Every time that I watch this movie, I see it deeper than the time I last saw it. Whether or not Cameron Crowe meant for this movie to be the embodiment of the manifestation process, it is.
He writes it. It starts to happen. It’s uncomfortable. He learns. Then he wins.
The action word “manifestation” is such a buzz word these days. You’ll hear it from creators on TikTok often with flashy capcut backdrops with exotic cars and penthouse apartments showing you that they took their life from zero to their own hero. This is certainly a part of manifestation, but what you’re seeing is the end result. There’s a lot more to it and the movie Jerry Maguire pretty much lays out how the process can some times go.
Jerry has it all. The career, the money, the reputation of always being on top and what he thinks is his dream relationship. Yet…there’s this nagging on his soul level that there is something missing. That his life – though pretty – has been built on a superficial level. One night, he decides that he wants a deeper connection with his clients, he wants a smaller more intimate agency so to build more meaningful connections. Jerry wants a slower pace and to maximize each and every relationship. He writes it down into a manifesto.
Now what we have is his power of attention, thought, intention and feeling, coupled with him actually writing it down. This is the formula for manifestation.
If you know about manifestation at all, then you likely know who Napoleon Hill is and his book Think and Grow Rich. You may also know Claude M. Bristol’s The Magic of Believing, or James Allen’s As a Man Thinketh. How about David J. Schwartz’s The Magic of Thinking Big, or Henriette Anne Klauser, PhD who wrote Write It Down, Make It Happen? There is a definite connection with thought, feeling and writing something and it coming into fruition, this has been studied and proven.
After Jerry has written his manifesto and distributes it, things begin to go so wrong for him. Or atleast he thinks so. His world begins to fall apart. Like most humans would, he starts to panic and not see the forest through the trees. He tries to recant what he says and desperately attempts to cling to the old and familiar life. All of his attempts to do so become futile and he feels he’s at the bottom – a place that he never thought possible for him given what he was acustom to. In essence, he was stripped of everything but his intention and his own ability to create. What he didn’t realize in that moment is that the Universe was giving him what he asked for. The new business model and therefore new life that he was seeking was not going to be able to be sustained within the one that he had already built.
Fast forward a bit, and you see Jerry actually begin to live by his motto with the relationship that he makes with the only client that stood with him. He has many realzations about himself during this time that changes him into the person that is able to sustain the newness that he asked for in his manifesto. He releases the parts of him that he had to release in order to embody the person that he was meant to be.
In the end, Jerry gets the girl, gets the new reputation, and the business that he wanted. Jerry gets big names as new clients and the list continues to grow as him showing up authentically attracts to him the new business opportunities. All of this happens for him after it first looked pretty dark for him because asking for big changes will likely create big changes.
I believe that when Shakespeare said that “All of the world is stage, and men and women are mearly players”, he was refering to our ability to co-create our realities. He’s litterally saying that our lives are stages and the players within are the players in our “scenes”. Just like in a play, when Act I moves to Act II, there is a pause. An anticipation as to what is next. Also, just like in a play, when one scene closes and an another begins, the stage is cleared of actors and scenery, and the stage crew brings out the new set and the actors get into position before the curtain pulls back again.
If you find yourself in a place where you asked for something and then something or someone left, just know that there is going to be another Act. There will be another scene – it’s surely coming. Be an active member of the stage crew and build your scene as well as cast the right players.
As a former stage actress, (2 spring muscials in high school count right?), I rememer getting into position before the curtain rose again. I used the pause to concentrate on my lines, and quickly attempted to embody the feeling of my character. I envisioned myself stepping out on to the stage after the curtain pulled back and being the absolute best presentation of that character that I could be. Such as life. Except we are our own main character in our story and we get to chose who we are going to be everyday. We decide with our actions, (and inactions), how we are going to stand on the stage that we built and what the world is going to see from us.
In the pause between acts, while we shuffle our set into place, practice who the new you is going to be. Go to the gym and get into that new routine. Reach out to people and network, finally learn how to meditate or cook. Read the books that you’ve wanted to. Dig deep into the experiences that you want to learn from but then let go of forever. Close the old chapters so that the new ones have a chance to come to life.
As Jerry Maguire found out, manifestation is a process and sometimes it doesn’t feel so great while its coming about. That’s where we are called to trust the process. God, Creator, Universe, Higher Power, Allah, The Universe – it doesn’t matter what you call it, it’s going to have our back 100% of the time if we allow it. Surrendering is an art that must be perfected for ourselves and it’s a personal process. Getting quiet, taking care of ourselves, and making sure that whatever manifesto we are willing to write is the one that we truly see ourselves in because words have power.
My friends, you are powerful, you are loved, you are needed in this here and now. Art often imitates life so even a movie such as Jerry Maguire can have a powerful message for you to learn from. Get a notebook and a pen and follow your good-hearted intentions. It’s your soul calling to you.
xoxo,
Jenna Prosceno 
What are your thoughts and ideas?