The first time I’d heard about manifestation was back in the early noughties, reading about Noel Edmonds in a Jon Ronson book, where he talked about “cosmic ordering”. Most people wrote it off as Noel Edmonds being, well, Noel Edmonds, and back then, it was impossible to predict manifestation would become the incredibly popular practice it is today. It is big business in the wellness industry, from people selling courses to books, to monetising social media accounts, and it seems to have threaded itself into everyday vocabulary. I’ve heard it mentioned on business zoom calls, friends who have signed up to manifestation courses. If something missing, or absent in a person’s life, it’s okay, because it can be manifested.
Don’t get me wrong – I’m not mocking it. Although it’s not my belief system, I can see the power and benefit. First and foremost, it seems to be about mentally opening yourself up to the possibility of receiving something, which can be half the battle. A lot of us – including myself – struggle with the idea of being worthy of being loved, or stepping up to more wealth, power and status in our careers. Secondly, it’s not just about the power of thinking – it involves writing things down, creating vision boards and intentionally working towards making it happen. And above all, if it is getting people what they want in a way that fulfils them or makes them happy, there’s no harm in it, surely?
Except there’s one slight issue. Manifestation crops up a lot on social media – on TikTok alone, the hashtag has 18 billion views. And like other areas – particularly fitness, money and nutrition – due to the nature of how social media platforms are set up and people’s dwindling attention spans, a lot of these posts over-simplifies what it is, and strips out the nuance of other things that need to be in place in order to make your goals happen.
Instagram and TikTok offer different types of storytelling, but both are guilty of turning complex topics into a shorthand that drifts away from the original messaging. TikTok for instance, is well known for condensing incredibly complicated journeys from weight loss to recovery from trauma into 60-second videos. Instagram is known for portraying an outcome – whether that’s getting engaged or a buying your first house, often without being transparent about how the person got to that point, or the sacrifices that were made to get there.
When an influencer I love recently posted about their engagement with the caption “I manifested this!”, I thought about how interesting it was that two things could be true. On the one hand, of course she did – she opened herself up to the possibility of meeting someone, had a specific idea of the person she was looking for, and ended up meeting that person. On the other hand, the subtext of that message is: “if I can do it, you can do it too.”
For anyone who is unhappy and lonely, the idea of being able to manifest your special person is therefore incredibly attractive. It is a lifebuoy in the sea of unknowing. It gives hope that somewhere in the dating cesspit there is a nugget of gold. However, I don’t think this shorthand version of manifestation creates realistic expectations, or spells out the importance of the pro-active part of it. It doesn’t take into account other tools that might be needed such as therapy for ongoing mental health issues that may be hindering your efforts such as depression or anxiety. And in my opinion, while manifestation is about pro-active movement, the distillation of this message on social media puts far too much onus on you just happening to meet someone.
That’s a problem because currently we’re experiencing a cognitive dissonance around the romance narrative. Part of us still expects this person to drop into our lives (in part due to 90s and noughties rom-coms), despite the fact that from a behavioural science point of view, many of us no longer live in the same small communities we grew up in, and technology has radically changed how we interact and communicate with one another. Modern dating is brutally hard so I don’t want to put any blame on single folk, but part of getting into a relationship involves actually dating, whether that’s going on apps, asking friends to trawl their contacts list for single mates, or joining social groups that allow you to meet new people. It’s not enough to have positive thinking that it will happen.
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Manifestation isn’t precise or perfect, nor does it claim to be. But I do think we would be better served if it was something that was bolstered and strengthened by keeping our minds open, and being aware of what it takes to sustain a relationship. The influencer telling you they manifested their wedding is unlikely to go into detail about the amount of compromise that is stapled into their relationship, or the sacrifices they have made. And similarly, even if the person you have manifested does arrive, it’s important to keep everything else switched on, so you can work out if it’s the person who is right for you.
To me, manifestation acts as the door, but you have to actually find the door, go through the door and then have a whole other host of things to hand such as healthy relationship expectations, reciprocity, compromise, communication and flexibility of thinking. I suspect, however, I am probably yelling into the void.
