This book would not be complete without some discussion of failure in the attempted use of the law of assumption. It is entirely possible that you either have had or will have a number of failures in this respect—many of them in really important matters. If, having read this book, having a thorough knowledge of the application and working of the law of assumption, you faithfully apply it in an effort to attain some intense desire and fail, what is the reason? If to the question “Did you persist enough?” you can answer Yes—and still the attainment of your desire was not realized, what is the reason for failure?
The answer to this is the most important factor in the successful use of the law of assumption. The time it takes your assumption to become fact, your desire to be fulfilled, is directly proportionate to the naturalness of your feeling of already being what you want to be—of already having what you desire. The fact that it does not feel natural to you to be what you imagine yourself to be is the secret of your failure. Regardless of your desire, regardless of how faithfully and intelligently you follow the law, if you do not feel natural about what you want to be, you will not be it. If it does not feel natural to you to get a better job, you will not get a better job. The whole principle is vividly expressed by the Bible phrase “you die in your sins” — you do not transcend from your present level to the state desired.
How can this feeling of naturalness be achieved? The secret lies in one word—imagination. For example, this is a very simple illustration: Assume that you are securely chained to a large heavy iron bench. You could not possibly run, in fact you could not even walk. In these circumstances it would not be natural for you to run. You could not even feel that it was natural for you to run. But you could easily imagine yourself running. In that instant, while your consciousness is filled with your imagined running, you have forgotten that you are bound. In imagination your running was completely natural.
The essential feeling of naturalness can be achieved by persistently filling your consciousness with imagination—imagining yourself being what you want to be or having what you desire.
Progress can spring only from your imagination, from your desire to transcend your present level. What you truly and literally must feel is that with your imagination, all things are possible. You must realize that changes are not caused by caprice, but by a change of consciousness. You may fail to achieve or sustain the particular state of consciousness necessary to produce the effect you desire. But, once you know that consciousness is the only reality and is the sole creator of your particular world and have burnt this truth into your whole being, then you know that success or failure is entirely in your own hands. Whether or not you are disciplined enough to sustain the required state of consciousness in specific instances has no bearing on the truth of the law itself—that an assumption, if persisted in, will harden into fact. The certainty of the truth of this law must remain despite great disappointment and tragedy—even when you “see the light of life go out and all the world go on as though it were still day.” You must not believe that because your assumption failed to materialize, the truth that assumptions do materialize is a lie. If your assumptions are not fulfilled, it is because of some error or weakness in your consciousness. However, these errors and weaknesses can be overcome. Therefore, press on to the attainment of ever higher levels by feeling that you already are the person you want to be. And remember that the time it takes your assumption to become reality is proportionate to the naturalness of being it. Man surrounds himself with the true image of himself. Every spirit builds itself a house and beyond its house a world, and beyond its world a heaven. Know then that the world exists for you. For you the phenomenon is perfect. What we are, that only can we see. All that Adam had, all that Caesar could, you have and can do. Adam called his house, heaven and earth.
Caesar called his house, Rome; you perhaps call yours a cobbler’s trade; a hundred acres of land, or a scholar’s garret. Yet line for line and point for point, your dominion is as great as theirs, though without fine name. Build therefore your own world. As fast as you conform your life to the pure idea in your mind, that will unfold its great proportion.
Emerson
