Living in Los Angeles, I am surrounded by “The Vibe.”
I see it everywhere—from the crystal shops in Venice to the high-level masterminds where people spend hours discussing their “intentions” and the “frequency” of their success. Don’t get me wrong, I believe in vision. I believe in knowing where you want to go. But as a “bad” procrastinator—a person who physically cannot stop doing—I’ve noticed a dangerous trend in the business world.
People have become so addicted to the feeling of manifesting that they’ve forgotten how to actually move. We’ve turned “manifesting” into a full-time job, but we’re failing to realize that the universe doesn’t respond to your vision board—it responds to your output.
The Manifestation Trap
In marketing, I see this show up as “Vibe-Based Strategy.” It’s the brand that spends six months picking the perfect shade of “celestial blue” for their logo and writing a 50-page mission statement about “changing the world,” but hasn’t actually set up an email flow or looked at their conversion data.
They are manifesting a global empire, but they aren’t performing the daily, gritty actions required to build one.
The truth? Lighting a candle won’t fix a high bounce rate. You can meditate on “abundance” all morning, but if your checkout process is broken, the only thing you’re manifesting is a decline in revenue.
The Data: Why “Vision” is a Bottleneck
As a strategist, I like to look at the gap between what people say they want and what they actually do. It turns out, this “Intention-Behavior Gap” is a documented business killer:
The Execution Gap: According to research published by Harvard Business Review, a staggering 67% of well-formulated strategies fail—not because the vision was bad, but because of poor execution.
The Planning Paralysis: A study on “Action Orientation” suggests that people who spend excessive time in the “mental simulation” phase (manifesting) often experience a hit of dopamine that makes their brain think they’ve already achieved the goal. This actually decreases the physical energy they have to go out and do the work.
The Consistency Tax: In the world of creative growth, the “Doers” outperform the “Dreamers” every single time. It’s not the most “inspired” brand that wins; it’s the one that shows up with a cohesive system every single day.
Read more: My Post-Facial Monster Face & The Long Game of Perspective.
Manifesting by Action
I recently recorded a video about this because I’m tired of seeing brilliant entrepreneurs get stuck in the “dreaming” phase. I call it Manifesting by Action.
It’s the idea that your “frequency” is actually determined by your friction. How much are you willing to do? How fast are you willing to pivot? For me, being a doer means that my “vision board” is my project management tool. I manifest growth by looking at the data, refining the creative, and hitting “publish” while everyone else is still waiting for the stars to align.
If you want the universe to move for you, you have to give it something to work with.
Stop Dreaming, Start Doing
If you feel like you’ve been “manifesting” your business growth for months but the needle hasn’t budged, it might be time to stop looking at the clouds and start looking at your systems.
Marketing isn’t a magic trick; it’s a series of intentional, actionable steps that build a bridge to your goals. You don’t need more “vibes.” You need more momentum.
Let’s stop talking about what we’re “going” to build and start showing the world what we’ve already started.
To big visions and even bigger actions,
Lara
