There are many countless and inspiring stories where a strong faith has literally produced miracles simply because those concerned believed that anything and everything was possible. It is of course because faith is the very essence of positive thinking and for many; The Bible is the original self-help book.

“Ask and it will be given,” says The Bible. It could have been taken from any modern self-help paperback and there are plenty more phrases and texts just like that connected with all religions, which are intended to inspire and motivate good people.

Without faith, positive thinking can never work. I regularly hear from those who falsely believe that they are doing all the right things by imagining successful outcomes, practicing affirmations and developing mood boards, but nothing changes in their lives.

They simply do not believe that things will get better. Life takes over and their lack of faith is exposed for what it is – just random words and thoughts. They simply do not believe a word of what they are saying so how do you expect the Universe to respond.

Faith works alongside positive thinking in another highly effective way and is one of the reasons why I launched Powerful Positive Thinking. When you have faith, you place your order with the Universe for change and improvement – and you do it just the once.

Without faith you are like a dog that keeps returning to a bone. You keep using affirmations over and over again but you don’t believe you will ever be successful. Even worse, by going over and over the same old thing simply confirms that what you want is not in your life – and never will be because that’s the message you are sending out again and again and again.

I blame many of these so called self-help books that set exercises as if you were attending an examination. Don’t they realise that all this intense focus has the reverse effect and will almost certainly switch you off from the real benefits of positive thinking.

So how do you develop faith when none really exists? How do you train your mind to believe that everything is possible when all of your life you have been negative and cynical, particularly about the kind of stuff you don’t really understand?

It starts with baby steps. You set about attracting small things into your life to begin with that you can and do believe in. Do not try to attract millions of pounds or dollars when a couple of hundred would really do for the moment. Do not try for a miracle cure overnight when you would really just like to feel a bit better. Those brilliant new lovers are out there but give them chance to find you.

You can concentrate on the big stuff when you learn how to make faith and belief work for you and to do that you need to be calm and get rid of the intensity that drives all of the good things away – the total opposite of anything you intended.

There really is no magic ingredient that you have to find to benefit from positive thinking. It is already inside you and we all have the same power. It does of course require common sense and regular readers will know that action also helps to deliver your dream – but faith and belief are the real keys to success.

So decide what you need and believe that it is possible and then have faith that it will happen. Deliver your order just the once and then let the great Amazon of the Universe do its work – have faith and success will come knocking.