My Life Is Waiting

Wow, I finally finished reading my first book of 2011, Excuse Me, Your Life Is Waiting by the late Lynn Grabhorn.  It is in fact just the third book I completed since 2010, the first two being Rhonda Byrne’s The Secret and my favourite author, Sophie Kinsella’s Twenties Girl (which my intuition tells me is being read by my mom at home now).  Sophie Kinsella never fails to amuse me, by the way, so let’s not talk about the latter. 

Both The Secret and Excuse Me, Your Life Is Waiting, actually belong to my ex-roommate and were handed over to me by a mutual friend who borrowed them on a rare visit to our room.  I had seen both lying in our room for quite some time but never had the interest to read any, until then.  At that time, The Secret was booming everywhere.  All book stores kept piles and piles of this in stock and they would sell like hot cakes.  The movie was shown on practically all leading cinemas across the UAE (not the one who only screened Hindi movies, obviously) and everybody talked about it at school, at work, at home, and anywhere else in between.  I cannot be certain of course, whether this is really a result of the Law of Attraction (LoA), which is what the book is all about, or is it just another proof that the society we live in cannot think for themselves (after Paris Hilton’s and Justin Bieber’s rise to fame, I tend to stick to the latter). 

Despite all this hype, though, The Secret never appealed much to me and it is not because of my skepticism on LoA but more because of its Harry Potter-esque approach, which made reading the book feel like reading the Bible.  The hard cover’s brown colour was unattractive to say the least and it was designed like a treasure map, making me feel completely detached.  After all, a self-help book should make you feel that the Self is within, not without, you, right?

Imagine my shock then when I found out that the next book in line actually talked about the exact same concept.  Yes, the Law of Attraction!  I instantly thought to myself, “Oh, God, this would be another half a year wasted!”  I am no Warren Buffet or Bill Gates, but I still hate the idea of wasting my precious time over such a commercialized and yet scientifically unproven concept which had brought me nowhere.  Needless to say, the first few chapters were just me force-feeding myself with the blah-blah-blah of how the Universe would conspire to do exactly what I want.

Only after finishing the first half of the book, my fondness (love is such a big word) towards the book began to grow.  While still a cynic, the down-to-earth approach of Lynn started showing effect on me.  It absolutely worked well on me than The Secret.  The words are easy to digest, the font comfortably normal (unlike The Secret’s pretentious handwriting) and again unlike Rhoda, Lynn did not feel the need to adorn the pages with quotes from Buddha and the likes just to make the concept believable (after all, who is Rhoda Byrne to claim that all of these people are indeed disciples of LoA?)  Lynn’s stories are also so personal you can easily relate to.  For example, she admitted that even after understanding the concept of LoA and actually thought she had a magic wand she could turn anything into gold like Midas, she did not ascend straight away to heaven and became an angel.  Instead, she continued to struggle with her mistakes and kept learning. 

I am not suggesting that this book should win an award for how it was written and laid out, though.  After all, many chapters are unnecessarily long and the content is often repetitious.  That said, I can still say this is how a proper self-help book should be; personal, down-to-earth, and practical (to those who wonder, no, I didn't try the wire test on the Appendix). 

I understand that many people are skeptical about the concept (with or without reading this kind of books) and will remain so.  Similarly, there are people who are so fascinated about and would swear on how their lives have completely changed from Chapter 1.  The first group would claim that even after wholeheartedly practicing what the book preaches, life is just the same old sh*t, while the second group (and I would imagine Lynn herself if she was still alive) would argue that this is exactly because they have not done it wholeheartedly (or properly).

It is indeed hard to prove whether or not the concept actually works and there is always a possibility that Lynn, just like hundreds other people are just opportunists trying to milk naïve and innocent readers for more and more money.  Nevertheless, I must admit that reading the book has been a fascinating ride for me.  I myself have not witnessed any particular incident worth mentioning here (although some unpredictable incidents here and there did spark some curiosity), but the book has indeed given me a new insight towards life, that your life belongs to YOU and YOU only.  People can do bad things intentionally to take your happiness, but at the end of the day, it is YOU who decides whether to let go or keep hold of it.

Numerous researches conducted that apparently those who dwell in negative thoughts tend to fall sick easily, while those who tend to see their lives as a cup half-full are likely to maintain good health.  So to speak, even if there is actually no such thing called the Law of Attraction, taking control of your mind and dwell in positive thoughts can only bring positive results.  It doesn't always mean that your cancer will heal completely, or that your wifey will be 50 years younger or that your boss will suddenly give you a meteoritical pay rise.  Some things in life are simply inevitable, but our part is to make sure that life goes on no matter what, happily.