A couple of days ago I had this great conversation with my friend Art. We were talking about the principle of magic called “Lust of Result.” Basically, it’s this: When you desire something greatly, and want it above all things, you invariably push it away. The more you need something to happen, the harder it is to pull that thing to you. 

I have been looking at my attachments lately. My career and writing attachments and aspirations, those are at the top of the list. And somehow, that is where some elusive, poorly defied design of “success” is constantly just out of reach. In romance, similarly, the want for love just keeps that magic at bay. I have been looking at giving up, and having what I already have being enough. It is an act of peacefulness. And those desires keep creeping back in.  There’s a real trick to it. Wanting the thing, setting the intention, and letting it all go to the point that you forget you ever wanted it.

That’s the part I have trouble with. I keep thinking there is some hard work to it, some toil that I got to put in to earn my reward.  And in many things, I am sure there is. But when setting intentions, it’s all about giving up all lust for result.  I’m going to put it down here, as much for myself and my own thinking as anything.

The Structure of Magic

1. Set an intention. Write it down. Be specific.  

2. Convert the intention into another form. Transformation. Change it into something that has no relationship to what you are creating. Convert the words of your intention into gibberish or symbols. Attach a nonsensical task to it. Speak in tongues. Draw a picture. Do a collage. 

3. Charge that intention. This infuses it with your energy and the power of your thought and attention.  This can be accomplished through meditation on the idea until it disappears from your mind. Focus on your nonsense symbol or gibberish mantra while you reach orgasm or get punched in the face (emotional intensity/no-mind). Run a marathon. Clean your house. Charge it. 

4. Forget everything. Stop thinking about it. And when you notice yourself thinking about it, give that up. 

Step 4 is the hard one for me. I think a lot. I want it to happen so bad (whatever “it” is). I gotta give it all up. Give up the finding of a lover, give up the finding of my perfect career, give up that being inspired to write that novella I have been procrastinating about, give up on Obama being president, give up on all the dreams  I am so often desperately trying to cause.  

It’s the paradox. You gotta let anything go for it to come to you, but you gotta want it for the universe to know. It’s a dance. 

I’m just going want nothing. It’s not like I really need anything more, anyway. Life is so sweet.

A man walks up to me while I’m sitting on the 16th st. Mall in Denver. He stinks  of piss and cigarettes. He’s hunched over, wears a leather jacket and pristine aviator shades and a scraggly mustache backed up by a few days of graying stubble. He’s about 60 by my estimate and quite mad.  I am blasting William Orbit on my iphone and working on my laptop. He shouts at me.

“What’s the forecast? What’s the forecast for the ENTIRE FUCKING PLANET?”

No strangers have ever asked me such a question. “Why,” I say, “A golden age is coming.” 

“I know,” he says.  He speaks in this cadence, like he is trying still to construct poems with his words. “If you ever get on a bus in Oceanside, California and it leaves you here, you know you are in trouble.” 

I smile and the sun comes from around a tall building. “Those are some great shades,” I say, dropping my own. 

“Have we met before?” He asks lowering his shades to reveal beautiful and sharp blue eyes.

I look at him for a moment. “No, I don’t think so.” He smiles and pulls up a chair. 

We talk for a while, he tells me how he wants to kill them all and set the world on fire. He fumbles for a long time trying to get a lighter to tell time. He can’t light the thing, and somehow I can see him making a mistake and lighting himself on fire. He shows me his lack of teeth, the poor bastard, and he curses the dentist that did a number on him. He wishes someone would put him out of his misery and buy him a cup of coffee, to which I get him one. We sit and have coffee for a while. He pulls out two packs of cigarettes and is immediately asked for one by another passing homeless person.  His name is Mercer. Pronounced “Mar-Sir!” 

it really gets me thinking. When he walked up, I was sitting down to blog about the stories we tell ourselves and how powerful they are, how they actually create reality.  And here comes this man, obviously living at the tender mercies of his created reality. Of course, there are circumstances that aren’t helping, he’s on the street, probably in poor health and without money. (although when he emptied his pockets for display, he had two packs of cigarettes and lots of receipts.)

I see that his story that he is telling himself is at the direct opposite end of the spectrum to my own self imposed fiction.  I can’t help but see the world as this expanding beautiful place, where things keep going better and better. Things are easy and fun. It’s a damn good life.  

But when we tell stories to ourselves and then share those with others, there is the potential to infect those around us with our meme.  They spread by the power of our passion. And Mercer, cantankerous old freak he is, was determined to get his world all over me. Instead, I got to get down to the heart of his happiness, and, as my coworker David puts it, “I just treated him like a man.”  

But my love for my life outflanks his.  I gave that dude some magic today. Or he gave me some. As I was leaving, he asked when we could meet like this again. I told him, I would be out in front of that starbucks again probably tomorrow, but that was my last day. He seemed sad.  And then I told him a story that he could hold onto. 

Looking into his eyes I incant, really creating the reality for him. “Mercer, you have a run of good luck coming. I mean it. Things are looking up for you. It’s all going to be okay.” 

“Oh good.” he says, getting every word in his heart, “I need it.”

“May we meet again, under stars more bright.” I say.  He nods.