5 Steps to Obtain Anything You Want

The master formula of attainment according to the esoteric thinker, William Walker Atkinson

I spent over a year interning for a book summarizing startup (think Blinkist but much smaller). Though I didn’t leave with any money, I got to read some great books. One of these was the Personal Power Series by William Walker Atkinson.

Now the term “occult philosophy” may bring fantastical images to mind. Still, if reading Atkinson’s work taught me anything, it’s that occult philosophy is simply taking a look at the world from a different angle than we are accustomed to.

With that said, there is nothing impractical or fantastical about Atkinson’s work —you will find quite the opposite when observing his “Master Formula of Attainment.”

These five steps form a ladder; you must complete the first step sufficiently before attempting the second, and so on. These steps feed into each other, and the early ones form a basis for the latter.

When following the Master Formula of Attainment:

First, you must have a definite ideal

Another way of putting this is knowing what you want with precision and clarity. The clearer your idea of what you want to achieve, the closer you are to making it a reality.

This step is similar to what the professional basketball player does at the free-throw line. As he goes through his routine to prepare for the shot, he visualizes the ball going into the basket. This visualization helps him define what he wants to accomplish and synchronizes his mind, body, and attitude towards a specific result.

You should apply this step to every task in your process of personal achievement. If your goal is to start a successful business, for example, visualize working alongside your employees in the production room and shipping out products. Picture the face your satisfied customer makes after striking a deal with you. Imagine the respect your logo demands in light of your reputation for high-quality service, or envision a balance sheet with many zeros in the black.

There is a similar operation here to vision boarding. The process of creating a definite ideal will act as calibration — it will orient your mental, emotional and physical faculties towards making this ideal a reality and is the first step of attainment.

“Everything that man has ever succeeded in building has first existed in ideal form in his mind. Everything that he has ever succeeded in accomplishing has been attained largely by reason of a definite purpose existing in his mind and serving to direct and employ his will.”

-William Walker Atkinson

Second, you must have an insistent desire

Now that you have a clear image of what you want, you must want it hard enough.

Even if you have crafted a clear and precise picture of what you want in your mind, it will remain a mental picture if there isn’t sufficient desire. How often do we have a great idea or fantasy but not a strong enough urge to make it a reality?

Desire is the crucial basis of all human activity. When you break it down to its most fundamental, you will see that there is no reason to do anything without desire (or its opposite, desire in the negative). Our base desires as humans are for water, food, shelter, and to reproduce. As complex as human society has become, we can attribute all of our collective accomplishments to these base desires at some level.

Having an insistent desire creates a flame in you that gives life to your ideals. It takes your purely theoretical goals and spurs you to make something more of them. That is why having an insistent desire is the second key to attainment. The more passion you have for your goals, the more energy you can muster to achieve them.

“Insistent desire is a strong elemental urge — a primeval, aboriginal force. It is the force that animates all living things in their elemental conditions, and which seems to be present even in the inanimate forces of Nature. It is the power manifesting in all evolution, in all progress, in all achievement. It is a Raw Force — something essentially elemental and primitive. It is the Force that ‘does things,’ that ‘gains things,’ in the world of change and becoming.”

-William Walker Atkinson

Third, you must confidently expect success

Once you have a definite ideal and an insistent desire toward your goal, you need to have well-placed faith in your success.

It is easy for many people to disregard faith, associating the word with irrationality and magical thinking. When taken to excess, faith can become these things, but in proper measure, faith is a crucial component of attainment.

When I use the word faith here, I am using it slightly differently than its connotation suggests. In this context, confident expectation describes the kind of faith you have that if you drop a rock off a cliff, it will fall. In theory, you can’t know if the rock will fall or not until you drop it, yet you are confident of the result to the extent that any other prediction seems absurd.

This example is the kind of confident expectation you must have in going after your goals. The power behind this is far from mystical; a deeply held belief in what you are trying to accomplish will add vigor to your efforts. Your attitude of faith deeply affects your subconscious faculties, which empowers your decision-making, perception, and efficacy.

The opposite is true as well. A lack of faith in yourself and your endeavors will cause you to half-step. You will keep one foot in the realm of action and one foot in passivity. Even further, having faith in failure will all but guarantee it by training your subconscious to act against your goals and limit your efforts.

As Henry Ford famously said, “Whether you think you can, or think you can’t — you’re right.”

“There is a subtle principle of psychology involved in the operation of Faith Power — of Confident Expectation and Expectant Attention. The mental attitude indicated by those terms is accompanied by a sharpening of the perceptive and reflective mental powers…generally stiffening and strengthening of the will.”

-William Walker Atkinson

Fourth, you must have a persistent determination

The next stage in getting anything you want in the world is persistent determination towards your goals.

To put it most simply, this means you must apply your willpower consistently and in a focused manner until you pass the finish line.

Despite sounding easy, this is a critical step in the process. This step is where you will do most of the hard work. Depending on your goal’s magnitude and circumstances, you may have to apply persistent determination for months or years.

There may be long periods when you don’t see a lot of progress resulting from your efforts. I wrote about this phenomenon briefly here:

Even worse is when you face setbacks or seem to be going backward. These are the points where most will give up and where your persistent determination is the most important. It’s easy to be determined when things are going well and going quickly; when things get slow and grueling, this becomes a challenge.

Persistent determination also means focusing your efforts as much as possible. Your force of will is much more powerful when you are not spreading it in many different directions. The combination of focused effort being applied to a clear goal consistently will have a powerful effect.

When considering persistent determination, envision the stream on the side of the mountain. At first, the stream seems inconsequential to the mountain. Still, the stream persists in its flow. It rubs and chips away slowly until, after many years, the stream manages to carve out an entire valley. In this same way, your application of concentrated will to your goals may be slow, but with time and consistency, the small gains will turn into massive results.

“You will catch the spirit of Persistent Determination when you consider the essential meaning of the two elements…‘Persistence’ is, ‘Tenacity, doggedness, staying quality.’ ‘Determination’ is ‘Strength and firmness of mind; firm resolve or resolution; absolute direction to a certain end.’”

-William Walker Atkinson

Last, there must be balanced compensation

In other words, this means you must be willing to pay a fair price for the results you seek.

It is considered a universal truth that you cannot get something for nothing— the first law of thermodynamics represents this. This principle remains true when it comes to your goals. After you create a definite ideal, gather a persistent desire, confidently expect your success, and persistently determine toward your goals, the last thing left is to pay the price.

This price can come in many different forms. The most apparent can be the time, energy, and focus it takes to get what you want. Another form of this is sacrificing other goals to focus your efforts on the most important ones — an opportunity cost. Conflicting goals increase this need for axing the lesser ones.

The price you have to pay can potentially be thorough training or choosing work over leisure. You may even have to sacrifice parts of your worldview that prevent you from achieving what you want.

The fact that everything in nature has a cost means you will invariably have to sacrifice to achieve anything significant. This need for sacrifice is not a bad thing, though — if you followed the previous four steps, the price will be well worth what you get in return.

“All men who have obtained, attained, or achieved anything at all worthwhile, have ‘paid the price.’ The ‘price’ paid by them consists of various elements. Work performed; persistent application; perseverence; industry; diligence — all these form a part of the ‘price.’”

-William Walker Atkinson

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