Chip Away

Standing in line at Subway today, I glanced back at the chips while my standard 6-inch-on-wheat toasted. I scoured for the Sunchips to discover only an empty shelf space. Just as I’d settled for the Baked Lay’s, I spotted it. That lone bag of Harvest Cheddar tucked beside the Cheeto’s. That’s my bag, I emphatically declared. So I immediately used an energy technique of shielding to claim my chips, preventing the two people in line ahead of me from taking it. Suddenly, with a giggle, my intuition tapped me on the shoulder. “Lara if you want the bag of chips, just take the four steps over to the display and pick it up, silly.” And so it was.

I laughed at myself leaving the store, chips, sandwich and Diet Coke in hand. Isn’t that what we do, though? We see something. We claim it. And then we sit there just a few feet from it fretting that someone else might take that which we’ve claimed.

Lately, this has been showing up for me again and again…and again. And I think I may actually be cluing in now that no matter how many chakras I can clear, I have yet to master levitating chips off of shelves and into my hungry hands. So to obtain that which I want, I must move.

I mean let’s face it. The Law of Attraction has been given a far sexier package. Who couldn’t love the concept? And honestly it does speak well to those first two desires: identifying what we want and claiming it. Yet, that’s where my little romp seemed to so often end before now. You see, that’s the point where I’d throw up my hands in sheer frustration as to why that which I’d identified and claimed hadn’t shown up. I mean I saw the chips and I wanted them. Shouldn’t my angels—or someone else—just teleport those chips right over to me?

While I certainly believe it’s possible that could happen, I am also realizing that while the Law of Attraction may be the beauty, the Law of Motion (that a body at rest will stay at rest until a force is acted upon it) is where the true brawn resides. For if we are willing to look beyond the sex appeal, the universe will conspire in our favor to bring us that which we want—although we must be willing to roll the dice and play.

When I was growing up, I’d loved playing games, especially endless rounds of ‘Mother May I?’ with my siblings and cousins. We’d stand out in my grandmother’s front yard on the sidewalk perched between two huge spaces of St. Augustine grass and the ‘mother’ would dole out her permissions of who could move. As the years have progressed, I think to a degree I had unwittingly played this game with myself—looking outside of myself for someone to give me permission that it was safe to move. And what’s become so abundantly clear lately is that no one really cares which move I make—and much to my surprise—even the universe.

What I finally understand now, as my lunchtime Subway trip further punctuated, is that it’s just about taking a step. Any step! When I’d play ‘Mother May I’ as a kid, I wanted nothing more than to just take one giant step to victory. As an adult, I found myself doing the same. I’d hold the intention of wanting to be at my endpoint high-fiving the hand of the ‘mother’ (as we did in our childhood game) without taking any steps…big or small…to get there.

So as you hold the space of that which you desire in life—whether total financial freedom or to permanently eliminate that 10 pounds—I encourage you to ask yourself each morning when your feet hit the floor: what steps can I take today to move me to my desire? And the more steps we take, the easier it becomes for we have activated the Law and the universe is cheering us on each step of the way.

Because as a 10 year old standing in the blades of that beautiful grass—and reminded of at 34 among the hungry people at Subway—it’s the small steps that eventually lead us to fulfilling the big journeys.