I’ll bet you’re the creative sort, aren’t you? If you are reading/viewing/listening to the Truth&Rights VOL2009.02, then you’re probably a writer, musician, artist or a creative thinker of some other stripe. We creative types wear that badge proudly. We secretly hope that our creativity sets us apart (and above) our fellow humans who choose to focus on the more mundane aspects of life.

Here’s a quick reality check: If you’re so creative, are you having more fun with your life than the creatively challenged people around you?

Damn. I hate it when I fail my own tests. If I were truly creative, I could design a life for myself that’s the spittin’ image of my fondest dreams. Then everything I do would be fun, I’d make a handsome living doing what I love, and I’d have all the time in the world to do it…

If you answered the reality check question the same way I did, there’s hope for us after all. In Truth&Rights VOL2009.01, I wrote about narrow-mindedness, and how this disease of the mind restricts us to seeing only two possibilities in any given situation. Everything boils down to a simplistic view of the world in a black/white, good/evil, friend/foe, us/them mentality. You have only to watch the news to see how this stunted form of thinking is leading us along a path of mutual destruction.

But what if we could train ourselves to not just see the bigger picture, but begin to create a new world from a field of unlimited possibilities? What if we didn’t have to play within the rules of reality? What if we could make up our own reality?

In the last few years, two films have introduced a large number of people to the notion of creating their own reality: “The Secret” and “What the Bleep?” These movies propose that we can learn to attract the people, money, situations, health and relationships that we desire into our lives. “What the Bleep?” even bases these ideas on quantum physics, and explains that even what we normally consider to be hard physical reality is far less substantial than we think. Theoretically, at the quantum level we can change reality just by observing it. We can, in effect, “select” the reality we want to see and the universe changes to accommodate our desires.

Like many people, I’ve played around with these ideas and created some small successes in generating the results I’d like to see in my life. I’ve manifested lots of free parking spaces, some smooth and profitable transactions, new friends in an environment where I didn’t know anyone, and similar kinds of results that some would call “coincidence.”

But nothing prepared me for Dr. Richard Bartlett. My wife and I encountered this fellow at a local conference (ISSSEEM) and we were blown away. At his presentation he was able to perform spontaneous healing and transformations on stage in front of hundreds of people, all while prancing about, cracking jokes and generally acting like a madman.

At the end of the presentation we were truly bewildered. It was not clear what was happening, or how he could perform such “miracles.” So we came back for more. A few weeks later he returned to the Denver area to conduct another more thorough demonstration, and train others to do what he does. I came for the demo, and my wife, Bev stayed for the full training.

What we witnessed, along with several hundred others in attendance, seemed to be impossible. Dr. Bartlett would bring random people up on stage, have a brief conversation, quickly detect some underlying condition that was troublesome to the person, then he would touch the person on the shoulder or head and the person would instantly collapse into the arms of an assistant who would gently guide the person to the floor, where they rested quietly. In some cases where the changes taking place involved physical maladies like a frozen shoulder, or limited movement due to injury or arthritis, it was easy to see the instant transformation. In the space of a few seconds the afflicted person would suddenly be able to move their limbs in the ways that normal people could, completely without pain or discomfort. The shocked looks on the faces of the people being treated added to the impossibility of these events.

To confound our lost sense of reality, several of Dr. Bartlett’s assistants performed similar feats with no apparent effort. Later, two of the assistants went on stage and shifted into a trance-like mental state, and proceeded to contort their normal-looking 30+ year-old bodies into pretzel-like positions that would confound a yoga master. During the training that followed over the weekend, Bev and hundreds of others were able to perform some of the same kinds of impossible feats. What was happening here?

Dr. Bartlett is quick to point out that his methods do not treat existing disease conditions, as such. As he explains it in his book, Matrix Energetics, “We hold a state of awareness and enter into a kind of energetic rapport with clients, holding for them what shamanic cultures would call “sacred space,” so they can have the freedom to choose to express a different outcome…Often the trouble is that no one ever tells you with any real sense of conviction that you have that choice.”

Our sense of conviction about the “realities” of our lives is what holds those realities in place. If you believe that you have a math phobia, or emotional damage from a previous relationship, or trouble keeping a job, or any of hundreds of other mental, emotional or physical “conditions,” your beliefs are holding you hostage to that very “reality.” As I understand it, Dr. Barlett disarms the client with laughter and his goofy antics, temporarily suspending the client’s conviction about their condition, then holds the space for transformation to take place according to the client’s deep-seated desire for wholeness and wellness.

While I thought I understood a bit about quantum physics theory, this was my first experience of the seemingly impossible “instant transformation.” I began to wonder what else was possible that I previously considered impossible. Suddenly my notions of what it means to be creative took on a far deeper meaning…

In his book, Dr. Barlett refers to this quote from Lewis Carrol’s classic, Alice in Wonderland: “Alice laughed: “There’s no use trying,” she said; “one can’t believe impossible things.”


“I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was younger, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”

Dr. Barlett continues, saying: “If we do this as a daily habit we will begin to have experiences and thoughts that do not merely maintain the orthodox party line of normal consensus reality. Instead, we will begin to inhabit within the domain of our thoughts, a realm of wondrous and magical possibility. It is from such a realm that the experience of Matrix Energetics originates and resides.”

Since we are all just making up our realities, why not create some truly fantastic and exciting possibilities? We can begin to expand our sense of what we could create by practicing what the Queen suggests. Dare to entertain the impossible in YOUR mind!

If you’re not sure where to start, this will get your wheels moving. Keep a small journal where you ask the wild and outrageous “Why?” and “What if?” questions.

Try questions like: “Why do I have to work eight hours a day?” “What if I could work two hours a day, make twice as much as I do now, and spend the rest of the time playing?”

“Why do I have to write my words left to right, one after the other?” “What if I sprinkled them around on the page like a Jackson Pollack painting?”

“Why do I have to layer the melody over the bass line?” “What if the bass soared over the melody instead?”

“Why do I have to shoot my videos or tell my stories from a character’s point of view?” “What if I made the film or told the story from the viewpoint of a bird, or a snail, or a button on a shirt, or from my left hand?”

“Why do our minds and bodies deteriorate with age?” “What if we became stronger, smarter, more creative, more flexible, and more energetic with each passing year?”

When you read the previous questions, did that get your mind in gear—thinking of your own variations? If so, you’re beginning to tap the infinite well of fresh possibilities in an entirely new way. To start your own transformation, begin asking these same kinds of questions about the “conditions” of your life that you’ve never questioned before.

As Dr. Barlett suggests, “When you start to habitually ask open-ended questions of the universe, it starts to answer back, teaching you new things.” If it’s true that we can create anything our minds can conceive, let’s expand what we can conceive first. When we begin to entertain the impossible, we prepare ourselves to create on a much broader scale. Surprise yourself. Live life subject to change without notice.

Header photo by tavopp and licensed under a Creative Commons AN 3.0 UL.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 1st, 2009 and is filed under Commentary, VOL2009.02. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.