Manifesting and Inner Guidance

The Big Picture

These conversations place the source of your results inside you, in two different places: your intention and your subconscious mind [1][2][3][4]. Oprah Winfrey, the guest on The Mel Robbins Podcast, describes reading Gary Zukav's The Seat of the Soul, whose chapters on intention tie intention to cause and effect [1]. After 1989, every idea for her show had to arrive with its intention attached [1]. Bruce Lipton, a cell biologist and former medical school professor talking with Lewis Howes on The School of Greatness, argues that the first seven years of life download beliefs and behaviors from parents and community, that these programs run about 95% of our lives, and that most of them are limiting [2][3]. Bob Proctor, also a guest of Howes, says our results are driven by a paradigm, a program in the subconscious mind, which can be changed through repetition [4].

Winfrey also describes checking in with herself: when something isn't flowing, she asks, "what is it I'm resisting?" [1]. She illustrates getting out of flow with her old Chevette, strewn with hair rollers, and says she realized one day that the car represented her life [1].

Where the Experts Agree

• Something unseen is at work. Winfrey says that if you say yes to please someone, they feel your eagerness, not your hidden resentment, so they keep coming back to you [1]. Lipton says the subconscious mind, programmed mostly before age seven, runs about 95% of our daily behavior [3]. Proctor says results are driven by a program in the subconscious mind [4].
• It can change. Winfrey says the idea of intention cured her people-pleasing [1]. Lipton explains how he says programs can be rewritten [2]. Proctor says the paradigm can be changed through repetition [4].
• Lipton and Proctor both speak of reprogramming the subconscious. Lipton's conversation is about how the subconscious mind is programmed and how to change it [2]. Proctor talks about how he reprograms his own subconscious mind [4].
• It reaches everyday life. Winfrey applies intention to ordinary jobs: if you work to support your family, let every step be for the love of your family [1]. Lipton applies his argument to money, health, relationships and parenting [2]. Proctor talks about how he thinks about money, gratitude, anger and death [4].
• Each speaks from personal history. Winfrey describes her people-pleasing and her old car [1]. Lipton shares decades of failed relationships, a book he couldn't finish and a moment that ended his depressive spirals [2]. Proctor describes himself as a high school dropout with low self-esteem who was deep in debt until age 26, when a mentor handed him Napoleon Hill's book [4].

Where They Differ

The passages show different emphases more than open disagreement [1][2][3][4].

• Intention or programming. Winfrey's account centers on intention and on what she is resisting [1]. Lipton's centers on programs set in the first seven years, which he says shape our health, relationships and results far more than genes do [2][3]. Proctor's centers on a paradigm changed through repetition [4].
• The frame. Lipton mixes claims from cell biology and quantum physics with spiritual ideas about energy fields and the soul [2], and moves into epigenetics and the biology of stress [3]. Proctor's conversation is filled with quotes from the authors and mentors who shaped him, from Napoleon Hill and Earl Nightingale to Wallace Wattles and Thomas Troward [4]. Winfrey's passage rests on her own experience and Zukav's book [1].
• The subject. Proctor's message includes the claim that the earning of money is an exact science governed by law [4]. Lipton's concern is why so many people feel stuck, sick and stressed [3]. Winfrey's is purpose at work and what people really want [1].
• The mood. Lipton opens one conversation by predicting the collapse of the current civilization, though its tone is described as hopeful [3]. Proctor's tone is described as warm, grandfatherly and anecdotal [4].
• How well people know what they want. Only Winfrey raises this: she says asking "what do you really want?" often stumped her audiences, and many women could only answer in terms of their children's happiness [1].
• Positive thinking. Lipton explains why willpower and positive thinking alone often fail [2]. The other passages do not take up that point [1][4].

Practical Takeaways

• If you work to support your family, let every step be for the love of your family; this is Winfrey's advice for ordinary jobs [1].
• Never criticize someone in front of others: Winfrey says the worst thing you can do to anyone is humiliate them [1].
• Winfrey's own check when something isn't flowing is to ask herself, "what is it I'm resisting?" [1].
• Know what a yes costs: Winfrey says that when you say yes to please someone, they feel your eagerness, not your hidden resentment, and keep coming back to you [1].
• Winfrey's rule for her own work after 1989 was that every show idea had to arrive with its intention attached [1].
• Lipton says willpower and positive thinking alone often fail, and his conversation offers practical tips for noticing and changing negative self-talk [2].
• Proctor says the program in the subconscious mind can be changed through repetition [4].
• Proctor's own daily practice: he has read Think and Grow Rich every day since 1961 [4].

Sources

1. Oprah Winfrey on Mel Robbins: Your Inner GPS, the Thread of Purpose, Forgiveness, and the Right to Change Your Mind · The Mel Robbins Podcast
2. Bruce Lipton on Reprogramming Your Subconscious Mind, Self-Love and Leaving Victimhood Behind · The School of Greatness
3. Bruce Lipton on the Subconscious Programs Running 95% of Your Life · The School of Greatness
4. The Law of Attraction: Creating Wealth & Manifesting Abundance with Bob Proctor · The School of Greatness

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