You, Michael Jackson, Intent, Detachment and Success

Whatever your opinion of Michael Jackson may be, we can all agree on one undisputed fact: In the history of this planet, few artists have produced more hit singles, gathered more fans or sold more records than he has. That is a fact no one can argue with. I mean, if you can count, you can't argue with that, no matter what your opinion may be of him or his music. That is an incredible accomplishment. We are talking of a success that is rarely comparable, in the history of the world!

I was watching the recent Living with Michael Jackson interview they had with him. Quite early on in the interview, he said a few things which really struck me. And this is why: Many people look for proof as to whether success really can be effortless. They say, “I don’t believe in that effortless stuff. Hard work is the only way.” And so it is for them. Yet it never has to be. And Michael, in that interview, brought through that proof.

Now before we proceed, I just want to make it clear that I am not saying that work has no place in the path to success. Of course it does. What I am saying is two things: (1) You were never meant to struggle and never need to and (2) work is not the source of success, it is the recipient. Actions are the receiving end of creation, not the start of it. Whenever you find yourself struggling for success, with a view that the hard effort you put in is what will get you your success, stop! Nature is effortlessly abundant. So is success. Effortlessness means struggle-free. Work is the recipient of high success, not the cause of it. The result of struggle is struggle; the result of effort is effort, nothing more and nothing less. You can achieve magnitudes more in a few minutes through state of being and deliberate thought than by years of hard work. The wealth gap in the world is proof of this.

Effortless success involves intent and detachment, not struggle and control. I will give you a most simple example. You are now reading this article. You are reading it because you intended to read. However, if you are observant and honest with yourself, you will notice that you are not the maker, doer nor director of that reading process. You are not making the words, senses, light and all the things that are required for the reading process to happen - it is just happening! You are not directing the lights stream, the brain work, the optic nerves and anything else required for the reading process - it is just happening! You are not manually doing the setting up of the memory and mind, storing this information yourself - it is just happening!

Reading is an extremely complex activity, if you clearly think about it. Extremely complex! I mean, they can take a man to the moon, but they can't make a computer that reads, understands, and thus achieves knowing of the material read, just like you are doing now. The best they can do is teaching it to recognize characters. Reading is a hell of a lot more complex than making space shuttles and computers. Yet you do it effortlessly. What I am getting at here is that it is not you who is making, doing and directing the reading. You are simply an observer of a complexity of universal energetic intelligence all working together to produce the thing that you call reading. You are just the observer, and the reason you observe is because you intended to and everything else is taken care of for you. The reason it works is because you don’t attempt to interfere with the process, you just let it happen in a detached way. Now that was just a simple example. But it works the exact same way with success. We will get back to intent and detachment in a while. For now, let us get back to Michael, and find the proof that you have been seeking.

At some point in the interview, the interviewer asked Michael “How do you write your songs?”

Now, what you would expect is that Michael would give some formula or something, some steps. But you know what he said? He said, “If I sit here and say I am going to write a best-selling song, nothing is going to happen.” So now we know that he can't just sit there and follow some formula and come up with a hit. He continued, “The way I wrote Billy Jean, for example, was I was in the car and I thought I’d like to make a song with a really cool base line, and I let it go. I just let go. A few days later, the beats just started playing in my head.”

And the interviewer asked him “And how did you write the words?” And Michael said “The mistake many musicians make is that they get in the way of the music. Get out of the way. Let the song write itself.” Of course the interviewer was confused by all this. He expected some formula, something to do. So he asked “But if you don’t write it, where does it come from?” And Michael just shrugged, paused and said “Above”.

Let’s pause there for a while. Can you write music by making up your own words? Yes, of course. But the question is how many people will fall in love with it and buy millions of your records. Not as many, as the evidence shows. Michael, with the proven track record we just talked about, confesses that he himself can't sit down and write a hit. It just has to happen. All he does is put forth the intention, then completely detach and let go. Then some time later it will just start playing in his mind. And does this work? The numbers prove that it does so immensely.

But he is gifted, you say. Fair enough. But the point is, even he can't write that hit song. He is gifted, but he himself can't sit and write a hit. He can write music, but nowhere as good as if he lets it happen. It happens through him, not by him! Intent and detachment has been taught for thousands of years by hundreds of success coaches and spiritual masters. Yet the common person ignores that approach and instead insists on control. He or she never once stops to consider that his or her control ideas are based on past experiences. There are two problems with that. One is that past experiences are extremely limited in scope, so depending on them shuts out the infinite other possibilities that the universe can bring to you if you just let go and allow. The other limitation is that past experiences are often selectively biased towards a reaction to some form of fear.

You now have undeniable evidence of the power of intent and detachment. There are people who say “I wish I could write hit songs like Michael” and they really try hard to emulate him. Yet he himself says he can't, it just comes whenever he intends and let goes, not trying to direct or control anything.

Need more evidence? Albert Einstein on numerous occasions showed us that his insights all came through imagination, intent and detachment. Thomas Edison, with over 1000 patents including the light bulb, used to come up with most of his insights when he was most detached. Numerous other artists, scientists, sports stars, and business legends have said they use intent and detachment to achieve pinnacles of success. Whatever you can achieve through hard work and obsessive control, you can achieve much more, and with no struggle, through simple intent and detachment.

Do what you love, and you will never have to work another day in your life. Intend and let go. Trust life. And there is nothing that will be hard for you to achieve. It is that simple. The obsession with control that most people have is ridiculously ineffective. The only reason a person would desire to control a process and an outcome is because of fear. Yet that very control is based on an extremely limited perspective of life, one built based on a very small collection of past experiences.

The universe is infinite and an outcome can come about through infinite processes, not just the one you think is correct. And an outcome can have infinite forms, not just the one you think is suitable. Do you start to see how the obsession with control is false on every level? First, how can you control when really you are not the maker, doer or director, but an observer of the manifestations of whatever crosses your mind? So in your attempt to control, arising from fear, you fire off all these thoughts and emotions which, by universal law, get manifested and thus get in the way of your happiness and success. Second, control is like asking a question and holding a premeditated answer that is wrong, and of course when the correct answer comes up through the ever-loving and infinite universe, it will look like an attack on your own answer, which is wrong. The minute you hold your own limited answer, any other answer to your request will appear as an attack on your person, no matter how fantastic it is.

This article is not meant to go deeply into how to get detached, the laws of the universe, wealth consciousness, and so on. That is well covered in many books such as A Happy Pocket Full of Money, Think and Grow Rich, and Achieving Your Life’s Goals Effortlessly. The point of it is to give you proof, yet again, of the power of intent and detachment. It is within your reach. You were not meant to struggle - struggle is unnatural. I wish you the highest possible achievements. If you wish to know more about all this, see http://www.imagesofone.com.