This book has been annotated to contain an article on the history of the New Thought Movement and its influence on the author, to provide a comprehensive historical context for her writings.
On this book, the author says: THESE pages have been written for the purpose of furnishing you a key to the attainment of your desires, and to explain that Fear should be entirely banished from your consciousness in order for you to obtain possession of the things you want. This presupposes, of course, that your desire for possession is based upon your aspiration for greater happiness. For example, you feel that the possession of more money, lands, or friends will make you happier, and your desire for possession of these things arises from a conviction that their possession will bring you freedom and contentment. In your effort to possess, you will discover that the thing you most need is to consistently “Be” your best self,
Genevieve Behrend was the only personal student of New Thought ("Mental Science") writer Thomas Troward. She established The School of the Builders in New York City and ran it until 1925.
The critical view of books like this and their contemporary equivalents like “The Secret” or “Ask and It Is Given” is that they focus on and pander to materialism. So then people ask, is it really good to use the power of visualization to manifest a materialistic object like say a new $80000 BMW? When we begin to ask such question, we’ve totally missed the point. What you use “Your Invisible Power” (Visualization > Manifestation) for is not what’s significant here. What is much more important is the paradigm shift, the knowledge and discovery that you are a spiritual being, a source of powerful energy, a “co-creator” in this universe; and that you are able to use the power within you to visualize and bring things or circumstances into existence. You can bring anything into being if you understand what you are capable of, if you develop a relaxed belief and faith in its coming - it shall come to pass. With this knowledge you can never be a victim of circumstance, for you are a center of power...
Almost every line a truth... a jewel. -------------------------------------------
"The thing you most need is to consistently be your best self."
"The Joy of Living comes from within. Therefore, make the effort to obtain the things which will bring joy, provided that your desires are in accord with the Joy of Living."
"All study and meditation should be without strain or tension."
"Whatever you think and feel yourself to be, the Creative Spirit of Life is bound to faithfully reproduce in a corresponding reaction."
"Since Order is Heaven’s first law, and visualization places things in their natural order, then it must be a heavenly thing to visualize."
"In visualizing - making a mental picture - you are not endeavoring to change the laws of Nature. You fulfill them. Visualizing is the great secret of success."
"Visualizing without a will sufficiently steady to inhibit every thought and feeling contrary to your pictured thought would be useless."
"The joyous assurance with which you make your picture is the very powerful magnet of Faith, and nothing can obliterate it."
"Your mental picture is Universal Mind specifically exercising its inherent powers of initiative and selection."
“ 'Ask and ye shall receive.' The trunk of the tree cannot fail to provide for its branches."
"The Power that brought you into existence did so for the purpose of expressing its limitless supply through you."
"You have the great Power. Sometimes you are unable to recognize it is there. Infinite substance is manifesting in you right now."
"As you grow in the comprehension that your being, your individuality, is God particularizing Himself, you naturally develop Divine tendencies."
"Make a mental picture of your business increasing, instead of a picture of losing it."
"The more enthusiasm and faith you put into your picture, the more quickly it will come into visible form. (This) is increased by keeping your desire secret."
"Past experience has no bearing upon your present picture."
"Visualizing is an Aladdin’s lamp to those with a mighty will."
"She kept her vision, and it strengthened with her faith."
"[Your mantra:] 'The best there is, is mine. There is no limit to me, because my mind is a center of divine operation.' Your picture is as certain to come true, in your physical world, as the sun is to shine."
"By holding your picture in a cheerful frame of mind, you shut out all thoughts that would disperse or dissipate its spiritual nucleus."
"You concentrate energy of a particular kind for a particular purpose. Keep this in mind and let specific details take care of themselves. Never mention what you are doing to anyone."
"Never forget that every physical thing, whether for you or against you, was a sustained thought before it was a thing. Thought is not good or bad; it is Creative Action and always takes physical form."
"So be yourself and enjoy Life in your own Divine way. Do not fear to be your true self, for everything you want, wants you."
"Since Divine life is operating in me, I must be Divinely inhabited, and the Divine in me must operate just as it operates upon the Universal plane."
"In every word is a power germ which expands projecting itself in the direction your word indicates, and ultimately develops into physical expression."
"Everyone knows that joy comes from within. No one can give it to you. Joy is a state of consciousness, and consciousness is purely mental."
"Only believe, and all things are possible unto you."
"Your desire to be your best expands your faith into the faith of the Universe which knows no failure, and has brought you into conscious realization that you are not a victim of the universe, but a part of it."
"If you think your thought is powerful, your thought is powerful."
"Ask, believing you have already received, and you shall receive."
"Your steady recognition of Thought Possession causes the thought to concentrate, to condense, to project itself, and to assume physical form."
"Free your consciousness entirely of all thoughts and feelings other than: Love and Unity with all Humanity.
"You were given life to enjoy it fully. The steady recognition of this Truth makes you declare yourself a Prince of Power."
"Jesus did not claim to be more divine than you. His power was developed through personal effort. He said you could do the same if you would only believe in yourself."
"A great idea is valueless unless accompanied by physical action. God gives the idea; man works it out upon the physical plane."
"Repeat the word 'joy' secretly, persistently and emphatically. The repetition sets up a quality of vibration which causes the joy germ to expand and project itself until your whole being is filled with joy. This is not a mere fancy, but a truth."
"Absolute dominion is yours when you have sufficient self-mastery to conquer the negative tendency of thoughts and actions."
"All disappointments and failures are the result of endeavoring to think one thing and produce another."
“Even intense fear requires faith.” -Your Invisible Power
I like a lot of things about this book. What I gained the most was the articulate written-expression of holding the image in your mind that you want to become.
You become in your mental domain first, whatever it is that you will, secondly, desire to be in its physical form. Thoughts are real and they are everything—in most cases. If one is having trouble achieving their dreams, then this book will possibly help you to excavate one of the root causes. Great book!
Very reminiscent of Florence Scovel Shinn, Prentice Mulford, and Neville Goddard. If you liked any of those authors, you'll probably like this too.
My takeaway from this: "For every five minutes given to reading and study of the theories of Mental Science, spend fifteen minutes in the use and application of the knowledge acquired." Your Invisible Power, pg 56. Good advice.
Great book! I would say it requires some knowledge of the Law of Attraction beforehand though only because her terminology may be hard to understand.. I wouldn't recommend it to someone as their first book on the subject although the subject is pretty basic. It was a quick read and I did learn some new tips on visualizing, so all in all, it was worth it.
Written in 1921 following the New Thought movement and Thomas Troward. Focuses on visualization and faith. Excellent read.
"It is the Faith which understands that every creation had its birth in the womb of thought -words that gives you dominion over all things, your lesser self included, and this feeling of faith is increased and intensified through observing what it does."
This is rather a Christian book that has elements of the law of attraction, but is about visualisation of desires (what we say dream on). He has good arguments why to practise euxaristies and pray and explains Christianity from a rather unusual new age point of view.
La ley de atracción es un tema que me apasiona. Soy una eterna agradecida porque he visto la magia manifestarse ante mis propios ojos. Este libro al principio me pareció un resumen de La llave maestra de Charles Haanel pero los ejercicios son muy superficiales. Igualmente agradecía a quien me lo hizo llegar y porque siempre se aprende algo nuevo. 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐬 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐬 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐬
Geneviève Behrend's "Your Invisible Power" distills the teachings of Thomas Troward into a practical guide for harnessing the power of thought to manifest desires. Through clear, concise explanations, Behrend empowers readers to tap into their mental potential, making it a foundational read for anyone interested in the principles of mental science and personal growth.
Tiene una explicación clara los que inician su ley de atracción excelente libro, si hubiera sabido de este libro iniciaría con este y después con el de el secreto.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
I think I need to give it a second listen, otherwise, I remain a skeptic of esoteric philosophy. I was surprised that Behrend's (and by proxy her mentor's) beliefs are still vested in Christianity and yet still part of "New Thought" philosophy.
This was a short book, easy to listen to, but didn’t really inspire me too much. It was an okay listen. The last 30 minutes or so is sharing a variety of books recommended.
Have you seen "The Music Man"? This is nothing but Harold Hill's "think system", only Hill explained it so much more clearly. An old friend urged me to read this book. It, and others like it have brought her some peace and happiness, and I'm pleased for her. It's not for me, though.
Knowing it would be discussed at some point, I did my best to decipher the nearly unintelligible New Age gibberish. Once I got the gist of some of what Behrend was spouting, I had to reluctantly admit that a few of her assertions had validity. The biggest example: if you focus on one goal, you're more likely to work towards that goal (and spend less mental energy on those things that don't matter as much), and will make decisions based on the the attainment of that goal. There's nothing magical here.
Behrend tells about her personal experience of needing $20K, and having it fall into her hands, but conveniently doesn't give the details. For all I know, when "there appeared a circumstance which indicated the direction through which the $20,000 might come," she was in a bank standing near an open safe. Some details were definitely called for here.
I took lots of notes and could go on and on. But I shan't. A 95 page book shouldn't need a long review. Obviously, from the other critiques, there are those who get something out of this. Whatever works for them. But I can't recommend it. I prefer to fall back on the equation of hard work + focus + passion = fulfillment, but good old Yankee industry and practicality aren't nearly as mystical as believing you can visualize wealth and contentment and "the Universe" will provide.
Meg gave me this to read lol and I don't think she has finished it herself
this was very weird. honestly as a piece of literature it's kind of cool, woman in 1920s gives guide to her new weird ideas of Mental Science?!
I couldn't get down with all the Christian stuff, this book assumes you believe in god and a lot of the stuff she is talking about refers directly to god being involved somehow.
To me i feel like, visualisation or manifestation or whatever sometimes works because you picture yourself in the situation you want to be in, and that forces you to think about the steps you'll need to take to get there & then you're more likely to take those steps. This book suggests that you should NOT take any steps and just believe that the universe/god/Universal Spirit (?) will just somehow allow that stuff to happen to you. She also says that you should never tell people about what you're visualising which to me seems like, how do you know that it works all the time then because all the people who it didn't work for probably never told you they even tried because they're still waiting for it to happen. what happened to speaking things into existence etc.
Anyway it was kind of fun, I did enjoy the kind of cosmic hippydippiness and the words she used, and I can understand why you might get very excited about this sort of thing if you read this book expecting to believe in it. I would probably enjoy falling asleep to an audiobook of this i think haha
New Thought isn't all that new. It's been around for centuries. The resurgence of Mental Science is expanding exponentially. The Secret, What the Bleep Do We Know & the Law of Attraction are three recent examples of the principles of Mental Science that have made it popular. But before these came about, before they leapt onto our TV screens and into the pages of books, people like Geneveive Behrend were already writing about it, lecturing about it and teaching it throughout the world. This little tome was written in 1927 (I believe) and is the result of the determination of a widowed woman to fill a void in her life. She had enough money to sustain herself. She had many friends and she traveled the world. Yet she felt a longing within herself for more- not more wealth or friends or things, but inner peace, contentment, Love... In Your Invisible Power, Mrs. Behrend explains how she found what she was looking for and how you can find it too. Her writing style is somewhat archaic and difficult to follow at times. But once you understand her voice, you will be delighted by her forthright and subtly humorous expression. And along the way, you just might discover how to change your life in many wonderful ways.
Judge Thomas Troward was an incredible man deeply rooted in science, philosophy ,nature and how we truly are a manifestation of God. Genevieve Behrend was his only student who came back from after studying with him for 2 years 1912-1914 in London she was American and she wrote this book. Every sentence is packed with so much depth - many books have been written on New Thought manifestation /law of Atrraction however they don't get to the depth of the topic to the real juice and I believe that Ms Behrend has done an excellent review. It's not something to to read once yet something to be studied so that it infiltrates ones being. The only thing left now is to see if I can become a better person having read and re-read this timeless piece.
This is a little tiny book so powerful on the invisible power.The power within which enables you to form a thought picture is the starting point of all there is there is a power within you and it is going to enable you to do anything you want to do if you learn to with it now.
Order of visualization.
The practice of visualizing always keeps the mind engaged and in control as it also attracts things useful in your life to make the life more fun in the normal way.
Once you get used to photographing in your mind every desire you have in life then you will carefully examine on such and find the desire easily. Other Books...!
This book consisted primarily of law of attraction information packaged in a more antiquarian and interestingly phrased format. Of course since it was written in the 19th century, it is not without the Victorian habit of mentioning and praising God, but fortunately in this book, not excessively so. A nice feature of this book is that it is short, and doesn't repeat itself quite as often as it could.
Mixed feelings about this book, starts nicely with stories about Wright brothers and how they used the power of visualization. Later on it uses the power of pray (ok that has been proved scientifically as well) and hypnotism. Refers to Man as Thinkent and other books of the time. Maybe the old style bothered me and this actually better than 3 stars book, I dont know.
Author Genevieve Behrend breakdown of one's self and thought was complex at times to understand. One must first understand Thomas Troward's Edinburgh Lectures on Mental Science to fully grasp her book. Behrend a student of Troward's work is shown in Your Invisible Power.
This book will be good for eternity as far as I'm concerned. I believe in the views taught in 'Your Invisible Power' and believe that if you have an open mind, you will be able to see the beauty in this volume.