Understanding Manifestation and the Law of Attraction
Manifesting is rooted in an older idea, the “law of attraction,” according to which our thoughts determine what we attract in life, be that bad or good things, poverty or riches, illness or health, abusive or nourishing relationships.
Manifesters believe that by thinking positive thoughts, feeling positive emotions, practicing “vibrational alignment,” and “acting as if” they have already achieved their dreams, they can achieve tangible success in the real world, especially becoming rich and famous.
The best-known examples of law-of-attraction self-help books are Rhonda Byrne’s (2006/2016) The Secret and Napoleon Hill’s (1937/2007) Think and Grow Rich! You may also have encountered Roxie Nafousi’s (2022) Manifest: 7 Steps to Living Your Best Life, which became an instant international bestseller when it was published.
These and similar books have a huge reach and, therefore, a considerable real-world impact. The Secret (both in book and video form) sold over 30 million copies (Dixon et al., 2023, p. 1), while #manifestation has 49.4 billion views on TikTok, to date.
Manifesters argue for a “mind over matter” doctrine, claiming that our thoughts are omnipotent and have the power to shape the external world. They posit that our thoughts are like magnets, able to attract good or bad things into our lives, depending on the frequency and quality of the kinds of thoughts we send out into the universe.
Proponents often claim that manifesting is based on principles from quantum physics (more on that below). Manifesting also taps into much older spiritual beliefs that are based on the notion that the universe is made up of energy or spirit, and that the material world is an illusion.
This self-help tradition emerged in the final decades of the 19th century. Its beginnings lie in the American “mind cure” movement. Enthusiasts believed that all sickness originates in the mind. Consequently, right thinking has a healing effect. The mind cure thinker Prentice Mulford (1834–1892) set out the principles of the “law of attraction.”
In Thoughts Are Things (1889), Mulford explains that positive thoughts attract positive outcomes and that negative thoughts attract negative ones. William Walker Atkinson (1906) later made similar claims in Thought Vibration or the Law of Attraction in the Thought World.
Positive thinking was first popularized by the American pastor Norman Vincent Peale (1952) in The Power of Positive Thinking. It is as influential as it is controversial. Extreme positive thinking has been critically examined by several researchers, who have found that it can be maladaptive; generate false hope, toxic positivity, and unrealistic expectations; and lead to poorer goal attainment (Wood et al., 2009).
A defining feature of manifesting is also its focus on attaining material riches by pseudo-spiritual means. The first self-help author to combine the spiritual idea of the law of attraction with materialist aspirations was Napoleon Hill.
Hill’s (1937/2007) message in Think and Grow Rich! is simple: If we focus strongly on thoughts about money and abundance, the universe will resonate with our subconscious and send riches our way. All we need in order to become rich is to develop a definite desire. Then our thoughts, “like magnets, attract to us the forces, the people, the circumstances of life which harmonize with the nature of our dominating thoughts” (Hill, 1937/2007, p. 21).
It is unsurprising that such a message would have been soothing to readers struggling with the economic fallout of the Great Depression. But this message has remained attractive ever since. The Secret, too, pushes the same message and is filled with stories about unexpected checks in the mail and sudden transformations of personal circumstances.
In psychological terms, we can understand manifesting as a spiritual belief system that impacts decision-making, judgment, self-concept, and behavior.
It is a form of thinking that is based on thought–action fusion, conflations between physical and nonphysical phenomena, delusions of causality and control, a belief in pseudo-scientific forces and karmic justice, blind optimism, and a dramatic overvaluation of our personal agency and power (Dixon et al., 2023).
Criticisms and Limitations of Manifestation
Anyone who believes in evidence-based psychological principles will view promises of effortless transformation with suspicion.
It is well known that sustainable change in our inner life and outer circumstances requires effort, time, dedication, practice, reality testing, and perseverance.
Criticisms: False expectations
While reading these kinds of books may make clients feel temporarily hopeful, perhaps even giddily expectant, reality will inevitably catch up. Clients may end up feeling worse, not better, when their promised riches fail to arrive.
Overestimating personal power and underestimating economic and social structures comes at a cost. When things don’t work out as hoped, clients may end up feeling guilt and shame.
Criticisms: Victim blaming
Manifesters hold those who suffer misfortunes personally responsible for their sufferings. Byrne (2016), for example, suggests that all of life’s calamities are caused by our failure to think positive thoughts.
Joe Vitale, one of the experts who contributed to her book, makes it perfectly clear that the rule of the law of attraction also applies to “events in history where masses of lives were lost” (Byrne, 2016, p. 28).
Following that logic, it was the Jews’ fault that they were killed in Nazi concentration camps because their “thoughts of fear, separation, and powerlessness” attracted them “to being in the wrong place at the wrong time” (Byrne, 2016, p. 28). Vitale sternly asserts, “Nothing can come into your experience unless you summon it through persistent thoughts” (Byrne, 2016, p. 28).
Limitations: Levels of success
Dixon et al. (2023) analyzed the impact of manifesting beliefs in detail. For their study, they created a manifestation scale, measuring the degree to which participants believe in personal power, as evident in positive self-talk, visualization, acting “as if,” and cosmic collaboration (i.e., partnering with supernatural or cosmic higher forces).
They found the following: While manifestation beliefs seem to be self-enhancing, equipping manifesters with a highly positive view of themselves and their chances of success, these beliefs make no impact on their objective levels of success (Dixon et al., 2023).
In other words, the overconfidence and over-optimism of manifesters do not translate into an increase in image, fame, or fortune in the real world. On the contrary, manifesters are “more likely to have a stronger preference for risk-taking, have riskier investments (i.e., cryptocurrency versus traditional stocks) and [are more likely to go] bankrupt. Therefore, there is a risk of negative financial outcomes for those who believe in manifestation” (Dixon et al., 2023, p. 13).
Dixon et al. (2023) also found that manifesters believed they could achieve a level of success, such as earning $300,000 a year or gaining a million fans, quicker than non-manifesters. This overconfidence, the researchers believe, “could leave manifesters vulnerable to believing unrealistic and/or inauthentic claims from the success industry and others who promise unlikely success, such as get-rich-quick schemes” (Dixon et al., 2023, p. 14).
However, there are specific strategies and aspects that are part of the manifestation belief system that have been shown to have positive effects. These include the placebo effect, cultivating an optimistic mindset, gratitude, visualizing, goal setting, and vision boarding. This makes the matter more complex.
“Manifesting” is a big trend in the self-help and success industry.
There is, for example, plenty of evidence that optimistic thinking is better for us than pessimistic thinking, and 
