"Attraction"

I get this newsletter on parenting from enjoyparenting.com. it's a cool resource and they've got a lot of good stuff to say. today's reminder was great, if phrased a little intensely. it sounded like something that i feel i hear a lot these days so i thought i'd pass it on.

here's the article, it's pretty short:

Attraction means pulling instead of pushing. The "pull" of attraction is not physical. You attract by focusing your mind. Your thoughts have a sort of "gravity" that pulls matching thoughts, conditions and events into your awareness and experience.

Today, try this experiment...

Think of *one* characteristic that you really, really adore and appreciate about your child. Something that makes you smile when you think about it. Pick a keyword or phrase to remind you of this trait, and write it on the back of your hand. (If your child can read, use a code word or symbol instead.)

The idea is to focus on this aspect of your child as many times as you can today. But don't tell your child specifically what you're doing -- the power is in what you think, not what you say.

You might also put little reminder Post-It notes in places like door handles, telephones, the fridge, your car visor -- wherever you frequently look or reach.

After a full day of focusing on this aspect of your child, review the day and note how it affected your interactions.

Can you see how, through your intentional focus, you
*created* (attracted) that experience?

the purpose and outcome of this is right on the money. i've found this to be one of the most effective practices in my life in terms of appreciating people on a consistent basis.

however, the whole "attraction" thing is just more ethereal than it needs to be. one could do this same experiment with something more tangible, like the color blue. if i spend mywhole day focusing on the colr blue, i will tend to see more blue that day. does this mean i've attreacted more blue into my life?

when we got our new car (a subaru forester) we suddenly began to see a lot more foresters on the road. does this mean that a bunch of people bought foresters at the same time as we did? did we attract more foresters into our life, or just become more aware of the foresters that were there all along?

these traits that we "attract" in others by focusing on them are there all along. we may allow other aspects to crowd them out of our perception. by focusing on aspects that we appreciate i our family, friends and coworkers, we will likely be surrounded by more of those traits than we thought.

don't think the things that used to bug you disappeared. it's just that now the positive aspects in focus have squeezed others out of the limelight.