The Painful Truth About Effortless Success
There are a lot of people who have doubts that good things in life can come to them fairly easily, or that good things can come to them at all.
But there’s also a lot of confusion when it comes to how the universe responds to our thoughts and actions by manifesting things into our lives.
One of my pet peeves is teachers who do personal development work and tout, “Just visualize and everything is going to work out”. This is the idea of “effortless success.” There’s only one guy I know who preaches effortless success who actually does it, and his name is Deepak Chopra.
But here’s the thing. When he says effortless success, he does not mean effortless as in “You don’t have to do anything, the universe will just do it for you,” because you know what? He has a team of about 100 employees that work for him so yes, effortless success, but effortless for who?
I happen to be of the opinion that if something’s too good to be true, then take a second look at it, for sure, because like the saying goes, it probably actually isn’t true. The idea of effortless success falls squarely into that category.
If you’re not going to put any time and energy into something you want to manifest, and you’re not going to put the “whatever it takes” action part into it; and if you think that just by meditating and/or visualization that everything good is going to come to you, then you are setting yourself up for major disappointment.
I’m not saying that it can’t happen. I’m saying I don’t know anybody who just gets what they want by visualizing without putting in effort.
Let me just bottom-line this for everybody: there is a difference between effort and struggle, and most people struggle. Most people are used to struggling, like that’s normal, but my friends, this is not correct. Things don’t need to be a struggle.
Here’s the definition of struggle: effort laced with negative emotion. You need effort because effort is energy. They’re the same thing. However, struggle is optional. You’re the one who adds the struggle to the effort.
Listen, I hear some people say something like, “I’ve got to do some work tonight.”
I hear other people say, “Oh my God! I have to work tonight, again. @#$! What a drag! I work my ass off as it is. I’m always working. I don’t even know if it’s going to pan out. When do I get a break?”
See the difference? One’s just stating it as it is, the other sounds like a victim. That sounds like struggle. Even if you don’t enjoy it, don’t make it worse than it is.
Can things come easy? I think things can come easy, but only after you’ve put quite a bit of effort to make it come easy.
Let’s say I was going to write another book, for example, and let’s say I want it to be a bestselling book. Would it come easy? No, not a chance. I’d have to be crazy to think I could get a bestselling book without a ton of effort.
Would it be a struggle? No, no struggle because I wouldn’t allow that. I’d allow the process to flow and unfold. I’m going to allow it to be as easy as possible, in my frame, in my world. I’m not going to make things a problem. If problems occur, I’m going to just correct them without the negative emotion.
There’s a big difference between effort and struggle. Just don’t add to the pile. Allow what is to be. Think, “Hey, this thing came easier than I thought. Great!”
Allow it to be, bless it, be grateful for it, and continue whatever you’re doing, but make sure you put the effort and energy into it to keep what you’ve got. That’s called the law of maintenance.
Everything takes energy to either get or keep. It doesn’t have anything to do with negativity whatsoever, just energy. Keep your foot pressed on the accelerator, and go nice and steady.
What’s been a recent struggle for you? What’s the emotion behind the struggle? How have you turned struggle into effort? Share your experiences in the comments below…we want to hear from you!
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For Your Freedom,
I believe effort becomes more effortless the closer you are to your “zone”.
Do what you love and love what you do…and have fun.
Know your “zone”.
Don’t laugh, but laughing can improve productivity 30%.
I want to know one important answer. Why is it that just as you or the person launches out to expand what they have been doing for the benefit ofany others, those who were in your immediate circle decide to move away from you, leaving you to question the purpose and plan you were iniating knowing you need help. Now you have no one to help or even attend your functions.
Dearest Yvonne, it is merely because YOU have changed and chosen to live YOUR passion. The people in your life are still experiencing you as you were in the past. As human beings, we expect others to stay the same, even as we allow ourselves to change. Keep following your heart, be open to new people being drawn to you who match your new vibration and will become a new support system for you. And, allow those who have been in your life a chance to get to know the “new” you.
Love Robin’s anwser to you Yvonne, and that you ask here, as that is a question so many have and you allowed it to surface for all. Also, I think we have vestiges to clean out about “if there’s no pain, the gain’s not allowed” bs, and so bring in punishment, many , for daring to be, simply happy and expansive. That you and each person ca, find out where the messages were about deserving ..or , too often not ( “if you don’t suffer for your good fortune (sic) and happiness, then I have to look at my own choices, so suffer please so I can still ignore my own capacity that I am ignoring now to be happy and expand into joy”). Or you have to pay with hurt because I don’t have what you (worked and chose to create to) have. etc. You’re not there to control another’s life..but you sure will inspire those ready to come into their happiness and joy, and remind some others who forgot, that they can as well…What do you Know Yvonne? In any case, living your truth is only a blessing for those around you, even if you may never see the results of that resonance in your lifetime. Like we who sing..who knows what each person takes home from that music resonating in their cells and heart..but our work is to resonate it as clearly and fully as possible so that that Love=Music can do its work at its best, bless…
I agree – although for most of us that concept takes a while to learn. *WISDOM* has to be earned, it doesn’t just come without trial and error. But for the most part, yes, the way we approach a situation greatly determines the outcome. And without effort plus the “whatever it takes” mindset – it’s unrealistic to expect progress of any kind. And the other great point you make is to do what it takes to remove the problems and roadblocks (effort) vs. allowing them to control us or detour us from our destination journey(struggle). Good stuff T. Harv Eker !
I’ve struggled for the past 5 years building my business and working on my skills as a trainer. Finally I landed a job that is everything I wanted. I’m not struggling any more so my mind sometimes play games on me and says ‘you’re not struggling is this going to last? This is too good to be true!” I now say “thank you mind for sharing. I earned this and I’m going to maintain it by being the best I can be and I’m allowing myself to reap the rewards of all the years of struggle. Thank you I’m blessed!
Thanks Kal for this. Plus the obvious..if you are coming from struggle, what are you then teaching as a trainer? I loved Harv’s effort vs struggle..It’s all there, eh?
Acquiring Abundance (more of it) —> Managing Abundance! (stewarding more and/or different things) : )
My lesson: When the ship of opportunity and abundance has turned direction and is now accelerating, be ready for accommodating changes in order to take really good care of the newer abundance, to be an excellent life & money manager : ) In managing, your priorities & subsequent time schedule will shift (and you’ll have to use discipline to live differently with this new schedule of different activities), and new systems of managing life & money will be needed. You may find that you revisit tweaking your mindset in a positive way, and really shift (more) your diet, exercise, and the way you manage stress : )
It’s all fine & well to prefer additional abundance, but *DON’T* complain about the additional gifts to manage : ) Have fun with it!
And, it may take being at 60-80% of your usual excellence until the new plateau of appreciating increasing abundance and managing time & resources kicks in. This will feel uncomfortable! Harv said it would!
You know what he also said? Pat yourself on the back, because this means You’re Growing! 😀 lol
So: How I deal with what could be a struggle in managing abundance: 1. Awareness, 2. Mindset, 3 Manage emotions/stress, 4 Education, 5 Tools, 6. Systems…and the philosophy of bite-size easy pieces to do every day (the slight edge): easy to do; easy not to do.
Effortless = Knowing or learning about the easy simple habits to do with progressive plateaus of receipt & management of abundance : )
Having, enjoying, appreciating abundance is easy..and the better (non-struggle, yet effective) that we manage it, the more we receive to enjoy, appreciate & manage : )
For a long time I was captivated by the idea of effortless success.
I finally learnt to quiet the ego voice and now I am putting in the effort to work out what I want from life and find out what drives and inspires me.
I am discovering that law of least effort can actually involve quite a lot of effort, but now with no added stress – It is far more rewarding than law of no effort.
Loving this lesson 🙂
oops, Steve! Apologies! I accidentally hit the down thumb, but did not mean to do so. Thumbs up!
I am currently got into around RM500,000 in debt. I figure out I have to make myself to smile and be positive. Workout to reduce my stress, constant learning more on my financial skills, meditate and visualize about my goals, and smile because I know one day I will succeed. Thanks for reminding!
Heh Wayne, what if it were not to “make yourself” smile, but to choose to smile, and to find and put the reins into the hands of the parts of you that are smiling from the heart already..So it didn’t all feel like manipulation, which feels false so we can’t create abundance, of course, from there, as abundance is Love smiling at the joy of being alive and seen (in my book anyway!). Choice, vs manipulation. Which means giving a real try in honour of your choices, effort to enjoy your passion ( ya, like that version too!) Bet you’ll rocket from there!
It is interesting your take on achieving our personal goals. HoweverI have not yet found a way to overcome the negatives. I do continue to put out the effort and I do see incremental progress, but it is slow, not quick I continue to learn and to plan and I hope to achieve my goals.
Hopefully, I will learn from your articles.
I enjoy to be a profesional poker player and du whatever it takes to inpruve my game level and i think the balance of proper mangment of time an energi is the key. 🙂
I am one of the people who can get things in their life by visualizing them. All I need to do is to think about it for a some time and then let go. In a few hours, days, or weeks it will appear all by itself without me doing anything to get it. Then again I would not say that it comes without any effort, as I spend a few hours every day practicing and developing my creative powers. I believe that we all are created for a certain purpose, and following this purpose gives us our superpowers. For example, I am a Creator avatar of my Higher I. That is why it is so easy for me to create. It took me many years to find my purpose. My relative is a Healer avatar; she is an outstanding doctor, able to save patients who have been given up upon by all other doctors. We all have purpose and we all have superpowers; the trick is to understand what that is 🙂
Wow that is absolutely amazing! Christie Marie Sheldon says the same thing happens to her! I’m doing my best to get to this level 😀
I struggle with intimate relationships, be it a close girlfriend or a romantic one with a man who is close to my heart. My struggle is believing the person will love the real me and also that I take on way too much responsibility for their emotional well being.
Dear Jennifer, forgive that I presume to write back, but it’s so simple and we all could use a reminder. You know this one already, but maybe haven’t taken deep into yourself yet. No, you can’t have any intimate relationship until you’ve come into the main one, until you’ve come Home. Ya ya that one. With yourself, as the creatrix of your world, and loving the Love that you are Yourself and came down here to have fun with. So you may have to put the religious interpretations aside for awhile and just focus on truthfulness and the joy of Truth, which you’re here to celebrate. All these big words! but your heart knows well.. So go fall in love with yourself, every corner, especially the frightened places that are waiting for you, the Grownup you to come and hold her-you-them close and explain why she-you-they need not be frightened anymore, You are here now, and Love is all around you too, just waiting for you to be Home and to open the doors to those who respect your Home. As you now do. The rest will flow breautifully. Likely you created a stop place to get yourself to come Home, that’s all…
Great lesson!! thank you Harv.
In my actual moment, 2 weeks ago I started supporting full time, my husband´s Art Gallery business (the mayor income of the family), and I am looking for someone to work the majority of the hours. Meanwhile, It meant cutting off the low but regular income from my normal job. I am working more hours, but I am struggling about if I am doing the right thing or not. Low season is in-front of my nose, and my mind asks constantly if I am doing the right thing… I am controlling my mind to stop bombarding me with scarcity thoughts and asking for clear signs. Struggle… How can I stop the external pressure and struggle? I need some one to work at the gallery, hoping that they´ll sale, for me to oversee, and get a decent job that pays real expenses. He, (my husband) is working full-time in his art-work, he has an important exhibition in a Museum out of time, and is requiring my on going support. Advice, ideas and encouragement are welcome.
Thanks,
Dear Alejandra, one simple thing comes to mind. How would you pay an assistant? If you do it on commission, she-he will work at intensity (there you’ll have to go with your feeling of someone who won’t hound people of course, but who is very present about your husband’s work and your passion ) and that should free you up soon to be following your own and monetizing it, as is the buzzword these days, so you are free also in your own time and dreaming..What do you love to do? Part II. Create a membership site through internet– Russell Brunson’s site is fantastic for that and he’s clean and clear– about selling art, or about your own separate passion-s, which can start to being in a regular income…Enjoy!
bueno mi lucha fue enviar mi primera carga ala corporacion lindley
bueno la emocion negavita fue que estuve un poco desanimado por la demora del flete, y luego cuando el carga fue enviada las emociones negativas desaparecieron y todo fue felicidad.
It’s all about mood.
If I am in a bad mood even the simplest things that I have done countless times become difficult. And, if I am in a good/great mood even the most difficult, I don’t know how I’m gonna do it, type tasks are resolved without struggle.
I listen to music that makes me feel good or watch something that really makes me laugh, not smile or chuckle but laugh, to put me in the right mood to:
1. focus on what I’m doing,
2. be open to the ideas and inspirations that the universe sends, and
3. have the confidence to take action.
Beautiful! : ) Love/Joy/Appreciation is the “highest vibration”..great for health, being in the flow..and it just feels good! What a wonder-full world ours will become when more folks understand and engage this! : )
1. I believe two things. God, love, the universe may “hand it to you on a silver platter,” but what you do with it is up to you. You still have to take action. 2. The more attached you are to a particular outcome, the greater the struggle. Put your energy into the doing, the process, and you might end up with a better outcome than the struggle would have produced.
Thanks I needed to hear right now …spring is always busy for a horticulturist…and I ‘m working 12 hour days but I love it and people love what I do so that makes it a win win …and I’m only half way done on the course… you’ve helped create a monster so the 2nd half will have to wait till I am thru with my busy season …I hope you understand Harv , Yes or Yes
Struggle is optional with opinion.
Yes I agree life should not be a struggle, but we make it so if we change our mindset and put some effort to become more positive then everything will be easy, even if we get sick if we change our mindset we will never be so sick, thank you Harve for all your life lessons.
I have struggled with finances for so long because we didnt geow up with much money my mom has lived check by check and no help from my father because he would always complain about giving money because he worked for that. Now i am 20 years old have a wife and a handsome son and we started to struggle for the past 3 years and since i have started to read secrets of a millionaire mind and many other books our ideas of money and mindsets have changed to where we dont spend like we used to we are starting to focus on how to get our lifes on track and i finally figured out what career i actually wanted to pursue so i thank you for teaching us the way to become successful and i will never stop reading about this stuff because we will be rich and successful soon.
That actually makes a lot of sense. Just like another article that I read that hard work is subjective to two different people. It really just depends on perspective. Thanks Harv. I’ll put this into practice for finals xD
It is not the very best thing to hear for my ego. Actually, by doing anysing I am consciously stop to remind myself to relax, and release, out of habit to stretch myself. I learn to do things easy, and not create more of hardship in the future. To be present in the moment and feel joy of it. No matter what you doing, what matter is to be happy out of it. It is common to hit ourselves in to foot.
Hola from México 🙂
I do not know many important things; but I know this:
If I want to get different results in and around my life; I must start by doing different things . . .
I am possitive that the experience T. Harv Eker has to offer to us, will help me to get closer to my dreamed life 🙂
In fact, before I get my first lesson tomorrow night , I feel that I am already creating my new me, my new life exactly the way I want it (and I deserve it)!
I have been self employed for over 33 years and for the last 20+ I have tried side ventures with people I came to know. I would work my job do what I do and take my spare money and invest in other ventures. I started doing a promotion thing, than a restaurant thing, than a fine art thing, than a big real estate deal, and finally just recently a internet marketing thing. I invested my money and my inheritance to the tune of $400 k and ALWAYS FAILED!!!!! Why I work two jobs and always LOST. Now my wife wants me out.
I think when people say “effortless” it’s because you do what you love and even though it is a lot of work – its not nearly as hard as doing something you don’t love. When you do what you love, you’re driven, you change lives in a way, you do it with positive emotion – which makes seem effortless. It’s still work, but people usually associate word “work” with too hard or too much effort and energy. When it really is the best feeling ever – doing what you love. Because it’s love.
I always chuckle when I see people saying that it’s “effortless” but are continually putting out books, material, content etc. It makes me see that ‘hard work’ is a state of mind – but you have to put the work in!
‘Slow and steady’ like Harv says, is so true! It proved so true when I was on a bike ride in Tuscany, struggling up huge hill after huge hill, until the instructor came along and said in Italian ‘slow and steady’. There were about 20 of us in the group. I listened. I paced myself and even felt a little relief to give up the struggle. I slowly fell to the back of the group. You know what? I finished first as I passed all of the ones who were struggling and dropping like flies in front of me! It was so funny! They all called me the ‘little engine that could’. One of the most important things I did was TUNE OUT everything and everyone and focus on my goal, which was to get to the top, and I did.
I meant ‘nice and steady’…but I think you get the picture. Give up the struggle!
Brilliant. As usual. Because, I ‘d say, you come from the choice of clarity, and you pass it through your heart then (underline) a brain you use and enjoy feeling it working.. Thanks for that clarity of thought of effort vs struggle. As in a ballet dancer. The struggle comes before, keeping to our choices, honouring the service to a passion (=Love, in my book, as one of its definitions) so that on stage, there is no struggle in the dancer, effort that the work before has turned into mastery and flow, so you the audience don’t see it, and that is the joy, the return of flowing mastery for the effort, that is (underline again!) I’d say the definition of (u again) mastery..
I think there´s a confusion on what regard´s Chopra´s view of “effortless”. He does say that the manifestation of desires comes from atention to desires. And if you have to put atention on them for a long time, I guess none would deny it takes “great effort” to manifest them. What he calls effortless I guess could be better termed “strugleless” The idea that you must accept things as they are before you try to change them, that you don´t fight your circunstances and be always ready to respond to circunstances, rather than react to them. “The harmony of the world depends on the rectification of names” – Kung fu tzu
some of the youngsters I know and some people think that success can come easy.
probably they had seen their parents struggle and they do not want to take the similar routes.
the businessman or the CEO does not have it easy too. each of us needs to put in the effort to succeed.
success is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration ( I forgot who say it)
I am sorry Harv. Effortless Success does not mean visualizing what you want, and then cross your hands and legs, and wait for what you want come to you. From my own perspective, and my spiritual teachers, this is how I understand the subject at hand: Effortless Success is to set up goals and no matter how big there are, but you should never be focused on them, you’ve just gotta let go of them, because being focused on dreams creates stress, worry, negativity since it looks like you want to control your dream; but rather focus on the steps that will lead you to your desired dream with openness and stillness. This is what Effortless Success means for me.
For instance, I practiced this technique when pursuing my Bachelor’s Degree in 2015. I had to go to school and worked part-time. There was so many pressure on my way since I had to meet deadline on the job as well as attending lectures. At first, I was sort of worried about passing my BA and performing well at work. When I figured out that it was consuming when it comes to controlling, I just let go of graduation and good performance. Thereafter, I started to meditate, say prayers for guidance, sleep and read my courses anytime I had to take a test. In other words, I took things easy while schoolmates were worried and thought that I should sleep having my head within books like they did. So when results came out, I passed my first semester and had just for four credits to retake in the second semester. I asked helps from friends and went back to take tests in the four subjects. Finally, I passed the four subjects and passed my Bachelor’s Degree and kept my work too. I dont mean that I didn’t work to be successful, I actually worked to get it, but I used an Effortless approach, and which helped me a lot.
I think you mean don’t focus on the outcome