acceptance. If you’re a bottomless pit of low self-esteem, you’ve probably realized that promiscuous sex is not solving that issue. Find another way. And note that nature made love, commitment and honesty feel naturally good too… Otherwise, have fun.
- Drugs are bad – and drugs are everywhere, from TV to pure heroine. Anything which takes away from your ability to contribute positively to the gene pool has been deemed as unacceptable and is punishable by societal isolation and severe feelings of guilt. But who doesn’t love an occassional spliff?…
- Get to work – again with the contributing. Laziness just feels bad. Sure, you may not know what to do and hate doing things you don’t like, but for total bliss see “working hard at something you love”.
- Get a God – you thought I was dissing the notion, but quite the contrary. Find a definition of God that you’re comfortable with and feel the sense of oneness – whether you define it as Jesus, Allah, Buddha, nature, physics, the global consciousness, etc. Studies do show that people who feel part of something bigger lead more fulfilling and happy lives. Doesn’t mean you need to be a Christian or a Jew or part of some major religion, but just try finding something that’s “bigger” than you and adorning it with a sense of wonderment and humility. Feels nice.
And that was it. It’s quite common to feel torn by conflicting thoughts like “I think morality is good” and “I don’t like what religions are saying about morality”. So I hope this article leaves you with a possibly new perspective with no conflicting ideas.
Just saw The Secret Saturday night, and I must say I’m feeling inspired. Of course, the next day I looked up more on the internet and found a clip of a guy debunking the movie as nonsense and “snake oil”. Well, I don’t think it’s nonsense, but I understand how the more skeptical people in the world have a problem a) with the way the movie is set up, with all the mysticism and loose ends. and b) with the lack of consistent scientific documentation to support such a “Law”. I mean, they call it a law, but it’s not documented and tested and proven like say: The First Law of Thermodynamics. I think Law is a bit misleading, it’s more like a system where various things need to be done in order to be effective. This is why you can’t test it empirically like the “effects of MTV on rats”. It’s a system based on a set of laws and the results you get from it are only a reflection of your accurate use of the system.
Let’s think about General Systems Theory for a second. What Systems Theory tries to do is to see that all systems in the world (from tiny tiny to all-encompassing) are based upon the laws of the universe. And by “laws” I mean the real laws like gravity, thermodynamics, mathematical laws, etc. These laws determine the behavior of elements within all systems. The Law of Attraction is really only stating something obvious to Systems Theory – elements of a system fit together. No kidding, right? If they didn’t fit together, they wouldn’t be in the same system. So, what The Secret puts into practice is you determining which system you want to be in and then setting yourself up to be in it. And by being in that system you want to be in, you would only experience those elements which fit in that system. Get it? It’s pretty obvious if you break it down like that. So, let’s see the first step: what do you want? What kind of system do you want to be in?
Consider yourself a bigger system than the world’s subsystems. What are the subsystems of the world? There are an infinite number of susbsystems but there is only one you – but even you can shift your system. The susbsystems of the world can be “waking up and starting the day off well” or “waking up and starting the day off in a bad mood”. These are both systems – they have a set of properties and characteristics. Some things fit into this system and some do not. Waking up and going for a nice leisurely jog and feeling great may be a “good” system. Therefore tripping and falling into a puddle of mud because your head wasn’t there would be characteristic of a “bad” system. These two are not compatible. So the good system does not let those assymetric, conflicting, “bad” elements in. They are not characteristic of the “good” system, so they do not exist within it. So, if you shift your “bigger” system to something positive, something akin to what you want, those other elements in the smaller “negative” system do not enter. Now, you may say “sometimes I’m having a great day and something bad still happens”. Possible, but that only shows that your system was not optimal. A closed system does not allow conflicting elements in, so if some negative elements are witnessed, it just means that they were part of the system, which means you weren’t really as positive as you had hoped you were. Which is no big deal. No one is perfect. And that’s why some people are better at this than others.
I would like to point out that self-help, and life itself, are skills. You need to practice them and study them. And anyway, you can’t expect to create a system with only happy, perfect elements in them. What you can expect is some bad things which enter your system which you simply use as lessons to learn from. You move towards perfection but you’ll never acheive it. That’s how it works for all skills, be it “a good golf swing” or “using the Law of Attraction to set yourself in a positive life-system”.
Let’s take an example from the movie. The woman with breast cancer who cured herself in 3 months. She decided which system she wanted to be in: a cancer-free system. Then how to do it: she acted as if it had already happened. Every day she said to herself “thank you for my healing” and really felt and acted like she was already healed. How did that work? I’m not sure. But it seems to be correlated to the idea that your brain does not distinguish between the things you experience in your mind and those which you experience in reality. This is why atheletes use visualizations as a successful training method. And I know scientists have enough evidence to show that beliefs have a serious influence on your physical body. Simply put (and feel free to look for research confirming this), if you believe you are healthy, your body has a tendency to be healthy and if you feel sick, your body has a tendency to be sick. So she put herself (a bigger system) into a subsystem – that of a healthy cancer-free person. And by doing so, the cancer no longer fit. But the real magic here is obviously how the body heals itself. Not sure how that works, but I certainly believe that systems theory can explain it. And scientists still don’t know how everything works, but if we’re willing to work with things that seem logical and are worthy of belief (like systems theory being applied to your health) then you should be able to reap the rewards.Since this example is pretty clear, despite the “perceived” difficulty of the task, she actually had simplicity on her side. I’m not saying that beating cancer through shear will-power is easy, I’m just saying it’s quite clear and “simple”. It’s easier to put yourself in a simple system than in a complex one. She was only concentrating on the cancer healing. Other people trying to apply the Law of Attraction may be dealing with many many elements and some may actually contradict each other – that is, not fit well together in a system. Therefore the clear image of what you want becomes more difficult to grasp. For instance: “want a million dollars but don’t want to work hard”. There are a lot of contradictions there. “Want to have a happy family but want to go out drinking every night with the boys.” So, I believe the first step of deciding what you want is more complicated than we think. It may be easy to just say “I want a new BMW”, and you might get it by affirming and really focusing. But it’s hardly a long-term life plan. And what’s the point of all this if you aren’t building a real happy life? And it’s hard to define a life. There are a lot of things you have to learn about yourself and become conscious of. So, if the Law of Attraction isn’t working, it may be that the system you want to be in isn’t properly defined and you don’t have sufficient self-knowledge or knowledge of the world. The Law of Attraction is a system itself and you need to make sure all cyclinders are firing in the same direction to get optimal, predicatble results.
So, how do you properly define the system you want to be in? This basically amounts to: “what do I want to do in my life?” Not a question to be underestimated. Most people never find the answer to that one. Most people never even ask it! Or even know it exists! So, you’re already ahead in the game. Trying to figure what you want in life may be better left to feeling than rationality. Your conscious mind tends to complicate things. Since it is this massive, complex nerve center, it has taken on an infinite number of expectations and teachings from others throughout the course of your life and embedded them in your head in the form of neural patterns. So, when you try to ask questions like “does this neural pattern really feel good for me”, it is the neural patterns themselves which will answer you. And we know what they think! They are in place, living well and want to stay there. But your subconscious mind doesn’t work like that. It still knows the real you – what you like and not what others have told you to like. This is what they talk about in the movie as “the better you feel, the more ‘inline’ you are”. To find out what you want in life, you need to get back to the real you. And you do that by turning the conscious mind off, by feeling, and by getting a professional to help you take some distance from those patterns your stuck in. And then you can start getting an idea of the system you want and start putting yourself in it.
The Law of Attraction isn’t snake oil. Au contraire, it’s actually highly scientific and therefore hard to explain. So, it’s possible it isn’t being defined properly by the people promoting it (myself included). And unfortunately, it may be a turn-off to the traditional scientists who could most effectively support it by the fact that it’s not a law (but a system, as we’ve discussed) and can’t be tested with the scientific method. But keep the faith, there’s a lot that can be gained by properly implementing such a system. I’d be interested to hear other people’s takes on this. For the meantime, here’s a clip from The Secret on YouTube.