Manifestation is often dismissed as a TikTok trend, something for dreamers. Yet some of the most successful entrepreneurs on the planet have spoken about it openly, and made it a working tool. The law of attraction, visualization, assuming your success before it arrives: these aren't the ideas of the naive, they're practices that billionaires and empire-builders openly claim.
We'll share, honestly and with sources, what four of them said about it. And above all, what you can take from it for yourself.
Sara Blakely: the Spanx founder and the law of attraction
Sara Blakely started with 5,000 dollars and built Spanx to become one of the youngest self-made female billionaires in the world. As a teenager, her father gave her a set of Wayne Dyer cassette tapes, How to Be a No-Limit Person. She talks about them as the spark for everything.
"Dyer taught me about the law of attraction, manifesting what you want and visualization, which have all been tools that I use..."
Sara Blakely
Dyer taught her the law of attraction, manifesting, and visualization, tools she has used ever since. She has said she visualized, years in advance, appearing on Oprah's show. Manifestation never replaced hard work for her: it aimed it. It was that pairing, a clear vision plus relentless action, that made the difference.
Oprah Winfrey: intention as a compass
Oprah Winfrey, at the head of a media empire, devoted two episodes to the book The Secret in 2006, explaining that it summed up the message she had carried for twenty years: you are responsible for your life. Long before that, she had built a simple but decisive habit: before every decision, every show, she asked herself "what is my intention?"
When the intention was right, to inform, to lift, to heal, things fell into place. It's a very concrete form of the law of attraction: setting your inner state and intention beforehand, to shape what unfolds next. Nothing passive about it, a clarity of intention held at every step.
Steve Harvey: write your vision
Steve Harvey, who started from nothing and was once homeless, became a host, producer and businessman running several shows. He speaks about the law of attraction without the slightest hesitation, and has made it a pillar of his talks.
"If you can see it, it can become a reality. And there is a magic that comes with vision boards and writing things down."
Steve Harvey
If you can see it, it can become a reality. And there is a magic in writing things down. For him, "the law of attraction is very real, it's always working, whether you believe it or not." He often points back to an old piece of wisdom: write your vision, and make it plain. It's no accident that he insists so much on writing: putting your vision on paper gives it a form, and tunes your attention to it day after day.
Jack Canfield: the man behind Chicken Soup for the Soul
Jack Canfield co-created the Chicken Soup for the Soul series, one of the best-selling in history, after reportedly being turned down by more than a hundred publishers. A publishing entrepreneur who built an empire on persistence and one conviction: the law of attraction.
He teaches it plainly in The Success Principles and was one of the featured voices in the film The Secret in 2006. His principle is simple: you attract into your life whatever you give your energy and attention to. Here again, nothing passive: Canfield insists on clarifying your goal, visualizing it every day, then taking persistent action. It's active manifestation, turned into a method.
What they all have in common
Four journeys, four different worlds, one same pattern. None of them "waited for the universe to deliver." Each followed the same inner chain:
- A clear, precise vision. Not a vague "I want to succeed," but a sharp image of the life they were aiming for, often written down.
- Total belief. They felt success as already true before it existed. That's the heart of the law of assumption: you become what you assume you are.
- Relentless action. The vision gave them direction; the work did the rest. Manifestation set the compass, their hands walked the road.
Nothing magical here, and that's what makes their example solid. Visualizing a goal and writing it down tunes your attention to it, so you notice opportunities others miss. Charging it with emotion and certainty imprints it into your subconscious and sustains your action over time. For these entrepreneurs, the law of attraction is never passive.
How to apply their method
You don't need to be a billionaire to do what they did. The method fits into a few daily moves: choose a precise vision, write it in the present tense as if it were already here, visualize and feel it every day, then take one aligned action.
The only trap is consistency: a stray note doesn't last. This is exactly why we built the Manifestation and Visualization Journal: a daily framework that guides you through those same moves, write, visualize, feel, act, over 90 days, bringing together the lineage of Haanel, Goddard, Wattles and Hill. It isn't just another notebook, it's the method these figures practiced, made simple to keep. The PDF of the full method comes free with it, and it also exists as a standalone PDF to start today.
Frequently asked questions
Which entrepreneurs use the law of attraction?
Among the best known: Sara Blakely (Spanx founder), who openly credits the law of attraction and visualization; Oprah Winfrey, who promoted The Secret; Steve Harvey, who speaks about it constantly; and Jack Canfield, creator of Chicken Soup for the Soul and a law of attraction teacher. Each combined it with relentless work.
Does manifestation actually work?
Yes, but not by magic. Visualizing a goal and writing it down tunes your attention to it, feeling it as real imprints it into your subconscious, and this sustains action held over time. It isn't "write and wait," it's visualize, feel, then act, like these entrepreneurs.
What's the difference between the law of attraction and the law of assumption?
The law of attraction says your outer world reflects your inner state. The law of assumption, formulated by Neville Goddard, spells out how: by assuming right now the feeling of your wish already fulfilled. These entrepreneurs each describe, in their own way, that same certainty held in advance.
Why is writing your vision so often recommended?
Because writing clarifies and commits. Steve Harvey speaks of a "magic" in writing things down, Napoleon Hill made it a required step of his method. Writing your vision gives it a form and tunes your attention to it every day.
Go further
These entrepreneurs drew, often without knowing it, from the same source:
- Charles F. Haanel and The Master Key System the origin of the chain thought, feeling, action.
- The "I AM": Neville Goddard's law of assumption the principle of assumed certainty.
They didn't wait for their lives. They saw them, wrote them, believed them, then built them.
See it. Write it. Feel it. Act, every day.
That's manifestation that works.
Sources: Sara Blakely on Wayne Dyer and the law of attraction (speeches and interviews, 2021-2026); Oprah Winfrey and The Secret (2006 episodes); Steve Harvey, public statements on the law of attraction and vision boards; Jack Canfield, The Success Principles (2005) and his appearance in The Secret (2006).