#197: The Psychology of Fulfillment

The Psychology of Fulfillment

A Lecture in the Voice and Spirit of Neville Goddard

CAN a man be fulfilled while his mind still moves among the shadows of unfulfilled desire? Most decidedly he cannot. The fulfilled man does not think of his desire as something that is coming. He thinks from the desire as something that is already his. This is the psychology of fulfillment. It is not a technique added to life. It is the natural mental life of the man who has assumed the state he desires and has made that assumption the very ground of his thinking.

You ask what a fulfilled person thinks about all day. He thinks about everything from the position of one who already possesses what he once sought. His mind does not argue with the evidence of the senses. His mind does not rehearse the old story of how it will be difficult or how long it will take. His mind rests in the quiet knowledge that the thing is done. When he looks at his world he sees it as the out-picturing of a state already accepted within himself. When he speaks to himself in the secret places of his mind he speaks as the man who has received. This is not pretense. This is not imagination in the sense of idle fancy. This is the simple, direct assumption that the desire is already fulfilled, and the consequent thinking that naturally flows from such an assumption.

The common error is to believe that fulfillment will come when the outer conditions change. The fulfilled man knows that the outer conditions change only because he has already changed his inner state. He does not wait for the world to prove to him that his desire is real. He assumes the reality of his desire and lets the world conform. His thinking is therefore never anxious. Anxiety belongs to the man who still thinks of his desire. The fulfilled man has passed from thinking of to thinking from. In that passage all strain disappears. In that passage the mind becomes the willing servant of the state assumed.

Consider what this means in the quiet hours of the day. The fulfilled man rises in the morning already conscious of being the one who has his desire. He does not begin the day by reminding himself of what he lacks. He begins the day by living in the consciousness of what he has. His first thoughts are not petitions. His first thoughts are quiet recognitions. He recognizes himself as the man who is already in possession. This recognition colors every subsequent thought. When he meets the circumstances of the day he meets them as one who cannot be robbed of what is already his. When he encounters delay he does not interpret delay as denial. He interprets every appearance as the necessary bridge of incidents that leads him to the physical confirmation of what he has already accepted as true.

The psychology of fulfillment is therefore a psychology of rest. The man who still thinks of his desire is restless. He is forever calculating, planning, and scheming. The man who thinks from his fulfilled desire is at rest. He has done the only creative act required of him. He has assumed the feeling of the wish fulfilled. Having assumed it, he lives in it. He does not add to it. He does not take from it. He simply lets his thinking be the natural expression of the state he has entered. In this rest there is a strange power. The world, which once seemed to resist him, now seems to cooperate with him. Events arrange themselves. People appear. Circumstances adjust. All of this happens not because he has forced anything, but because he has ceased to think from the state of lack. The state of fulfillment, once assumed, draws to itself everything necessary for its outer expression.

You will find, if you observe closely, that the fulfilled man rarely speaks of his desire to others. He has no need to speak of it. He has already accepted it within himself. His conversations, both outer and inner, are the conversations of one who has. When he is alone with his own thoughts he does not argue for the possibility of his desire. He assumes the possibility is already realized and thinks accordingly. This inner speech is the most important speech in the world. It is the speech that determines what the man will out-picture. If his inner speech is the speech of one who still lacks, he will continue to lack. If his inner speech is the speech of one who already has, he will find himself in possession. The fulfilled man has trained himself to speak inwardly only from the fulfilled state. He has made it his habit. And habit, persisted in, becomes character. Character, persisted in, becomes destiny.

The feeling that accompanies this thinking is not excitement. It is not the feverish feeling of one who hopes against hope. It is the quiet, satisfied feeling of one who knows. The fulfilled man feels the naturalness of his desire. He feels that it belongs to him. He feels that he is the kind of man to whom such things come. This feeling is not something he works up. It is the inevitable result of thinking from the end. When a man thinks from the fulfilled state the feeling of fulfillment is automatic. It is the feeling that belongs to the state. Just as the feeling of poverty belongs to the state of poverty, and the feeling of sickness belongs to the state of sickness, so the feeling of fulfillment belongs to the state of fulfillment. The man who has assumed the state has assumed its feeling. He does not try to feel fulfilled. He is fulfilled in his assumption, and the feeling follows.

This is why the fulfilled man is not disturbed when the outer world has not yet caught up with his inner assumption. He knows that the outer world is always the last to change. It is the shadow cast by the inner state. The shadow must eventually conform to the substance that casts it. The fulfilled man is content to let the shadow take its time. He does not try to push the shadow into place. He simply remains faithful to the substance. His thinking remains anchored in the fulfilled state. Day after day, in the midst of all appearances, he returns to the quiet knowledge that he is already the man he desired to be. This return is not an effort. It becomes as natural as breathing. The old habit of thinking from lack is broken by the new habit of thinking from fulfillment. And the new habit, once established, maintains itself with very little conscious direction.

You will notice also that the fulfilled man does not spend his days rehearsing the past. The past, for him, has been revised by the assumption of the new state. What was once a barrier has become a bridge. What was once evidence against him has become evidence for him. He does not argue with memory. He lets memory serve the state he now occupies. If a memory rises that contradicts his fulfilled assumption, he does not dwell upon it. He turns from it in consciousness and returns to the feeling of the wish fulfilled. This turning is the secret of persistence. It is not a grim holding on. It is a quiet returning to the only reality he acknowledges—the reality of his assumption.

The psychology of fulfillment therefore includes a certain indifference to appearances. The fulfilled man is not indifferent to life. He is indifferent only to those appearances that contradict his assumption. He knows that appearances are always the out-picturing of some state of consciousness. If the appearance is undesirable he does not try to change the appearance directly. He changes the state from which the appearance springs. He returns to the fulfilled state. He thinks from it. He feels from it. And in time the appearance must change because the state that sustains it has been abandoned. This is not fatalism. This is the highest form of action—the action that takes place first in consciousness and then expresses itself in form.

What, then, does the fulfilled man think about all day? He thinks about his work, his relationships, his responsibilities, his pleasures—all from the position of one who has already received the desire of his heart. He thinks as a man who is already whole. He thinks as a man who is already secure. He thinks as a man who is already loved. He thinks as a man who is already successful in the deepest sense of that word. These thoughts are not affirmations tacked onto an old consciousness. They are the natural thoughts of a new consciousness. The old man thought from lack and therefore created more lack. The new man thinks from fulfillment and therefore creates more fulfillment. The difference is not in the things thought about. The difference is in the state from which the thinking proceeds.

This is why the fulfilled man can think about the most ordinary things and yet remain in the consciousness of fulfillment. He does not need to think constantly about his desire. He needs only to think from the state the desire has brought him to. The desire, once assumed as fulfilled, has done its work. It has lifted him to a new level of consciousness. From that level he views everything. From that level he thinks. From that level he feels. And from that level the world slowly but surely reshapes itself.

You who are listening have desired many things. Some of you have assumed the feeling of those desires fulfilled and have seen them appear. Others of you still think of your desires and wonder why they delay. The difference is not in the desire. The difference is in the psychology with which you approach the desire. If you still think of your desire you are still in the state of the man who lacks. If you have learned to think from your desire you have entered the state of the man who has. There is no middle ground. You are either thinking of or thinking from. You are either assuming the feeling of lack or assuming the feeling of fulfillment. The choice is made every time you turn your attention to your inner world.

Tonight, as you prepare for sleep, ask yourself a simple question. How would I feel if my desire were already fulfilled? Do not answer the question with words. Answer it with feeling. Let the feeling come. Let it fill the mind. Let it become the last conscious thought before you lose yourself in sleep. In that moment you are practicing the psychology of fulfillment. You are thinking from the end. You are assuming the state. And in that assumption the creative power of consciousness begins its quiet work. The bridge of incidents is being built. The world is being prepared. And you, in the silence of your own mind, have already received.

Do not be concerned with how long the outer confirmation will take. The fulfilled man is not concerned with time. He knows that time is only the interval between the assumption and its realization. He has already bridged that interval in consciousness. The outer world must in time reflect what has been accepted within. This is law. This is not hope. This is the inevitable consequence of assuming the feeling of the wish fulfilled and thinking from that assumption.

You are not asked to believe something that is not true. You are asked to assume something that will become true the moment you assume it. The fulfilled man is not a man who has more than others. He is a man who has assumed a different state of consciousness. From that state everything else follows. His thinking is the thinking that belongs to that state. His feeling is the feeling that belongs to that state. His world is the world that belongs to that state. This is the psychology of fulfillment. It is simple. It is direct. It is the way consciousness operates when it is no longer divided against itself.

Tonight, let your last thought be the thought of fulfillment. Let your last feeling be the feeling of the wish fulfilled. And tomorrow, when you rise, let your first thought be the quiet recognition that you are already the man you desire to be. In that recognition the psychology of fulfillment will begin to operate in your life. And in time you will discover that you have not merely thought about fulfillment. You have thought from fulfillment. And the world has answered accordingly.

The fulfilled man does not ask what he shall think about all day. He knows. He thinks from the state he has assumed. He thinks as one who has already received. He thinks as one who cannot be denied. He thinks as one whose desire has already been incorporated into his consciousness and is now expressing itself in every area of his life. This is not a promise. This is a description of what actually takes place when a man passes from thinking of his desire to thinking from his desire. The passage is made in a moment. The results of the passage appear over time. But the passage itself is the work of an instant. Assume the feeling of the wish fulfilled. Think from that feeling. And you have already entered the psychology of fulfillment. Everything else is the natural and inevitable unfoldment of that assumption.