Reality Selection vs Reality Creation
Do this one thing before the universe will give you what you want.
Watch the video version of this letter here if you prefer that.
People use the word abundance all the time.
I hardly ever see anyone actually talk about the term practically. It’s one of those words that has been thrown around so much that it has lost its impact.
So what is it?
How do you ‘create’ it?
What does it mean subjectively to you?
This is my favourite way to think about ‘creating’ abundance:
Creating opportunities for others creates opportunities for others to create opportunities for you.
One more time… Creating opportunities for others creates opportunities for others to create opportunities for you.
That slaps.
But rather that just giving you another fluffy quote, let’s dive into how this can actually be applied in your life today.
Now, a few years ago, I was stuck in the typical ‘9-to-5 grind’ (whatever you want to call it).
I was going through the same unconscious motions every single day. Tired. Always thinking about the weekends. Drinking. Didn’t like my girlfriend that much. All the cliché stuff. I was doing it.
Fast forward 4 years and I’ve managed to create a life where I can work from wherever I want. I’ve got enough money to do pretty much whatever I want (within reason) and my work reflects my mission and requires me to grow in ways that excite me.
However, nearly all of people I was around in that job, including my friends, the people I lived with, the people I worked with, are still doing the same thing.
Now this is not a judgement, this is not me saying that travelling to Bali and working from a laptop is the pinnacle of the human experience - everyone can choose what they want out of life.
BUT.
Many of these old friends and colleagues message me frequently asking how I pulled myself out of my old reality. I now have a level of freedom, that honestly, I take for granted.
For me the shift was internal (spoiler: it always is.)
That shift is what I’d say is responsible for whatever level of “success” I have now.
So let me dive into what that shift actually was.
When I first started trying to build a different life, or if I was starting now, I’d be really confused. Because there seems to be so much conflicting advice online about how to actually do this.
Some people say, “Hey, just start a business. Just do what needs to be done. Your emotions don’t matter. Execute.”
Grind your way out of the grind.
Then there’s another camp that says, “Follow your bliss, and success will magically come to you.”
My take? Both are wrong. And they’re both right at the same time.
You need to do both.
You need to both sharpen the axe and swing with power to cut down the tree.
(WOO + DO lol.)
So let’s take a look at the mindset/manifestation crowd for a moment.
I’m a big believer that you should follow your bliss.
However. what’s in it for other people?
Following your bliss and living a life that excites you is great. But if you want to have a profitable business, there must be something in it for others. That other 50% of offering value to the market must be there as well.
Otherwise, you might be happy. But I’m afraid you’re going to be broke.
I often say there are three P’s: purpose, profit, and peace.
If you’re missing either one, you’re not as powerful as you think…
Okay, so what about the grind crusaders? Grindrs.
Here’s the truth about getting out of where you are.
Yes, working hard is important. But that won’t sustain you for long.
Just grinding will grind you down.
There’s probably a season where you’ll have to grind, where you have to create enough velocity to get into orbit - but here’s what I’ve learned:
The state in which you create determines the manifestation of what you create.
One of my quotes that went semi viral on Instagram was:
Anything you gain while being inauthentic requires you to maintain being inauthentic to keep it.
You can change the word ‘authentic’ with pretty much any other human state of being.
If you’re not happy with where you are right now, that is all internal.
The things that are happening around you in your life are neutral. Your experience of them is coloured internally.
So it’s not that you have to do things that you don’t love, it’s that you don’t have love for the things you are doing…
In order to create a new reality (or to select a new lane of reality) you need to bring the energy of excitement, love and purpose to what you’re doing right now.
(only if excitement, love and purpose are states you wish to experience more of, of course)
Now, if your environment isn’t inspiring, yes, you can change it externally. However, the actual practice and discipline is finding purpose, love, and excitement in your current environment.
That’s the trick.
When I was in my 9-5 teaching job, I could feel myself slipping mentally. Getting jaded. I was only 22, and my hair was receding. I was looking older. I looked in the mirror and I could see myself becoming someone I didn’t want to be.
A typical day looked like this: overly tired all the time, waking up late for work, hammering way too much caffeine, rushing through the dark grey English morning, trying to get to work on time. I’d have a consistent headache every Friday at the same time and I’d use the first half of Saturday just to sleep.
I realised I couldn’t keep doing this forever.
The people around me had been stuck there for years and they weren’t going anywhere. And the more I was around that energy, the more I was going to turn into them.
The shift didn’t happen because I focused on how bad my life was.
The shift happened when I said, “F*ck it. I’m going to enjoy and squeeze the most out of every moment I’ve got here anyway.”
That was when everything changed.
The first thing I did was do an assessment of all of the areas of my life where I was acting out of a state of jadedness, escapism or any other emotion I was fed up of feeling.
I got good at examining my choices.
When I would reach for ordering a pizza, what was the emotion behind that? Purpose or escapism?
I committed to immediately to halting any action that did not come from a state that I desired to feel more of.
So the first thing that happen was that alcohol was no longer consumed.
I didn’t quit drinking.
I quit feeling disconnected.
Here’s how internal shifts work. You orientate internal to a desired state of being then the universe give you an opportunity to test how serious you are.
Woo + do.
We harden our new state into the environment around us by committed action from the new state.
So I committed to three years of no longer using alcohol to feel connect with others. Three years sober.
This immediately changed my environment. I had more time because I wasn’t hungover or groggy on weekends. I started exercising with more focus. I wasn’t going to the pub with friends anymore, so I had more time to work on things that excited me. At the time, it was music. I’d pour all my free time into making music.
I loved making music. I felt more positive overall. People were attracted to that energy.
And this is how the universe works. Both ways.
Before you can have the life you love, you need to love the life you have.
You have to make the first move show that you love your current life to some extent.
This is the practice.
No matter what your circumstances are, if you want to experience purpose, excitement, or abundance, find a small amount of it right now, whatever you can find, and choose it.
It’s not reality creation. It’s reality selection.
We become reality selection athletes when we get good at consciously choosing what we want to experience.
Here’s what I promise you:
There is abundance you can feel right now. Excitement you can feel right now. Peace you can feel right now.
I also promise you - there’s despair you can feel right now. Anger you can feel right now.
It is all available to you all of the time.
Your job is to build the muscle of selecting what you want to experience. And this is where the universe reciprocates.
Before you have the life you love, you have to show that you love the life you have.
This is the game we must play.
And this is why I started this letter by talking about opportunities.
There are opportunities in front of all of us right now. It’s our job to spot them and act on them.
Here are two things to remember:
First: wherever you are right now, don’t expect to be in a good flow with your next thing if you can’t find flow in what you’re currently doing.
If you can’t find flow, excitement, and opportunities in your current situation, don’t expect to find it magically somewhere else.
The practice is finding it now.
Second: we often hear “fake it till you make it.” That sentiment is somewhat good.
However, I’d suggest: It’s not fake it until you make it. It’s live it until you make it.
Practice living the emotions and feelings of abundance. The feelings of excitement. The feelings of joy.
That’s a muscle. It takes discipline.
It can seem hard when externally things seem bleak.
Can I find the good?
Can I choose what I want to experience?
If you constantly focus on finding even the smallest amount, you’ll be given more of it to spot.
I promise.
Keep pulling the thread.
Okay, one final thing.
Years ago, I read the book Secrets of the Millionaire Mind that I’ve always taken one thing to heart:
Never complain.
When you complain, what you’re showcasing to the universe is that you’re not in control. That you’re a victim.
If you ever complain, you’re basically saying, “I am not in control of my reality.”
And guess what? Reality says, “Yep, you’re right. You’re not in control. You’re a victim. Things happen to you. You have no agency.”
So here’s something you can practice starting today:
Stop yourself from complaining. Try for the next week, catch yourself when you do it. Try to have not a single complaint.
Energetically choose sovereignty.
It will be hard.
But it’s one of the most powerful shifts you can make.
Want to see where you’re operating right now?
Run my Identity Evolution Protocol.
This is a focused 3-part protocol designed to help you break through stuck patterns and step into the life you actually want - not in 6 months, but starting tomorrow.
[Link: Identity Evolution Protocol.]
@tomspark_
Welcome To The Producer Economy.