How To Manifest Your Dream Life (Backed by Science)

I’m not only going to show you how to manifest, but how to manifest your dream life. 

“Manifestation” probably sounds a little woo-woo. You might be imagining vision boards and people telling you to “just think positive” while your bank account stays empty.

To be clear, that’s not what this is.

I’m going to teach you how science-backed manifestation actually works—through your reticular activating system, your self-concept, your nervous system, and proven psychology. 

You’ll learn how your attention filter determines what opportunities you see, why “wanting” keeps you stuck, how your self-concept acts as a thermostat for your life, and the exact steps to reprogram all of it.

Let’s get into it.👇🏾

So, what is manifesting, anyway?

First, let’s start with what it’s not. 

Manifesting isn’t wishful thinking. It’s not throwing up a picture of a Lamborghini on your wall and expecting it to materialize somehow.

Manifesting is not a substitute for work, nor is it a process where you get something for nothing.

Here’s how I’d define manifesting:

The intentional alignment of your attention, emotional state, self-concept, and action toward a specific outcome, creating a feedback loop between your internal reality and external opportunities.

It’s getting laser-focused on what you want, feeling like you already have it, acting like the person who has it, and then actually doing the work—all at the same time. 

When these four things line up, your inner world starts reshaping what you notice and attract in your outer world.

Here are some of the keys to understand manifesting:

• Attention: What you focus on expands. 
• Self-conept: Your outer life is a manifestation of your inner identity. You don’t get what you want, you get what you are. 
• Embodiment: This is feeling like you already have and are already worthy of what you want. (It’s the opposite of the needy feelings of wishing and wanting.)
• Action: You need to take action, but this action will now be guided and directed by honing your attention, embodiment, and self concept.

To show that manifesting isn’t just woo woo wishful thinking, I’m going to back the concept with neuroscience, behavioral psychology, and sports performance research.

To start, I’ll go deep on something called the reticular activating system (RAS) because this is the foundation everything else is built on.

If you don’t understand how your brain filters reality, the rest of manifestation will feel like magic or wishful thinking.

But once you see how your attention system actually works, everything clicks. You’ll understand why programming your RAS makes manifestation real.

How to manifest: Understand the Reticular Activating System

Attention is the key to everything.

Our lives are dictated mostly by what we choose to focus on, and this is where the reticular activating system comes in:

The reticular activating system (RAS) […] is a mesh-like bundle of neurons […] situated in the brain stem. […] The RAS, despite being a small region of the brain, plays a critical role. It ensures that the brain does not have to process more data than it can handle.

If you had to pay attention to every single detail as you go about your day, contemplating everything all the time, you wouldn’t be able to function.

So the RAS filters out the unnecessary so you can focus on what you’re programmed to pay attention to. 

You can either consciously program your RAS or unconsciously program it. Most people do the latter by default.

Your RAS has been quietly programmed since childhood based on your experiences, traumas, beliefs, what your parents emphasized, what kept you safe, and what you randomly paid attention to along the way. 

If you grew up in scarcity, your RAS might be programmed to notice threats and problems. If you were taught that success is dangerous or that money is evil, your RAS filters out opportunities that don’t align with those beliefs. 

Most people walk through life with a RAS programmed by circumstance, which means they’re literally unable to see the opportunities, resources, and possibilities that could change everything.

To prove this isn’t just something I made up, I can point to an experiment.

Psychologists Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons had participants watch a video of people passing basketballs and count the passes made by players in white shirts. 

But halfway through the video, a person in a full gorilla suit walks directly through the scene, stops, thumps their chest, and walks off. The gorilla is on screen for nine full seconds.

About half the participants completely missed it.

They were so focused on counting passes that their brain filtered out a literal gorilla standing in front of them.

When you’re focused on one thing, you can miss obvious things happening right in front of you. Your RAS filters out the gorilla because it wasn’t relevant to your task. 

Now imagine how many “gorillas” in the form of opportunities have been missed simply because of your pre-programmed tendencies? 

I am digging in here because I want to make it clear that these concepts are rooted in science.

Now that we have a solid base, let’s break down each of the four pillars to manifest your dream life.

Attention: Harness its power

Here’s a simple example: You go to the dealership and buy a red Honda. Next thing you know, you see red Hondas all over the road. They were always there, but because your attention is now primed to spot them, you notice them everywhere. 

This works the same way with opportunities. I’ve had my share of “chance encounters” that changed my life.

For example, after working on myself through personal development, I started posting on my personal Facebook page. A friend noticed I like to write and asked me to write for his blog.

I’ve been writing every day since.

I randomly stumbled on an acquaintance on Facebook who mentioned her article going viral on Thought Catalog. I submitted an article to TC, got placed with an editor who became my mentor, and my writing career was off to the races.

The same thing happened when I stumbled onto a site called Medium—someone on Twitter posted about her article going viral there. 

These weren’t lucky accidents. This was my RAS at work.

Once I identified as a writer and started posting, my brain’s filter changed. Those opportunities were probably always in my feed, but my old RAS categorized them as irrelevant noise. 

The moment I shifted my self-concept and took action, my RAS started flagging writing opportunities as important. I noticed them and acted immediately. The “chance encounters” were my reprogrammed attention system showing me the path forward.

So, how is this applicable to you?

Here are three ways to harness your attention.

1. Get crystal clear on what you want

First you have to understand what you want out of life. This is a pickle all by itself, because most people spin in circles when it comes to figuring out what they want.

Here are some clues though:

• What would you do if money wasn’t an object at all? How would you spend your time?
• What is a career path or business idea you would choose if you were guaranteed success?
• What makes you feel most alive?
• If no one would ever know, what would you still want to achieve? 

Spend some time on this. Get clear on these answers and move to the next step.

2. Emotionally charge your focus

Clarity alone isn’t enough. Your RAS will only shift if you give it a strong emotional charge to push it into action. Wishy-washy-neutral, I-kinda-sorta-want-this thoughts will get filtered out.

You really have to FEEL it.

When you think about your goal, feel it. What’s the emotion of having it? Relief? Excitement? Confidence? Get specific about the feeling, not just the outcome.

Spend 5-10 minutes daily connecting to this emotional state. Read your goal and feel what it’s like to already have it. The greater emotional connection you create, the more your brain says, “This matters, pay attention.”

3. Immerse yourself in the right environment

Your RAS learns from patterns and repetition. In short, you have to brainwash yourself into getting what you want.

When I wanted to change my life, I read 75 personal development books in a year.

I took courses.

Listened to podcasts.

Watched YouTube.

I was surrounding my mind with content that aligned with who I was becoming.

And I didn’t simply passively consume.

I took action.

There’s a whole section dedicated to this below. But this “brainwashing” played a huge role in where I am today.

Don’t treat your environment as something that’s going to manifest what you want because it won’t. BUT you should absolutely use it to your advantage.

Do everything you can do to stack the deck in your favor by making cues in your environment—books you read, vision boards, affirmations, whatever you like. 

Self-concept: The root of everything

I read “Psycho-Cybernetics” by Maxwell Maltz in my late twenties and it changed how I understood success and failure.

I am the same physical person I was a decade ago, but my concept of who I am did a complete 180.

Maltz was a plastic surgeon who noticed something strange. Some patients would get nose jobs or face lifts and their confidence would shoot up like crazy.

But others would get the same surgeries and nothing would change.

He realized the physical change didn’t matter, unless it happened to change the self-concept of the person who had the work done.

Your self-concept is the mental image you hold of yourself. It’s who you believe you are at your core. 

You will always act in ways that are consistent with your self-concept, even if those actions work against what you consciously want.

If you see yourself as “someone who struggles with money,” it won’t matter what you do. You can want wealth all day long. You can work hard, set goals, and make vision boards.

But unconsciously, you’ll make decisions that keep you struggling because that’s who you believe you are. Your self-concept acts like a thermostat…whenever you start to exceed it, you’ll self-correct back to your set point.

Maltz called this your “self-image” and argues it is the key to all personal change.

You don’t change your life by changing your circumstances.

You change your life by changing who you believe you are.

This is why manifestation without identity shift doesn’t work.

You can program your RAS to notice business opportunities, but if your self-concept is “I’m not a business person,” you won’t take action on what you see.

You can embody confidence for ten minutes during visualization, but if your self-concept is “I’m shy and awkward,” you’ll revert to that pattern the moment you’re in a social situation.

Your self-concept determines:

• What opportunities you notice (it filters your RAS)
• What actions feel natural vs. forced (it drives your behavior automatically)
• What level of success you can sustain (it sets your upper limit)
• How others perceive and respond to you (it shapes your energy)

You must become the person first, then you’ll do what that person does, and you’ll have what that person has. Not the other way around.

Most people think: “When I HAVE money, I’ll DO what wealthy people do, then I’ll BE wealthy.”

It actually works backward: “I must BE wealthy in my self-concept, then I’ll naturally DO what wealthy people do. Then I’ll HAVE the results.”

When you genuinely see yourself as a successful entrepreneur, you don’t have to force yourself to take action. The action flows naturally because that’s what successful entrepreneurs do, and you’re a successful entrepreneur.

After reading “Psycho-Cybernetics,” I stopped trying to change my habits and started changing my identity.

I stopped saying “I want to be a writer” and started saying “I AM a writer.” Not as an affirmation, but as a fact I was choosing to believe about myself.

Everything shifted.

Your outer life will always match your self-concept. Always.

You don’t manifest “things.” You manifest versions of yourself. 

Change who you are, and what you have changes automatically.

So, how do you actually change your self-concept? That’s where embodiment comes in.

Embodiment: How to shift your identity

Imagine a version of yourself that is the same exact person physically and circumstantially.  Same looks, same IQ, same upbringing, same talent, same innate skill level and interests.

The only thing that’s different is your attitude and approach to life.

You’re fearless. You waste zero time and turn your ideas into action immediately. You go for exactly what you want with supreme conviction and confidence—not a single shred of self-doubt to be found. You are certain that everything will work out as planned, so it does. 

You can visualize this person, which means that this is available to you.

It eliminates the lie, “If only I were someone else, I could get what I want.” Nope, YOU can get what you want.

But it has to be the aligned, intentional, and maxed out version of yourself that uses every last bit of your genetic potential to go after it.

This is where embodiment comes in.

That person you just visualized? You don’t become them someday.

You become them now.

You feel what they feel, move how they move, decide how they decide right now in the moment, not when conditions are perfect.

Most people stay stuck in “wanting” mode. 

• “I want to be confident.” 
• “I want to be successful.” 
• “I want to be rich.”

But wanting affirms lack. When you say “I want money,” your brain hears “I don’t have money.” You’re broadcasting scarcity, and your RAS filters for more evidence of scarcity.

Embodiment means you feel AS IF you already are that person. Accessing the actual emotional state, the body language, the decision-making patterns of the version of you who has what you desire. 

It’s like method acting. When an actor is preparing for a serious role, they do not act as if they are the character. They ARE the character. To get what you want, you must become the person who gets it.

The science behind embodiment

Research shows your actions automatically match your identity because your brain hates inconsistency. 

Neuroscientist Antonio Damasio’s work shows emotions drive every decision through physical sensations: embody abundance, make abundant choices; embody scarcity, see threats everywhere. 

Mirror neurons mean your internal state literally affects how others’ brains respond to you; your vibe creates measurable social effects. You have surely felt this in action.

Sports psychology proves that vividly imagining performance fires the same brain pathways as actually doing it.

And polyvagal theory explains that if success feels unfamiliar, your nervous system treats it as danger. Embodiment practice teaches your body that good things are safe. 

Embodiment reprograms your attention filter, shifts your identity to drive new behavior, trains your body to handle success, and changes how people respond to you.

Action: Where manifestation meets reality

You’ve programmed your RAS. You’ve shifted your self-concept. You’re embodying the person who already has what you want.

Now what?

It’s time to take action. Relentless, aligned, strategic action.

Nothing manifests without movement in the physical world.

The manifestation trap is thinking that visualization alone will do the trick. It won’t. The work-harder-hustle-culture trap is thinking action alone will do it. It won’t either.

You need both. And the quality of your action changes dramatically when it comes from an aligned state versus a desperate one.

Same action on the surface. Completely different energy. Completely different results.

How to align your actions

When your RAS flags an opportunity, you don’t hesitate. You act immediately. That’s your programmed filter showing you exactly what you asked for.

When you’re in a meeting or on a call, you show up as the embodied version.

When opportunities come that the old you would have been too scared to take, you take them. Because your nervous system has been trained to handle success,.

When you hit resistance or failure, you don’t spiral back to the old identity. You stay in the new one. You tell yourself, “I’m a successful entrepreneur who’s learning,” not “See, I knew I couldn’t do this.”

• Attention (RAS) shows you where to look
• Self-concept determines what feels possible and natural
• Embodiment gives you the emotional state and confidence
• Action moves it from internal reality to external results

Can you manifest a Lamborghini by wishing? No.

Can you become someone whose RAS notices opportunities, whose self-concept includes wealth, who embodies success daily, who takes massive aligned action, and eventually makes enough to buy ten Lamborghinis? Hell yeah.

The work is required. But the work is 10x more effective when your brain, body, and identity are all aligned behind it.

The blur between science, mystery, and action

I can’t definitively claim that the universe is conspiring to help you. I don’t know if quantum mechanics proves consciousness creates reality. I don’t know if your “vibration” literally attracts things on an energetic level.

But I feel these things and that seems to be enough.

What I do know and what I can prove:

Your RAS is real neuroscience. What you program it to look for, you’ll see.

Your self-concept is real psychology. Maltz proved it with thousands of patients. Your identity determines your behavior more than willpower ever will.

Embodiment is backed by neuroscience and real physiology. Mirror neurons, somatic markers, polyvagal theory are all peer-reviewed and measurable markers related to the quality of your life.

I’ve felt the shift when I walk into a room embodying confidence versus faking it. I’ve watched “coincidences” stack up in ways that feel too perfect to be random once I programmed my RAS and shifted my identity. I’ve seen my life completely transform because I became someone different.

So maybe there is something happening at the quantum level. Maybe consciousness does interact with reality in ways we don’t understand yet. Maybe there is an energetic field we’re all swimming in that responds to our internal state.

Or maybe it’s all sophisticated neuroscience and psychology working together.

Either way, the HOW doesn’t matter.

Honor the possibility that there’s more happening than we can currently measure and you might tap into something even more powerful.

Believe the science. Program your RAS with crystal clarity. Shift your self-concept through embodiment. Train your nervous system to handle success. Take massive, aligned action.

And stay open to the magic.