Joe touches on this a bit in Zero Limits, but in my opinion ‘Zero’ is a better, simpler & less self-conscious/diffident about being different, than Spiritual Marketing/The Attractor Factor, you know. Although it is true that ‘Attractor’ is a more practical, more narrowly focused book and that’s different, I think that the main difference is the confidence-to-be-simple/additional maturity in ‘Zero’, the later book. And it’s not like say Wayne Dyer, who matured and perhaps got better but certainly changed a lot and went on to very different-stage-of-the-life-cycle topics (eg giving away most of your possessions, lol), I think that the main thing about ‘Attractor’ and ‘Zero’ is simply a good-to-great kind of a thing. That said, maybe more step by step is easier for some people, you know. Although I do think that the testimonials—lots of people grew, and not just one guy named Joe—in ‘Attractor’ is excellent, and that chapter just by itself makes the book unique. Although I will say that it’s at most optional to decide first what you don’t want. It can be a step towards knowing what you do want, but that’s all that’s necessary. Today, even if I were to read a book about fascism, or something, I’d only do it for the goodness hidden somewhere—perhaps bravery, especially of an anti-fascist or whatever, or some kind of a resilience story, or I guess possibly just unusual events and the fascination in that, right. But I mean, if it’s like Picture yourself somewhere, and you can picture yourself in the Azores and it’s great; you’ve got it. There’s no need to say, Start with what you don’t want: and it’s like, Okay, I’m in a rat-infested tenement and my landlord is a dishonest crook/grifter, and he likes to…. —You know, just don’t go there. Although I will say, not getting attached to the outcome—‘let go’, I think he says, is a classic but easily overlooked point…. I used to get almost exclusive with non-attachment, so I would actually get attached to non-attachment, and then, as I described to my therapist, “and then something sticks to you and you freak out”: and obviously freaking out is Not non-attachment, and it’s not helpful. I mean, it’s not like there’s a certain amount of “time on off” you need, although I don’t always think in an actively happy way, and I certainly don’t always read about prosperity, and you can “pray continually”, as long as you don’t get attached.

Anyway, obviously there are other books but overall this is a fine book by a very decent and fun fellow.

…. There are a lot of things here, a lot of which I haven’t demonstrated in my life or experienced enough to really understand. One thing I do kinda get is that when guck comes up—I mean, I don’t know if I feel comfortable doing the thing where you write the guck down and then destroy the paper, although I’ll think about it, (and write good things down and keep it), but certainly, if guck comes up, it’s not a mistake. Guck comes up for everyone sometimes. You have to really feel things deeply to release them sometimes; you shouldn’t imagine that you feel differently than you do. And you can get help from more experienced people, too. But basically, just trust life even when you guck it up, you know.

(shrugs) If you read the book, you might need some other point he mentions.

…. I mean, it’s not the BEST EVER book, you know. I feel like five (‘five steps’) is the wrong number, or maybe his chapter titles just aren’t good, you know. Maybe I’d go with four: Release negativity/limiting beliefs; set an intention; ‘feel’ your success; take action but let go when necessary. Or maybe that would be better as five, or even six. It doesn’t really matter, you know; I just felt like he could have made the summaries more memorable, although the content is good. Incidentally maybe half of the work or so—release negativity/limiting beliefs, and let go/non-attachment to outcome, could be considered spiritual philosophy as well as manifestation of wealth, although thinking that we have no reason to want wealth could be a limiting belief, right. Anyway, it’s an easy book to dismiss, a lot of people trashed it on goodreads—I was looking around for one of those overly-informative-but-marginally-useful-5%-of-the-time reviews that summarize each chapter for the five steps, since I couldn’t read the contents well on my kindle and was afraid of jumping around and forgetting my place, (which I had to do anyway, but it wasn’t a big deal lol)—but it’s like, whatever. It’s an easy book to hate because people hate their lives, so now they can dismiss the help or whatever, and feel more comfy being filled with negativity again, right. It’s not a bad book, though. I need to work more on ~feeling~ the success, not letting non-attachment to outcome paralyze me, more practice on setting intentions and doing actions, more practice letting go of the limiting belief that relationships & money aren’t worth having, and I guess also the rejection of the idea that it doesn’t have to be hard—but basically just, ~feeling the success~ and not seeing life as a duty (another limiting belief/negative thing), which can kinda mess up my affirmations. Like, it’s easy to do affirmations as like a “good boy routine”, you know, and not like, ~I care about myself enough to feel good, and I feel good now~. If you can really do that, then you can learn/practice whatever technical skills you might need that are pretty widely available quite often, but which 95% of the people exposed to them self-sabotage into oblivion because they don’t think success is good, or that they’re good—or both.

But of course, ultimately to use the practice is the best review, right; that’s the most important thing.

…. Incidentally, that ‘Manifesting Made Easy’ book by that ‘Queen of Manifestation’ chick has much better chapter titles. You can look at the contents pages and be reminded of what the book is about, which isn’t really true of this book.

(shrugs)

…. And he does say good things—‘turn it into something good’. Look for the happiness, not the problem. Because even in the worst case, if you’re made fun of sometimes in this age, by the online fact-checkers’ opinions and the people afraid of them, it only serves to solidify your eternal fame in an age that comes to understand that the schools weren’t turning out happy people in our days, you know.

(smiles) And, yes—think of something more practical about it that’s good, than that. (laughs)

…. I guess you have to trust yourself enough to trust the Divine. If you can do that, you’ll prosper.

…. And again, there’s a lot that doesn’t translate well to the written page or words in general, so I don’t know that Joe ever will write a book explaining to people that they should follow their intuition. Stories are great, but that’s all you can ever really say, and at the end of the day, you either have the trust or you don’t. Either you trust the love, in whatever form, or you don’t trust the real thing, possibly because you’re credulous or whatever. But you can’t, like, put it in 250 pages, like, “This is what God means when….” you know. I mean, you can use oracles and you can learn to see the world as an oracle, and I guess you can an oracle, but…. You know, not by explaining it. You just decide to do it, or you decide not to.

…. And learning by doing is a process. That’s the other thing about letting go, is it’s a process, and it implies patience. Letting go sounds a little Hindu, while patience sounds like tired and Victorian, but in the end, I guess, it can be the same reality, and reality, you know, is good.

…. And sometimes we do manifest good things when we don’t know, only not quite. When I was working at HomeGoods last Christmas—which seems longer ago now than maybe it really was—I literally found fifty dollars, $53 or whatever, that some frantic mother figure lost, you know: (I reported it and turned it in, but eventually nobody claimed it and I got it back)~ and I do feel like that was God or whoever winking at me and giving me a thumbs up for being loyal, conscientious, and as positive as I could manage, dutiful, you know, even though I wasn’t a great culture fit for that store~ but I used the money—it could have been worse—but I used the money to buy an expensive (and actually only 200 page or so) history of medieval Germany, you know…. I was not a culture fit, although I thought it didn’t matter. And sometimes, yeah, people are too narrow about culture, like theoretically Wikipedia is Facts For Everyone, but it helps if you’re an unhappy white man who’s bookish and doesn’t like money, right…. At least I cared enough about money to hold down a job and actually buy some of those weird books with my own money, right…. But it’s sat on my shelf for months and though I think I will read it eventually, it won’t be soon; ~and it won’t ever make me happy~, you know…. (shrugs) But we always manifest, good or bad, and it’s not really ever pure rottenness even when we’re a touch neurotic and clueless, and sometimes it’s even, almost good, you know….

…. And as they said in that puzzle (video) game I played as a kid, “The ending has not yet been written.”

…. And I suppose that, if you do it the right way, the business end of life is also a way of understanding the mysteries of the universe….

I have to say I really enjoyed listening to this audio book. It is read by the author and written in a casual, conversational style tone that allows for easy listening and absorption of the ideas presented. Joe Vitale presents a 5 step process to enhance creating what you desire in your life using the principles of the Law of Attraction. The 5 steps are easy to follow and implement and facilitate immediate results. I was surprised at how quickly, by using a few of his techniques, I was able to see and feel positive effects. I really appreciate this audio book and feel it could help anyone to change their way of thinking to the positive, feel more gratitude and in turn create the life they want. Thank you Mr. Vitale for such an inspiring and educational way of thinking! ( )

I have been learning about the magic of intention, and that if you want to earn a lot of money, you need to figure out your true motivation. I've been inspired by author Joe Vitale's challenge to "dare something worthy," and am in the process of applying that to my life right now. ( )

3 stars ( )