#169: The State of Fulfilled Desire

The State of Fulfilled Desire

A Lecture in the Voice and Spirit of Neville Goddard

You have believed that fulfillment must first appear in your outer world before you can know the joy of it. But this belief is the very chain that holds your desire at a distance. The state of fulfilled desire is not a condition that is granted to you after the evidence appears. It is a condition of consciousness that you assume now, and in the assuming the evidence is compelled to appear. To be in the state of fulfilled desire is to be conscious of being the one who already possesses what you desire. It is not a future hope. It is a present fact in the only place where facts are made—in your awareness of being.

When you are in this state your thoughts no longer circle around the lack of the thing. They move from the possession of it. You do not say within yourself, “How shall I bring this to pass?” You find yourself saying, “It is done. It is mine. I have it.” These words are not spoken to produce an effect. They are the natural speech of one who has already become one with his desire in consciousness. The mind that is in the fulfilled state does not labor. It rests. It is satisfied. It moves through the affairs of the day with a quiet certainty, for it knows that what is already a reality in consciousness must become a reality in experience.

The reactions natural to this state are reactions of peace. When the outer world presents what appears to be contradiction or delay, the one who is in the fulfilled state does not become disturbed. He does not argue with the appearance. He does not try to force the appearance to change. He knows that the appearance is the shadow cast by the state he has assumed, and he remains faithful to the state. The shadow has no power to alter the light that casts it. So he reacts with calm. He goes on his way unmoved, for he knows that the thing he has assumed must objectify itself, and no shadow can prevent it.

In the state of fulfilled desire there is no anxious expectation. There is no watching and waiting with strained attention. Expectation of that feverish kind belongs to the state of unfulfilled desire. The one who is fulfilled has a quiet knowing that what is already his in consciousness is already his in reality. He does not wait for it to happen. He knows it has happened. The interval between the assumption and the manifestation is not a time of anxious watching. It is a time of rest. It is the time in which the state sinks deeper into his consciousness and becomes more and more natural to him.

The inner knowing that belongs to this state is not a belief that the desire will be fulfilled. It is the knowing that it is already fulfilled. This knowing does not come from the evidence of the senses. It comes from the feeling of the wish fulfilled. When you feel yourself to be the one who has received, when the feeling of satisfaction and completion is natural to you, then you know. This knowing is not loud. It does not need to convince anyone. It simply is. It is as certain as the knowledge that you have eaten when you have eaten. The senses may deny it, but the knowing remains.

To enter this state deliberately you do not strain or effort. You simply feel what you would feel if your desire were already realized in your world. You feel the satisfaction that would be yours. You feel the relief. You feel the quiet joy of possession. You do not concern yourself with the manner of its coming. That is not your work. Your work is to feel the naturalness of being the fulfilled one. When this feeling becomes easy, when you can rest in it without forcing, you have entered the state. The feeling is the agreement between your awareness of being and the thing desired. When the two agree, the manifestation is assured.

This state is the state of oneness. You and your desire are no longer two. You are one. The awareness of being has become aware of being the fulfilled one, and in that awareness the desire is no longer a hope but a fact. From this oneness all things flow. The father within you, which is your own awareness of being the fulfilled one, draws to you everything that belongs to that state. No man comes unto you except the father within you draws him. And the father is none other than your own consciousness of fulfillment.

When you live in this state you will discover that your whole relationship to your world has changed. You no longer see yourself as one who is seeking. You see yourself as one who has found. This change is not something you pretend. It is the natural result of the change in consciousness. And because your consciousness has changed, the world must reflect the change. People will meet you differently. Circumstances will arrange themselves differently. What seemed closed will open. What seemed impossible will become natural. All this happens because you are now out-picturing a different state. The world is always the faithful mirror of your consciousness of being.

The state of fulfilled desire is a state of rest. It is the Sabbath. In it you cease from all anxious labor to make your desire appear. You rest in the knowledge that it is already done. This rest is not passivity. It is the highest form of action, for it is action from the level of fulfillment. From this rest the thing you have assumed flows into expression without interference from your former striving. You do not push. You do not pull. You simply are, and the being does the work.

If you fall from this state, as you will at first, you do not condemn yourself. You simply return to it. You return by feeling again the feeling of the wish fulfilled. You do not argue with the evidence of your senses. You do not try to reason your way back into the state. You feel your way back. Feeling is the door. When you feel yourself into the state, the state once more becomes your dwelling place. The more often you return, the more natural the state becomes, until at last you find that you live in it more than you live in the old state of lack. And when the fulfilled state is your permanent dwelling place, the desire has no choice but to appear.

The doubts that arise are not to be fought. They are the voices of the old state calling you back. They tell you that nothing has changed, that the desire is still far off, that you are deceiving yourself. These doubts have no power over you unless you give them your attention. When they arise, you turn from them. You give your attention to the feeling of fulfillment. You remember that consciousness is the only reality and that what you are conscious of being you must express. The doubts, having nothing to feed upon, wither and disappear.

In this state you are aware that you are not the victim of circumstances. You are the creator of circumstances. You are aware that your world is your consciousness out-pictured. Therefore you do not blame the world for your lack. You do not blame conditions or people. You know that you are the cause, and you have changed the cause. The effect must follow. This awareness frees you from all resentment and all sense of injustice. You see that life is always giving you what you are first giving to yourself in consciousness. And because you have given yourself fulfillment, life must give it back to you pressed down and running over.

The state of fulfilled desire is the state in which you give thanks. Not the thanks that is used as a magic formula, but the thanks that arises naturally from the heart of one who has received. This inner gratitude is the proof that the assumption has been made. When you feel grateful for what is not yet seen by the senses but is already felt as real in consciousness, you have truly entered the state. This gratitude is the acknowledgment that the father has done it. It is the acknowledgment that it is finished.

Do not discuss your desire with others while you are establishing yourself in this state. What others think and say belongs to their state, not to yours. When you tell your desire to another you often bring their doubts and fears into your consciousness and dilute the feeling you have assumed. Keep it secret. Let the manifestation speak for itself when it appears. Secrecy is the first law of realization, for it protects the tender feeling of fulfillment until it is strong enough to stand alone.

Live this night in the state of fulfilled desire. As you prepare for sleep, feel the feeling of your wish fulfilled. Feel it as the last feeling of the day. Let the feeling of satisfaction and completion be the feeling with which you enter sleep. In sleep the state deepens. In the morning you will awaken still carrying something of the state, or you will easily return to it by feeling again. Do this night after night. Do not judge the results by the evidence of a single day. Persist in the state. The state is the important thing. The manifestation is the inevitable consequence of the state.

You will find that as you persist, the interval between assumption and manifestation grows shorter. At first it may seem long, for the state is new and must become natural. But as the state becomes your home, the manifestation appears more and more quickly, until at last there is no interval that you can notice. The thing desired appears almost as soon as you have assumed the state, for you have become so one with it that there is no separation between the assumption and the expression.

The state of fulfilled desire is the state of the New Man. It is the state in which you know who you are. You know that you are not the man or woman who lacks. You are the one who has. This knowledge is not a boast. It is a quiet fact. It is the fact of your awareness of being. And this fact, once established, changes everything. Your world must conform to it. Your body must conform to it. Your circumstances must conform to it. For there is no power in heaven or on earth that can prevent consciousness from expressing itself.

You are not waiting for fulfillment. You are the fulfillment seeking expression. When you assume the state of fulfilled desire you are allowing the fulfillment to express itself through you. You are not making it happen by effort. You are letting it happen by being. This is the effortless way. This is the way of faith. This is the way that was taught from the beginning but has been hidden by the belief that fulfillment must come from without.

Tonight you can enter this state. You can feel the feeling of the wish fulfilled. You can rest in the knowing that it is already done. You can give thanks inwardly because you have received. And in this simple act of assuming the state you have set in motion the only creative power there is. Consciousness is the only reality. What you are conscious of being, you express. Be conscious of being the fulfilled one, and fulfillment must appear.

This is the word. This is the truth. Assume the state of fulfilled desire, and you will find that you have assumed the kingdom. For the kingdom of heaven is not a place. It is a state—the state of fulfilled desire made manifest in your consciousness and therefore in your world. Enter it now. Live in it now. And be transformed by it now.