I believe that I can manifest anything in the world by putting it out into the universe and then working hard on the things I know I can change and then just letting go. Sometimes I forget that when I was 15 one of my parent’s more “spiritually inclined” friends gave me a candle and a scroll to write on.

Now, they were a little bit “out there.” For instance, they owned more than one snake as a pet, but they meant well, so, I kindly accepted the gift not knowing what the heck I was getting into. When I went home and read the card, they had instructed me to write on the scroll everything I wanted in a boyfriend. I was slightly boy-obsessed at the time with no boyfriend to show for it and I really appreciated the gesture. They said to say a prayer and light the candle and think of the scroll. Now I only lit the candle once or twice (I did take it with me to college thinking that maybe it could work some juju on those boys…not so much), but I did write the list. I wrote close to 150 different things I wanted in a man everything from, “smart, funny, kind,” to “European, gives me forehead kisses, would be a good father.” I rolled up that scroll and hid it in a special place at my parents’ house in Anacortes, Washington, the place that has always held the most magic in the world for me and left it there. 

I didn’t have much luck in high school with the boys and to be honest I wasn’t very patient with high school boys either. I went off to college, where I fared better, seeing a guy here and a guy there and I got close to having a relationship, but then again I was pretty discerning. If he wasn’t exactly who I wanted and he didn’t seem like my forever guy, I threw him overboard(or more often than not…he threw me). I knew what I wanted and I didn’t want to waste my time. I was happier on my own than with someone that wasn’t the right fit for me so the second I knew it wasn’t going to be forever, that was that and I moved on.

I was pretty strict with myself when it came to boys. At one point in college I thought I was in love with my best guy friend. I decided after much hemming and hawing that I should tell him. When I finally looked him in the eye and actually used the words “I think I’m falling in love with you,” he responded with, “Chelsea, you’re an amazing friend, but that’s never gonna happen.” I felt like the rug had been ripped out from under me. This was the friend who’s bed I had slept in, but whom I had not slept with and I guess that should’ve been my sign. He told me in the same breath that he was having a party that night and that I should come. As if my whole world hadn’t just been turned upside-down. But I told myself, there was no use crying over something I had no control over. I allowed myself two hours to wallow in self-pity and then I walked my booty up to his floor in our freshman dorm and forced my way into that party. That also happened to be the night where I took my first shot of vodka (only one) because let’s face it, you don’t get over things like this in two hours. But what I didn’t realize was this entire time the universe was at work.

When I was 15 I wrote that list and when I was 22 I went on my first date with the man that would become my everything. After a few months of dating, Domi and I took a trip up to my family’s magical home in Anacortes and out of the blue I remembered about the list that I had made seven years before. I decided it would be fun if we read it together because, let’s face it, I’m brave. Both of us already knowing even in the first few weeks that what we had would be the forever kind of thing-it didn’t make me nervous to share these things with Domi. I read it first and was dumbfounded. I crawled across the living room, sat in my love’s lap and handed the scroll to him, who read it and then looked equally as shocked. He looked at me and said, “I’m sorry I don’t have blue eyes.”

I burst into laughter. Out of the 150 things I had written on that list he had 149. It was truly one of the most remarkable things I have ever experienced. Needless to say, I was a convert. I started writing down everything I wanted. I put it out in the universe and more often than not it comes back to me. Sure, sometimes it takes weeks or months or years, but out of the blue I’ll look back when something amazing happens and it’s been something I have written down. You don’t have to write all these things down, you can sit and meditate and send them out into the universe without writing them, but writing them down gives a physical manifestation of what you want and sometimes when you write it out you realize that some of the things you thought you wanted aren’t what you wanted at all. I think anything is worth trying and I’ll be grateful to my parent’s friends for giving me the gift that helped me manifest the man of my dreams. The man that fulfills so many requirements that I call him my unicorn because I can’t believe this guy that I dreamed up actually exists.