77. Decolonizing manifestation, Part 2 - Our Desires come from Ancestors

Conventional manifestation puts all the weight on you: what you want, what thoughts you think, what you put on your vision board, your vibrations.

In today's episode, I'm proposing a radical reframe. 

Manifestation is a collaboration with your ancestors, and the best way to manifest is to become a channel for what your ancestors already intend for you. And the work includes learning how to listen to them to begin with.

(I've also found this to be the most satisfying, effective, and joyful way of getting what you want.)

This is part two of the decolonizing manifestation series.

Transcript

Hello, everyone. Welcome back. You're listening to Liberatory Business, and I'm your host, Simone Seol. Thank you so much for listening.

Okay, so last time — which was the first episode of the multi-part series on decolonizing manifestation — we went to the roots, right? We talked about how old and how lineaged this idea of manifestation is.

A radical reframe on what manifestation is

And today I'm going to start by proposing a radical reframe on what manifestation is in the first place.

The radical reorientation I want to suggest is this: the real work of manifestation — the truest version, the most effective version — is to figure out what our ancestors want for us. Being receptive and sensitive to that communication about what's being asked of us, who we are, and where we're meant to go, all of it.

And then actually saying yes to it, and using our powers to turn yourself into a channel that can make that happen.

Not you as an individual deciding what you want and making that happen. These two are very different things.

The conventional kind, the one most people are familiar with, is about what you want and making that happen — manifesting your desires. The version I'm proposing is inherently so much more relational. It's an artifact of your belongingness in your lineage — biological and creative and spiritual, all of it.

It's deeply contextual and relational work, as opposed to individualistic work.

So this is gonna require a little bit of unpacking, but here's my hope. My hope is that by the end of this episode, I'll have sold you on the value of thinking about manifestation this way. Even if you're not familiar with ancestral work right now, even if you don't have an intentional ancestral practice — no problem. Even if you're not sure you're on board with this whole ancestor thing at all.

Why I want to bring this to you

I'm gonna get into all that. But the reason I'm offering you this is that it's a radically different way of understanding yourself and your life — what you're here to do and what you're capable of doing. And it makes everything about manifestation make so much more sense. It makes everything so much easier. And honestly, I think it's gonna feel like a giant relief, because it means that whatever you want, you're not trying to make it happen alone.

It's not all on you. It's not a test of whether you're good enough, skilled enough, high-vibration enough, powerful enough to do it on your own. And to be honest, I don't think that's just an ineffective way to do this work — I think it's a lonely one. To know that whatever you're manifesting, you're doing it rooted in relationship first, relationship with people who love you — that feels so much better.

And the second reason is that when you orient to ancestral direction — ancestral blessing — as the way you understand manifestation, it's gonna point you toward things that will actually fill you up. Things that'll actually make you happy. Because we all know what it looks like, right? When we've spent all this time, all this energy chasing something, dead sure that the minute we have it we're gonna be fulfilled, we're gonna be happy — and then we get it, and it turns out it's not what you thought it was gonna be.

It doesn't make you happy like you thought it would. This is the way to stop doing that to yourself — to point your powers of reality creation in the direction that's actually good for you, the direction that actually serves you in the long run.

And the last reason I wanna bring this to you is that when you know your sense of what you want comes from something so much bigger than you and your ego, you get access to a kind of courage, a conviction, a strength that's immovable.

You get to want things and go after things from a place that's so grounded, so peaceful, and so steady that you become so much harder to knock off course.

This is why I'm insisting on bringing these ideas to you, even if it takes a little bit of unpacking — which is exactly what we're going to do. First, in order to say this, I have to explain a little bit about what I mean when I say ancestors. I have to tell you a little bit about my cosmology, and maybe even my theology.

What I mean by ancestors

Because when I say ancestors, I don't just mean your deceased parents, or your deceased grandma and grandpa and great-grandma and great-grandpa and great-great-great, right? Yes, those people too, obviously.

But here's the thing: our ancestors have ancestors. However many great-great-great-great grandmas and grandpas you can track back to, they also have ancestors. And other people's ancestors have ancestors. And actually, if you think about it, if you go back long enough, all of our ancestors converge at the very top — at the level of what a lot of people call God.

This great cosmic, universal, creative, loving intelligence. So when I say ancestors, yes, I mean your late grandma and grandpa — but I also mean, at the ultimate level, this great cosmic, loving, creative super-intelligence that so many of us call God, call Allah, call whatever you wanna call it, right?

With fractals of it being lived out by the specific individuals — the ancestors who love us and care for us. That's what I think of as ancestors. Some people call it spirit guides, or angels. I don't care what you call it.

I'm just telling you my own view, which is colored by the lineage I come from, which happens to be East Asian.

A teaching from Korean spirituality

So I actually wanna tell you about what I think is a super cool teaching in traditional Korean spirituality.

According to traditional Korean spiritual wisdom, our ancestors are actually the most effective intermediary between us and the heavens, or God, or whatever you wanna call it.

Whenever we want any answer, any help, we call upon the ancestors first. And here's why. While we're here on earth living as human beings, we're limited in our connection to the spiritual world. I mean, we're obviously always connected, but the connection is limited because we're bound to the 3D space-time continuum.

We're physically bound to our bodies. But when you cross over to the other side, you're in the spiritual realm, and so you have closer access to spiritual realities and the ultimate divine. And because those ancestors have a personal relationship with you, they're literally invested in you — in your happiness and your safety — because, hello, you're their descendant.

You carry their DNA and their likeness. So obviously they love you so much, and they're rooting for you in a very personal way. They're in the position to petition on your behalf. They can move things around on your behalf. They can essentially ask God, or the heavens, or the ultimate divine authority, "Hey, here's my descendant, they're trying to do a thing.

Can you do us a solid?" right? Of course, you can always pray on your own behalf. But our ancestors naturally have a more direct line, because they're already in the spirit realm, and they're already on your side. So this is something Koreans have always believed — and from my understanding, not only Koreans believe this.

So I offer it to you in case it resonates.

Think of someone younger you love

By the way, shout out to my friend Minju Park — she's @fluentkorean on Instagram — for teaching this bit to me, because she's an expert on all things Korea. The minute she said it, I was like, "Wait, that makes so much sense." It feels like something I already knew, but it also blew my mind at the same time, to have this theology of the Korean people explained this way. So thank you, Minju, if you're listening.

Okay. So I want you to really take a moment to connect to what ancestral love actually means — because this is what you're on the receiving end of, and I want you to have a vividly felt sense of it. 'Cause otherwise it can just feel abstract, right? So...

Think about someone that you love who is younger than you. It might be your literal child, or maybe even someone you mentor, or a niece or a nephew.

Honestly, if you're like, "I don't have children, I'm not really into human children," but you have a dog that you love and you would do anything for — okay, think about that dog.

And think about what you would want for them. Not what the world wants for them, but what you want in your deepest heart of love for them. You don't just want them to be rich or famous, or to do the biggest, most impressive things by social standards, right? You want the biggest version of what's actually true to them. And I think an important nuance here is that you want the best for them, and you don't want them to suffer, right?

But you also know there are certain lessons they can only learn by going through something hard, right? So you don't necessarily want to spare them every single kind of pain.

So that clarity, that love — if you can connect to how that feels for a young person you love, you can turn it around toward yourself. Because that's exactly how your ancestors feel about you when they look at you. That's exactly what they want for you.

What this work actually looks like

Now let's talk about what this work actually looks like. If it's not just you going out and making it all happen by yourself, for yourself — if it's more relational — what does that work actually look like?

There's a great yin-yang polarity to it. You need to be able to hear what your ancestors want for you and receive it — which means you register it, you accept it, and you make yourself available to the thing that already wants to happen for you.

That kind of receiving is yin. But it's not only passive. Some of it is passive — but making yourself available to something can be an incredibly active process. So here's an example. Many years ago — well over 10 years ago now, when I was much younger — I was going through a process of getting clear about what I wanted to make myself available for when it came to friendship, right?

I decided: I have all kinds of friends in my life right now, and I only wanna have friendships that actually replenish me and fuel me and add to my life — where I spend time with these friends and I come away feeling fueled instead of depleted, right? Friendships that help me grow in life.

And so I wanted that for myself. And making it happen wasn't just like, "Oh, I'm gonna sit here and do nothing and wait for the right friendships to find me." It meant I had to go out and basically unsubscribe from the friendships that weren't the kind I wanted anymore. And that was a very active process.

Making proactive decisions, changing my own default relational habits, changing what I say yes or no to. I had to do a lot of work on myself to become the person who could not only invite in, but also sustain and nurture, the kind of friendships I wanted.

So that's what I mean when I say receiving is both passive and active.

How do ancestors actually speak to us?

Okay, so this is probably the part you've been waiting for me to get to. Let's talk about how ancestors actually speak to us. How do you begin to know? How do you receive the information? Let's talk about it.

I'm gonna give you a guide. And what I want to say is, this is never gonna be a perfect guide, because we're talking about spiritual reality and how to work with it — and trying to capture that through human words is always gonna fall short a little bit.

But we're gonna try, because I do think it's helpful to think about this in terms of a few simple directives that we can apply as filters to our lives.

Now, I'm gonna offer you three ways that you can tell.

The first way: through other people

The first way to know how our ancestors speak to us is through other people — through the people in your life who love you and see you in your power, in your bigness, in your wholeness, even when you don't see it.

Because sometimes the people who love us can see us more clearly than we can see ourselves, especially the parts we're too scared to claim for ourselves. So here's the question to hold up in your life. If you have people like that, who do they say that you are?

And I'm not talking about people who've just known you the longest, or random people you're related to, or who are closest to you — because those aren't necessarily the people who see you in your power, in your wholeness, in your bigness, in your truth, right?

If you can think of someone who thinks the world of you, adores you, treasures you — and the way they see you, even if you can't always see yourself through the same eyes — if you feel loved and affirmed and expanded by the way they see you. If you can think of just one, even just one person who is that kind of presence for you. It could be a family member, could be a mentor, could be a friend, could even be your child. I think I've talked to a lot of people for whom it's their child who sees them that way.

You wanna keep that awareness really close to your heart: how does this person see me, who do they say that I am? And make room for that self-concept in your mind — because, hello, that's your ancestor speaking.

The second way: through life events

The second way to know is through life events — the patterns of what happens. You might have had experiences where there are certain doors that just won't open, no matter how hard you try, even when you're doing everything right.

One example from my life: for a long time I thought I was supposed to climb the ladder in academia, and I was good at it. I was in the right place at the right time. It felt well-suited to me on every logical level, and I was on track. I had finished my master's, and I was on track to get a PhD in this particular prestigious program. And somehow, mysteriously enough, I lost the appetite to do the work.

I couldn't keep showing up the same way and producing at the level I had been, even though nothing had changed in my intelligence. Little projects, little goals just started to not work out, and at the time I couldn't understand why. And then something happened in my personal life that made the whole PhD timeline I'd been planning on entirely impossible. At the time, it felt like a catastrophe.

It felt like a giant, big, fat failure. But looking back, I knew — oh, my ancestors were saying, "You're not going in that direction." It was a redirection. Even though at the time, with my awareness, that's all I could envision for myself. That was the best I could have envisioned for myself. But that path wasn't for me.

And sometimes it works the other way too. Sometimes a door opens and you're like, "Whoa, I was not thinking about that door at all. I didn't know that was for me." And you might have resisted it at first. An example from my personal life: I never in my entire life thought I was gonna marry a super Korean dude, live in Korea, raise a Korean child.

My parents raised me to see myself as a woman of the world, right? They took us to the United States — well, they took themselves to the United States first, and then they brought us over — because they wanted us to have the biggest lives possible, and big meant not Korea. But through a set of circumstances that at the time felt very frustrating and totally unpredictable, I was briefly visiting Korea, and I ended up on a date with my now-husband. And there was a distinct moment where I realized — I remember it — I was like, "Fuck, I'm gonna be living in this country for the rest of my life, aren't I?"

Right? 'Cause I was falling in love with this guy, and a part of me recognized — oh, shit, I'm stuck here. It was such a devious move on the part of my ancestors. They got me to fall in love so that I would come back to where I needed to be. And now, many years later, I can see a thousand different ways why I needed to be here and nowhere else — to do the work I'm meant to do, for not just the world, but for my family.

My ancestors literally called me home, and I thank them for it every single day. And here's where a skeptical person might think: okay, but isn't that just you fitting your life into a neat little retrospective narrative after the fact, and calling it, "Oh, my ancestors wanted this for me"? How do you know you're not just justifying what happened?

And you're right — I can't prove this is what my ancestors wanted. I can't deliver you a notarized letter as objective proof, right? But here's how I know, and how I think you can know for your own life. If you have a story of what you think your ancestors willed for you, and you're wondering whether it's true or just something you made up because it feels convenient and sounds good — ask yourself this: does living inside this story make you more alive, more rooted, more powerful, more able and resourced to do hard things? Or less?

Because here's what I noticed. When I was living inside the other story — like, I'm supposed to be a woman of the world, and that means not Korea, my life is supposed to be big, and that means anywhere but Korea — I was running somebody else's programming. And whatever I tried to do, things took effort.

It felt like running uphill. I was tinkering with the engine the whole time. But when I let myself be called home, a thousand things clicked into place in ways I could never have engineered in advance — that I didn't have enough foresight to arrange on my own. Everything just started to click.

I cannot give you objective proof that it was my ancestors. But I can feel the difference between a life I'm forcing to try to happen and a life that's carrying me forward. It's like the difference between trying to swim uphill and sailing with the wind on your back. And it does not mean there's no difficulty.

It does not mean there's no pain, no trial. Absolutely, there have been. And yet there's a quality of difference between trials that I know are meant for me, and ones where I'm like, "I think this is work I shouldn't have to do," right? So that felt sense is how you discern. It's how I discern.

The third way: through the emotion underneath the desire

Now, the third way to tell is to check what the emotional fuel underneath the desire is when you peel the layers back. If you look under the hood of what's motivating this particular want — what's actually driving it? And what do you find at the bottom of it? Why do you want this? What do you think it'll give you?

Why do you want that? What do you think it's gonna give you when you have it? And you just keep asking those questions, and you get down to the bottom — and if what you find down there is fear or scarcity or shame at the root of this desire, that might be a sign that the desire wasn't ancestrally implanted in you, but rather generated by your ego.

And your ego isn't bad — it just wants to protect itself. Ego's primary interest is survival, not happiness or growth or fulfillment, right? So here's an example. Let's say you wanna make a lot of money. "I wanna make a lot of money." Great, but why? And you go a little bit deeper. "Well, because it means I can have blah, blah, blah."

Well, why do you want blah, blah, blah? "Well, that's because da, da, da, da." And you do a few rounds of these questions — but why do you want that? Why do you want that? And it turns out the real reason you want all of this, at the root — I'm just making this up — is that it's finally going to prove your parents wrong.

Your parents who always told you — again, I'm totally making this up — that you don't have what it takes, that you're not good enough. And you're like, "I wanna prove them wrong," right?

So here's the treatment we apply to it. I would ask: imagine someone could wave a magic wand and take that tension away, take that fear away. Imagine you already felt completely safe, completely respected, and there was nothing to prove to anyone, ever.

Just imagine that's true, and then take a look at that desire. Is it still there? Is it still the same? In this fictional example I just made up, most likely it just kind of deflated, or faded a little bit. That shows you that what was really underneath the desire was an ego survival mechanism.

And I want to be so sure to say: that does not mean you did something wrong, or that you're bad. It literally means there was an unconscious program running that was prioritizing your survival — you being okay, you being safe. And that unconscious instinct is a good thing. It got you to where you are today. That's amazing.

And at the same time, when you look under the hood, when you really look at what's beneath that desire — it's not that the desire is bad. It's just that it might not have the most effective fuel under it. And when you really examine this, right, you might find that you still wanna make a lot of money. But when that fear layer is gone, when that layer of tension of "Look, I gotta prove myself" is gone, you might realize that what's really left is this sense of, "Oh, actually, I have work I wanna do in this world. I have things I wanna change. I wanna take care of my people. I wanna build X, Y, and Z for the world."

And that vision, that desire, requires resources — and that means money. And when you get to the bottom of that, none of it feels like fear. None of it feels like self-protection. And that's how you know: "Oh, okay — that's something my ancestors want for me, something they planned for me, something that's been marked for me."

Now, sometimes this whole ego, fear, survival mechanism works in a very different way. Sometimes what ego does is hide your true desires from your own view. And here's what that can look like. Someone says, "Oh, you know, I don't really want much. I don't need that much money. I don't need that much of this and that. I'm content with a simple life," right? That sounds great. It sounds like wisdom — and sometimes that's exactly what's best for them. That's the truest, most ancestrally appointed shape of a person's life. However, sometimes you look under the hood of "I'm content with a simple life," and what's driving it isn't really peace. It's a sneakier form of fear.

Like, "I don't want much because wanting more means I could fail at getting it, and then I'd feel all the terrible feelings." Or, "I don't want much because every time I wanted something big, I got punished. Other people got weird around it. Bad things happened. So it's safer if I want less." So this is a case where fear is obstructing the view of a true desire. Because what would happen to this — again, fictional — person if I asked...

If you knew that whatever you wanted could work out, what would happen to your desire? If no one's ever gonna judge you, or call you greedy or arrogant or too much, or say, "Who does that person think they are?" — if no one is ever gonna say anything like that, what might you find yourself wanting?

What if there's no scary consequence waiting on the other side of wanting something more? What if there's no punishment for being too big, for taking up too much space, for having more? What would that version of you want? Is it still a simple life? Maybe it is. If it is, then amazing — that's real. But maybe it isn't. And if something comes up that surprises you, then you might have a conversation you need to have with your ancestors, right?

Your true shape

But that's what I love about this. When you start listening to your ancestors, you get back in touch with your true shape, your true size, the true dimensions of what you are and what you're capable of. And that becomes a foundation that can't be shaken by external circumstances, or by the world, or by whether your output goes up or down one day to the next.

It gives you an immovable set of roots. And it gives you the courage to do unconventional things, to go against the grain.

It's a conversation, not a test

And the thing is — and this is a little funny — what your ancestors want for you doesn't necessarily arrive as one fixed, complete, sealed document that you have to decode perfectly and execute. It's not like that. It's a conversation. And sometimes it's a negotiation. Because, yeah, your ancestors want the best for you, but they also respect your sovereignty.

Think about it like having a child who's also a grown adult. I don't have a grown adult child yet, but hopefully one day I will, if I live long enough. Let's say you have an adult child who stays up until 4:00 in the morning every night playing video games, and they have to be at work at 9:00.

You know that's probably not great for their long-term health and happiness. But if that's what they keep choosing to do with their agency, night after night, week after week, month after month — there's only so much you can do to stop them, because they're a grown-up. Like, I'm gonna respect that this is what you wanna do with your life, and you're gonna suffer the consequences.

That's fine. You're still gonna love them so much. You're just gonna be like, "Okay." So that's the same way it goes with your ancestors. There have been times when I got a message clear as day, and I ignored it. Like, "Yeah, okay, but maybe later." Or, "Oh, it's too hard, I don't wanna do that." Right? And they're like, "Okay. We'll give you time." There's a back and forth. Like, I wanna play video games until 4:00 in the morning for now, right? They might not love it. And you might wanna negotiate with them: "Okay, so..." This is a silly example, right? But — "Let me play video games for these few months. I'm really into this game. Once I'm done with this game, I'll do what you want me to do." Whatever. What your ancestors say back to that, I don't know. But again, the important thing is that this is a conversation with someone who loves you — not a test you have to pass with perfect grades.

The posture: finding the will and doing it wholeheartedly

So that said, there's something I always think about when it comes to the posture you need to take when undertaking this task of listening to ancestors — the kind of posture I orient to.

It's very specific to me and my life story, and it's from one of the most formative and beloved movies of my whole life — one I've watched five million times and still cry every time. The Sound of Music.

You know there's this part early on in the movie where the Mother Superior calls Maria in. Maria's been summoned, and she's about to be sent to the von Trapps, and she has no idea. And the Mother Superior asks her, "Maria, you're at this convent — what's the most important thing you've learned here so far?"

And Maria's answer — something that has stayed with me all these years, that I think about way too much — she says, "The most important thing I've learned here is to find out what is the will of God, and to do it wholeheartedly." And when I first watched that movie, the first many times I watched it, I was very Catholic — and some part of me still is — and I was so moved by what a beautiful, profound, wise answer that is.

'Cause she was a novice at the time — is that what you call it? Novitiate, novice? A nun in training. And when she was asked, "What's the most important thing you've learned here?" she could have said, you know, how to be a good nun, or something. But instead it was essentially about discerning the will of God — and wholeheartedly making yourself a vessel for what God wants for you.

And that's what I think manifestation is. That's when you have the greatest power source underneath you — whether you call it God or ancestors, or, in my mind, both. That's when your eyes are the most open and clear.

That's when you see the openings, the opportunities, the connections being sent your way. When Maria was told she's gonna be a governess — right? — to seven children of a widowed captain, that was not in any way anything she ever wanted for herself. In fact, it was the opposite. She wanted to be a nun.

It was a big breakdown of her self-concept to be able to say yes to what God was asking her to do. And yet it led — at least in the context of the movie, and from what I know, in real life too — to the life she was really meant for. She was never gonna make a good nun, right? And from my own life too: what my ancestors have wanted from me has consistently been so much bigger, deeper, more beautiful, more colorful, more enriching and joyful than anything I could have come up with for myself.

Out of my conditioning, right? Out of my limited self-concept, out of the limits of my own imagination.

Ancestors at the smallest level too

And remember, this isn't all about your destiny and generations and the fate of the world. There's the big level, right, of what's meant for you. But I also think your ancestors are always talking to you at the smallest level. I always think ancestors are your best life coach. Like — how do you wanna feel today?

What would actually nourish your body today? Who do you wanna spend time with today? They have answers at that level too, 'cause they want you to be happy.

They love who you are, way beyond whatever the world has told you about who you are.

What's next

So that leaves us with the obvious question. Okay — what my ancestors want from me: heard, received, registered. What then? What's next? How do I become the channel for that reality? How do I translate an ancestrally implanted vision into reality?

Well, that part is the next episode.

And I can't wait to get into it with you. Thank you so much for listening, and I'll talk to you next time.