When I upgraded my website to a new system that would be much more flexible and efficient for me, it turned out to require a lot of hand work to format and tag the entries. I was able to transfer the basic text electronically, but needed to insert by hand the tags that would make the powerful search capabilities of the software work. (I’m still working on all this tagging as I write this story.)

I was working on tagging entries for Debra’s List, my online directory of websites that sell green and nontoxic products. In addition to having to put in the search tags, I also need to choose a sort category and research the state where the website is located and insert that data. But before I do that, I first need to make sure the website is still there and is still selling the same products and that the data transfer had transferred all the data correctly. And I after I post the entry, I need to send an email to each one telling them they could purchase a premium listing.

So this is not just a matter of clicking a few check boxes. Each one takes time. And there are more than a thousand I need to update, as well as a large backlog of websites to add, which had either contacted me to be added or I had discovered on my own.

I had decided to spend an afternoon systematically activating listings on a particular page, so I could at least finish that category. After several hours, I just couldn’t do any more right then.

I clicked on the next link on the old site, to check to see if that website was still in business and it was. I noted they had changed their name and that I liked their new design. I remembered they had sent me an email about something in the past, and I wanted to write to them about the new Premium Listings. But it was now late in the afternoon and I just had to stop. They would be first next time I worked on this project. This was on a Thursday.

On Saturday, I opened an email and saw it was a company that wanted me to link to their website. Wait a minute, I thought. The name of this company sounds familiar. It was that very same website I was about to transfer over, but didn’t! The very same one.

As a spirit, I had my attention on this business and an intention to contact them, but in less than 48 hours, they contacted me! I have not given any attention to this listing since I posted it about five years ago. They had not contacted me in all this time. Yet, within 48 hours of my deciding I wanted to be in communication with them, they contacted me.

I can imagine a world where everyone can communicate spirit-to-spirit. How fun that would be!

It was a Thursday morning, just like any other morning and that was the trouble with it. It was another day of cloudy, overcast skies, which can be forgiven in June, but this was August. Another day of the usual household chores and talking with the usual people. In summary, I felt depressed. As I stumbled, half awake, into the kitchen, I could think of nothing to look forward to. Then out of the blue, I thought to myself, I need a cat!

A few minutes later, as I spooned garbanzo beans into the blender, I glanced out the kitchen window, hoping to at least catch a glimpse of someone walking their dog. There, walking along on the sidewalk below, was a cat! I summoned a cat!!!

As I made silly kissing sounds, the cat turned to look at me and proceeded to climb the stairs up to my apartment. I could see it was healthy and well-fed and not at all interested in my garbanzo bean-breakfast. We communed for a few minutes and then, amazed at what had occurred, I turned back to the task at hand, and the cat departed.

I used to do visualizations of cats, which would invariably attract a cat into my experience within a day or two. But I hadn't done this sort of meditation in years. Otherwise seeing a cat walk by is a rare event.

All in all, this creation has given me much to ponder. Supposedly one of the symptoms of depression is feeling helpless. Feeling helpless about what? Feeling helpless to create what we want to experience? Forgetting that one of our powers as spirits is the power to create what we want to experience? Could it be that what the doctors call depression is really amnesia?

And why was I amazed? Why are we amazed when we manifest something? Why don't we simply say to ourselves "of course!" Of course!!! I am a powerful spirit and, of course, I manifest my intentions!

Some days it seems like the whole Universe is conspiring to remind me of my spirit power to create!

As a self-employed writer, my income for most of my life has been a roller-coaster ride. For many years I went from feast to famine, not really having the skills to create money at will and manage it for financial stability. As a spirit, I usually managed to pull money out of nowhere at the last minute, but over the last couple of years I made a decision that I wanted to have more money to work with and I wanted a continuous flow of income so more was always coming in. I have never really been interested in money just to have it, but it is useful to have available so I can do what I want as a spirit.

The first step was to redesign and restructure my website, which took just about a year and a half.

Five weeks ago, it was time to start generating new income.

One of the things I do for income is sell Premium Listings to websites on Debra’s List, my online directory of websites that sell green products. I also belong to a number of affiliate programs from which I receive small commissions when my visitors click through and make a purchase. I hadn’t been able to sell Premium Listings for some months because of technical difficulties on Debra’s List, which now were solved.

On Monday of the first week, as a spirit I decided to set a target for a certain amount of money I wanted to make that week. It was above and beyond my immediate need, but I wanted to use the excess to pay down the debts I had accumulated while upgrading my website. While setting this target, I made an intention to have it happen. It was an amount higher than I had ever generated before in one week.

After making this targeted intention, I decided to send out some emails and make some phone calls to my list of “hot prospects” who I thought would buy Premium Listings on Debra’s List. I was doing well with this and had made about half the targeted amount for the week (in a few hours) when the mail arrived. There was an affiliate check for the other half. I had made my target for the week in one day, plus $100 more!

I was so astounded that I had made this big target in one day, I didn’t do anything else to make money for the remainder of the week. But then I managed to observe that I had just stopped when I made my target, and had I just kept going with my successful actions I could have brought in even more money.

On Monday of the second week, I again set the same targeted amount, but this time decided to make a game of it. I took a piece of paper and wrote at the top “GAME: Bring in $______ this week (of course filling in the dollar amount). At the bottom of the page I wrote “GOAL: $________ or more by (last day of the week)”. I went to work sending out my emails and making phone calls and every time money came in I wrote it down on the paper and kept a running balance so I could see how much I had created and how much more I needed. By making it a game, I took all the seriousness out of the activity of making money. It was just a game to play. By the end of the week, I was just $50 short of the target, all from email and phone calls to my hot prospects for Debra’s List Premium Listings. Also, a couple of phone consultations came in, without my doing anything specific to generate consultations. A little short, but still, I came very close to my target.

On Monday of the third week, I again targeted the same amount. Again I made a piece of paper with my game and goal clearly stated. It was a little more difficult because I was getting through my list of hot prospects. But more consultations came in to make up the difference and I finished up the week only $20 short of the target.

On Monday of the fourth week, I just did the same again, and this time, I made $200 more than my target. And I got an email saying that the rights to my book Home Safe Home had been sold to Russia, and I would be getting a check for that in a couple of months.

On Monday of the fifth week, I again targeted the same amount, but I really didn’t know where the money was going to come from because I had now pretty much exhausted my hot prospects list. I now needed to start sending out emails to websites who didn’t already know me, offering Premium Listings. But an interesting thing occurred. Right away I had an idea for another way to get some immediate money. I did that and within 24 hours I had half my target for the week. Then, a big consultation inquiry came in, and while it got delayed for a week, it’s income that will be there. Then while sitting at my desk sending out prospecting emails, I got an email from a website I didn’t previously know, and they immediately bought a Premium Listing. Also while sitting at my desk sending out emails, more phone consultations. It was clear that if I made an outflow of effort to create money, it would come right in, even if from a direction other than where I was sending the outflow.

In addition, during week five, I suddenly woke up one morning with a picture in my mind of a spreadsheet I could create that would help me manage all this new income better, so I could figure the income tax I would owe weekly and set it aside. This is something I had been trying to do without success for almost forty years as a self-employed entrepreneur. I jumped out of bed and created the spreadsheet and it worked perfectly. Now at the end of the year, I will have all my income tax figures calculated and money set aside to pay it.

Also during week five, in kind of an unexpected roundabout way, I attracted some information that will greatly help me in making my work known to more people, thus increasing sales. It’s like all the missing pieces I’ve been needing are zooming in, so I can move income production to a new level.

What I’ve learned from doing this is that income is the result of my intention as a spirit to have a certain income, plus communicating with others to make what I have to offer known. I can increase my abundance by intention and proper action. By making an intention, and having the confidence my intention will manifest, it then becomes clear to me what actions I need to do in order to achieve the intended result.

And I managed to do this in a down economy. As spirits, we can each create our own personal economy regardless of what is going on in the world at large, and together we could create a prosperous local, national, and world economy by intending it so and taking the necessary actions to create it.

It’s really clear to me now that my income is limited only by my own ability as a spirit to intend and create it. I can have as much money as I need for anything I want to do or have as a spirit.

I sat by the side of the river at twilight time.

My heart was so heavy and my body so weary

That I thought I had never felt so low.

At first there was silence

rare and precious. The light was dimming.

And slowly, very slowly

I noticed that the water shown like a golden mirror

reflecting the trees and the evening sky above.

Like a stage.

Suddenly a hawk appeared above me swooping and dancing over me and the river.

And as he departed

A flock of geese appeared flying in perfect formation down the river towards the sunset.

And the very momet they were gone

A flock of swallows arrived swooping daringly low over the water in front of me gaily gathering their evening meal of tiny insects.

I began to wonder if they were all performing......perhaps for me? No matter. I was completely enchanted.

I didn't have a moment to wait before the next artist apppeared. He was a solo swallow, and he perfomed the most daring acrobatics of all. No other feathered perfomer touched the water so many times and came away unscathed. He took frequent rests on the bank between air dances. He was the star attraction, I think.

And as the sun finally sank completely behind the trees the hawk returned to give his finale flight.

And the sun went down.

And the show was over.

And my heart was light

And I am so thankful for this gift!