GORDON LIGHTFOOT | Culture
MANIFEST YOUR DESTINY
After a long day as a service delivery officer in a government agency that doesn’t even need to be specified, Logan Goulburn, 27, wanted nothing more than to zone out on the train without disruption. More specifically, Goulburn wanted at least 40 centimetres of personal space between himself and any of the other strangers in his carriage.
As he usually does, the frontline government employee waited at Platform 7 at Wellington station for the train to arrive, knowing that this would guarantee him a window seat. The next step would be to use his newly found power of positive thinking to prevent every new passenger from sitting down in the seat next to him.
“A train ride home from work can either be relaxing and quite enjoyable, or tense and uncomfortable. I used to always have unwanted people plonk themselves down next to me on the train,” he explained thinking back to a time before he had the ability to manifest his own destiny.
“And it would never be the little petite women who sat down next to me either. Never the ones who only take up half a seat. I always ended up next to the 6 foot 6 old bugger who probably used to play rugby for Wellington!”
Goulburn said that the key to keeping your adjacent seat free is to visualise a train ride where you are calm, relaxed and don’t have some bloody stranger sitting next to you. “You need to think like it’s already happening. Imagine the train is already moving and you’re gazing out the window, legs comfortably spread apart and elbows positioned in a relaxed over-hang into the next seat.
“Perhaps you’re listening to a popular podcast that you know most of the people in the carriage wouldn’t approve of. No problem. You’ve got your headphones on, and what they don’t know won’t hurt them. Pure bliss,” he described.
“And on this occasion, against all odds, as I was sitting there the train started moving with no forced travel companion cramping my style. Everyone else on the carriage had a buddy, but not me,” he smiled, pleased with the outcome.
“These are the kinds of things you can achieve when you believe that anything’s possible.”
More to come.
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