Episode 243
Title: Is It Manifesting or Just Hard Work?
Host: Dr. Nick Carruthers & Dr. Nicole Rivera
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Transcription:
Dr. Nicole (00:01.276)
Hello everyone, welcome back to another episode of Integrative You Radio. We have a fun one for you guys today. Oh, we got Dr. Nick snapping. So, you know, because he always forgets that this is also a podcast, not just a video. Alright, guys, for those of you that have been following us, I know that there are rumors like, “What are they doing over there? Why are they selling all their stuff?” And the topic of this podcast is...
Dr. Nick (00:11.196)
Hehehe.
Dr. Nicole (00:32.156)
...is it manifesting, or is it just hard work paying off? And this was a topic that was actually proposed by one of our team members. I was like, "That is a great, great topic." So, I figured I would launch this with an announcement, which will then proceed into a story. And what that is, is Dr. Nick, myself, and little baby Q are moving to Italy.
Got nothing, Nick?
Dr. Nick (01:04.54)
It’s been one hell of a manifestation, and it’s been pretty wild. You know, when you're in alignment with manifestation, you can definitely work hard. Um, we always "quote-unquote" work hard, if that's what you want to call it, which I'll probably disagree with later, calling it work. But the aspect is that things happen really fast.
When you're in alignment, and you're manifesting, and you also have the compounded energies of multiple people synchronizing their energies into a specific creation, things happen quickly. Yeah, Dr. Nicole, tell the story because it’s pretty wild.
Dr. Nicole (01:50.332)
So I want to preface this by saying...
Dr. Nicole (01:57.02)
...when it comes to putting your eye on a prize, you have this desire, you have this want, and it’s something that really feels good. As Dr. Nick said, it aligns. It’s like, gosh, this is going to allow me to really feel free, happy, feel joy, feel gratitude. It just feels good on a cellular level.
That is where there’s more power behind it because it’s aligned to your true soul, your true desires. When we went to Italy, there was a feeling that we had. For me, it was a feeling of peace, like my mind and body were at more peace than they ever were. And that peace made me feel more powerful, made me tap into...
I’m really capable of so much more than what I’ve even achieved thus far. It was a feeling that I couldn’t really ignore. In addition to that, the feeling of not worrying about our food—actually enjoying food again and enjoying going out because the culture is built around quality time and quality food—that also was something that felt...
...so unbelievably good, but also freeing. You know, we love going out and socializing, but it’s difficult in the US because you just know you’re not getting great quality. Restaurants need to make a profit, and the business infrastructure of restaurants here is just totally different. So essentially, the moral of the story is, we had this...
We had this feeling, we had this vision, and then we put a lot of energy and focus into, "What do we want our 2.0 life to look like?" And that was through conversations, through meditation, and structured meetings. Then, we had a knock at our door. Someone said, "Hi, I would like to buy your house." And we were like, "What? Our house isn’t..."
Dr. Nicole (04:21.916)
...for sale." And we just sat back and thought, "Man, that is weird. Really, really weird." But when they gave us the price, we were like, "Wait, what? That’s a lot more than what we bought it for." So now it wasn’t just about, "That’s crazy that that happened." Is this part of a manifestation? But then it was also like...
"This could be a very smart move from a financial perspective and generating generational wealth," which ironically was also part of our 2.0 life and part of our manifestation. I had a conversation with a client yesterday, and he was talking about something that presented itself in his life, and I congratulated him. I said...
"Congratulations, you just manifested." And he was like, "What do you mean? No, it’s just my friend, and she got an in, and she really liked my painting, and this and that." And I said, "No, no, no, no, no. You just manifested, and now don’t ignore this opportunity." And I think the biggest thing I want to drive home in this podcast is that...
We can have an idea of something we want. We have this vision of our dream life. And if we think it’s out of touch, that’s okay—it’s supposed to feel stretchy.
But if we’re not paying attention, we could actually let the opportunities pass us by that are the stepping stones to the full creation of the manifestation.
Dr. Nick (06:19.42)
Yeah, I think that’s an amazing point because most people think about manifestation, they think about sending a prayer, or meditation, or sitting in good vibes, or affirmations, or writing stuff on paper and lighting it on fire and letting it go up into the ether. Like all kinds of things. Um, I forget what it’s called. But yeah, it’s actually like an alchemy trick.
Dr. Nicole (06:30.108)
Affirmation.
Dr. Nicole (06:37.5)
That’s a thing.
Dr. Nick (06:49.468)
I’m blanking on it. I’ve done it before. I’ve done all the weird things, and...
What’s crazy is that we’re still in this belief system—at least, America is—that wants a quick fix. They want that manifestation to come up in the form they were sending out that energy for. Like, we could easily say, "Boom, we want to go to Italy." We wanted a private jet to magically take us over to Italy, and boom, our manifestation was there. But no, like...
Knock, knock. "Hey, I’m here to buy your house." It’s like you want a certain amount of money, and you’ll go buy a lottery ticket thinking, "That’s the manifestation. If I manifest it, I’ll get the lottery ticket." That’s not how the universe works. The universe will drop hints so that you can actually take action. When you take action, guess what? There’s a loss and a gain. There’s always a balance in energy, and that’s...
There’s balance in manifestation. If you just manifested and got the lottery ticket, up until that point, there’s no transfer in the balance of energy. There’s no loss and no gain. There’s mostly just gain, which is going to create a huge loss in the future. That’s not really manifestation. So it’s about, you know, looking at it, Dr. Nicole. It’s like...
Italy gave her peace and those things, but the feeling she got was from being in alignment with the environment that gave her the best opportunity to serve her highest values. Because she’s living in an environment right now that’s deterring her from living those values, she has to spend time on lower productive actions, like constantly searching for healthy food.
Dr. Nick (08:54.948)
Spending more money on actual food, not lab-grown food, and all these things that take away that feeling of peace. So when you put her into an environment that allows her to be more in a higher resonance, more congruent with her highest values, is she going to feel peace? So I wanted to put that out there because you’re not searching for peace. That’s not what you want to manifest. Peace is just the side effect.
Dr. Nicole (09:13.212)
That’s like...
Dr. Nicole (09:16.924)
Yeah.
Dr. Nick (09:22.748)
The feedback mechanism that showed her she was in alignment with being her more authentic self.
Dr. Nicole (09:30.044)
Well, and I think that’s something we’ve talked about before, but this idea of distraction is detraction. I found that because of certain things being out of alignment, like wanting to have healthy food, wanting to feed my child healthy food, wanting to be able to go out and socialize and not be kicked out of a restaurant if I’m not eating and drinking and gorging myself...
...something that’s a little bit more slow-paced, something that’s built around community. When all of those things seem really difficult, it’s like a level of distraction, which then detracts me—not just me, but us—from what will actually allow us to fulfill our goals or values. I think that’s where that level of peace came from—there was less distraction, it was just living. And...
That is something that I want. I have big goals, and I want to focus on that and not be detracted from it by things that are not allowing me to live my life easily. If that makes sense.
Dr. Nick (10:42.396)
So when jumping back into this aspect of manifestation versus working hard...
What advice do you give to people? Because, I mean, you’re a business coach, you’re a doctor, kind of like a life coach too, in that sense. Um, and you know, energy flows where attention goes. So is it about not working hard? Is it about, you know, working hard with manifestation? Like, how do you tie that all together?
Dr. Nicole (11:10.268)
Yeah, I think that’s a really, really great question. The thing I always say is that it’s your A to B. Keith Cunningham talked about this in his book The Road Less Stupid. And he said, you know, a lot of people don’t want to look at where they are right now because they don’t want to feel guilt and shame about not being where they thought they were going to be. But if you want to create your B, your 2.0, your future vision...
...great. We need to do that, and it needs to be extremely, extremely clear on what it looks like, feels like, and sounds like. So, if you have this 2.0 vision of who you are as a person, what your family looks like, what your business looks like, how do you talk? How do you walk? How do you talk to other people? How do you look? How do you dress? How do you feel every day? Do you feel energized? Do you feel joy? Do you have...
...fun? Do you feel exhilaration through adventure? If you can tap into those three things, you’ll be very, very clear and intentional about what your 2.0 is, what your B is. But the thing is, some people don’t have a clear point of where they’re going, they don’t have a clear vision of where they’re going. And some people who do have that clear vision aren’t willing to be transparent and vulnerable about where they are—from a place of curiosity...
...not from a place of judgment. You need to be clear about both because, if you use the simple example, if your destination is, let’s say Italy, on a map, and you’re located in New Jersey versus being located in Hong Kong, that roadmap and journey look very different.
So...
If you’re clear on where you are and where you’re going, then you’re going to be very, very clear on what those steps are. Now, you’re not wasting time and energy because you’re extremely methodical and intentional about the steps you’re taking, the aligned action you’re taking. This applies to personal life and business. I had a conversation the other day with a woman about her business, and...
Dr. Nicole (13:37.276)
...you know, she’s looking at the external market, looking at her competitors in her area. She’s like, “Well, I should do this, and I should do this, and I should do this.” And I’m like, “But what if you shouldn’t? Which one of those things gets you really, really excited and lights you up, and is actually part of the bigger vision?” And she’s like, “Well, I’m just so in the trenches right now. I haven’t really thought about the bigger vision.” I said...
“Well, it’s time to think about the bigger vision because otherwise, you’re going to make a lot of decisions, waste a lot of time and money on things that are never going to go anywhere. You’ll end up on this merry-go-round, and that could go on for one year, it could go on for 20 years.” That’s something we’ve experienced firsthand. So, it’s not about sitting around and meditating all day, but 80% of creation is about...
...aligning your mind and your inner self. I feel like some people don’t understand the word “soul”—it just means what really resonates with you, what resonates with your values, what resonates with what’s important to you. If you focus on that, remove the limitations of all the people telling you what you can’t do, remove your own limitations about what you think you can’t accomplish...
...and then focus on the rest of that 20%, being extremely methodical and taking aligned action, then everything is going to feel a lot easier. It won’t feel like, “I’m working so hard, but I’m one step forward, two steps back.” You’ll be working methodically, but you’ll continue to move forward. Yes, of course, there will be obstacles, but they won’t...
...knock you down. They might push you back a little, but you’ll still be able to make progress.
Dr. Nick (15:35.9)
So I took four things away from what you just said. First, actually, is a slight correction. You’re resonating with your spirit. Your spirit is when you’re talking about the things you love, that’s your spirit when you’re inspired. Your soul is your S-O-U-L—State of Unconditional Love—where you just feel pure love. You love everything. Everything is just roses, unicorns, sunshine, all the things.
Dr. Nicole (15:39.516)
Okay.
Dr. Nicole (15:48.572)
Yeah, inspired purpose.
Dr. Nicole (15:59.324)
That’s a work in progress.
Dr. Nick (16:05.468)
But no, the three major takeaways, which were brilliant, are: First, getting crystal clear about where you are and noticing that most of us hold guilt and shame, the judgment that you’re not where you think you should be. So, you hold guilt and shame, and you don’t want to look at where you truly are right now. Being able to become grateful for that because gratitude is...
...the tool that removes and neutralizes guilt and shame, setting you free from that. The second one is asking yourself, “How do I feel right now?” Well, you can’t feel better if you’re consciously or unconsciously still holding onto that guilt and shame. Guilt and shame are the lowest vibrations and kill every manifestation. You have to go through the process of balancing out the guilt and shame, becoming grateful for it because it got you to where you are, which is just the next...
Dr. Nicole (17:02.012)
Mm-hmm.
Dr. Nick (17:03.68)
...stepping stone foundation to launch you forward. And the second part of that feeling is to start holding onto the small aspects where you already hold that vibration of what you’re trying to manifest. Grow that level of vibration, that frequency inside of you, and strengthen it. That’s the big part of manifestation—you tap into it and get crystal clear...
...on the feeling of what you’re trying to become. You just grow that, grow that intensity, grow that duration. When you compound that with other people, like us with the same manifestation we’re working on, that compounded energy allows things to transform very, very quickly. We changed who we were...
...through our feelings, and feelings are just created by our thought processes. So we created a new blueprint for how we’re thinking about who we are. And that takes me to number three—work harder on being, not doing. Dr. Nicole said 80% is about changing the feeling and the thoughts that create those feelings. Work really, really hard on changing that level of being, that experience of who you are.
Then the 20% of physical action—what you’re doing—will be more fluid, more coherent. You won’t waste time, you won’t waste energy, and you won’t waste money on that merry-go-round. So yeah, those were, I thought, brilliant takeaways.
Dr. Nicole (18:42.876)
Well, I would love to give people more tips and tools because, naturally, if I had listened to this podcast years ago, I would have been like, "Good for them. That’s not for me. My life is hard. Things don’t come to me easily." And...
Dr. Nick (19:04.604)
And I’m going to interrupt here. It’s like, bitch, this wasn’t easy.
Dr. Nicole (19:08.476)
Well, that’s kind of the point. You said this before, and we didn’t really expand upon it—the idea of loss and gain. For those of you who are in life right now, maybe things are rough, maybe things are just stagnant. Or maybe you’re like, "I’m doing pretty good, but I’m ready for my 2.0. I’m ready for something more. I just don’t know what it is." No matter what phase of life you’re in, you have the opportunity to leverage this information and the idea of...
...stepping into being the creator of your life. We all have this opportunity. We were born with it, but our lives have detracted us from it. They detracted us by telling us what we can’t be—this comes from family, mentors, professors, teachers, parents. We’ve absorbed the limiting beliefs of all these people and organizations around us, and...
...they’ve taken us away from what we are capable of because we are fucking capable of a lot. But I think there’s this fantasy that there are only positives and no negatives. The idea of positive and negative is really just perception. When we embarked on this, the reason we told that story the way we did is...
We had this vision of going to Italy. We didn’t want to sell our house. We weren’t even thinking about that. We were like, “Oh, well, you know, our house is pretty close to the beach. Why don’t we, you know, try to maybe rent it out?” We were weighing out all these options. Then that presented itself. For me—not really for Dr. Nick—that was devastating. The idea of like, "Okay, one, this is going to give me my manifestation, and two, this is a very smart move financially."
But this is our home. This is where my son has grown up. This is where all our stuff is. We have to get rid of all of our stuff if we don’t have a residence here. You can, but there’s no point in moving tons of stuff internationally. It was...
Dr. Nicole (21:26.466)
...rough. It was a very emotional thing. Then we were dealing with people, like my family—“What’s going on? You’re leaving us?” So, it has not been an easy decision in any capacity. There has been a loss to be a gain. But we also know that we have to give ourselves the opportunity to experience this.
If it’s everything we dreamed, fantastic. If it’s not, we can always find a plan B. We need to let go of this idea that everything should be positive, everything should be sunshine and rainbows. No matter what you’re doing, if you have a business right now and you’re like, "This business is not what I wanted. This is not what I thought it was going to be," the idea of...
...closing that business or restructuring it to create a new one—people think, "Oh God, I can’t do that." But again, it’s the loss to the gain. We lost a physical brick-and-mortar location, but to create this 2.0 version of our business, which is actually serving our clients so much more because we also have the time and space to serve ourselves so much more, we show up better than we ever have—a loss to the gain.
And the final thing I really want to say, and this is a huge one, so please stay with me, is to please stop distracting yourself with what is going on in the world, in the media, in your competitors, in other families, in your neighborhood. Even with the knowledge that I have—and I’ll speak again for myself—it is...
...so fucking distracting. It is so fucking distracting to just look at what other people are doing. Nowadays, it’s like information overload. I used to write things down and take notes, like, “Look how this person is making money. Look how this person is running their business. Look how this person is speaking and changing humanity.” And I used to be like, “Oh, that’s really awesome. Wait, maybe I should do that. Maybe I could do that.”
Dr. Nicole (23:48.316)
And it fucking distracts you from what you really want. It really, really does. It takes you away from the ability to say, “How do I want to show up in my own unique way? How do I want to make money that serves me, serves my family, serves my values?” That was probably one of the hardest pills to swallow. I lived my life saying, “I want to be this boss lady. I want to have an empire.” And it’s like...
I just want to have a life that I enjoy every day. I want to spend time with the people that I love. I want to be financially comfortable and free, and I want to be able to do what I want when I want. But I also want those other things equally as much. And when you look at some of these people who are absolutely unbelievably wealthy, ask them how much time they spend at home. Ask them how much time they spend on their own self-care. Ask them where their health is.
There are definitely people who have figured it out, they’ve got all their buckets full. But there are a lot of people that we’re looking at, observing, and envying, who have their money bucket full but the rest are really, really empty. So the point is, go ahead...
Dr. Nick (25:05.66)
And I also want to interject really quick. There are a few people who have their buckets full, but if you were to live their life, it wouldn’t work for you because their set of values is different. What they care about is different.
Dr. Nick (25:47.1)
Hey, back.
Dr. Nicole (25:49.308)
So you said if they were to live that life...
Dr. Nick (25:54.556)
I want to interject really quick because there are a couple of people in the world—not many, but a couple—who have every single bucket completely filled. What’s interesting is that if you were to put yourself in their life, it wouldn’t work for you because they have a different set of values. Working more or not working, your life is completely unique. So it’s...
It’s stupid. Honestly, it’s literally stupid to judge yourself compared to someone else because they’re not you. What works for them works for them, not you. The only thing with those people is because they’ve experienced everything and had mentors to help them, they would be able to help mentor you and guide you to your unique bliss, but it wouldn’t be...
...doing the same things they do. That’s not how it works, it shouldn’t work like that. That’s not creating. We’re here as human beings to create. If you’re just doing the exact same thing as someone else, we don’t need two people doing the same thing. That’s why there’s only one of you. So, we can look at other people to take advice from, to work more efficiently, to get coached...
...but at the same time, you don’t want to ever do exactly what someone else is doing unless that small piece is in alignment with your high values.
Dr. Nicole (27:28.284)
Yeah, it’s embracing your uniqueness, always. I think a lot of us are scared to do that. What if I’m ostracized? What if I’m judged? That means you’re doing it right. Be prepared for that because when you’re doing big things, or you’re an out-of-the-box thinker, you’re going to have people who love you, and then you’re going to have people who have something to say about it. There’s nothing wrong with that. We can’t be in control of others, we can only control ourselves...
...and do what makes us fucking happy, is what it comes down to. So we hope you enjoyed this, and we hope this gives you some inspiration to know that you can be the creator of your 2.0. It’s a matter of tuning back into yourself, not being distracted by your environment, not thinking manifestation is all about positives and no negatives...
...and it’s also about creating awareness around the opportunities that present themselves in your life as stepping stones to the creation of what you truly want.