Rewiring the Brain: Contrasting Secular or pagan Manifesting, Prosperity Gospel, and Trustful Surrender to Jesus

This Lent we are starting to rewire our brains to experience more freedom, more healing, more peace.

Maybe you have heard that the brain rewiring is connected to neuroplasticity, meaning that you can establish new pathways of reacting, absorbing, releasing, adapting thoughts and emotions, changing your body’s reactions. It can lead to healing.

Maybe you have heard that this idea is not necessarily Christian per se and everyone can use it.

It is true that secular or pagan New Age manifesting is using similar techniques. It is true that the proponents of the prosperity Gospel who use declarations, affirmations and all tools for ‘name it, claim it’ idea are attempting to use the principle of believing until you see it. Yet the traditional Christian approach has more to do with “Jesus, I trust You” than all of these.

The difference between secular or pagan manifesting, prosperity Gospel’s name it - claim it and I trust You, Jesus lies in the source of power, the role of human effort, and the ultimate goal.

Secular, Pagan and New Age Manifesting

The source of power here is self and the universe. They attain to their ideals through a human effort sometimes peppered with ‘intentions’ or ‘prayer to the Higher Consciousness’ via visualization, positive thinking, and energy alignment which should deliver the desired outcome. Material goods, prestige, fame, career, relationships etc. The end of is wealth, wellbeing, self-fulfillment and self-realization. The very popular Law of Attraction states that if you think and feel as if something is already yours, the universe will provide it. This assumes that one's thoughts alone have causative power.

Manifesting creates short-term dopamine-driven reward loops that reinforce the expectation of success. Dopamine is a neurotransmitter, which is a chemical that transmits signals in the brain and is involved in a variety of functions, including movement, reward and motivation, learning and memory, attention, and mood. Neuroscientific effects of dopamine driven reward loops can include the over-activation of the prefrontal cortex (the part of your brain where thinking and reasoning happens) - hours of visualization and repeating mantras focuses on goal-setting and "making it happen" by sheer will. These types of practices increase dopamine release and give people temporary high but can lead to stress and anxiety if reality does not bend to their expectations or universe does not respond as they want. This can be followed by frustration and despair even because manifesting conditions the brain to expect and get. Resilience to suffering follows and in many cases those who ignore emotional struggles and are forcing themselves to think positively will try to override suffering with will power, suppressing reality and delaying healing and health, emotional stability and menta; and spiritual coherence.

The Prosperity Gospel with its 'Name it - Claim it' Declarations and Affirmations

Here we have a little of manifesting topping faith. People rightly see God as the source of all good, but he is often seen as a vending machine that dispenses blessings if one has "enough faith." That’s why Declarations and Affirmation (nothing wrong with those by themselves, objectively) are to be repeated often, until you will believe all God’s promises or some spectacular ones, or some prophetic word is true for you and until God will grant you what you want.

This approach borders with trying to bend your mind to a certain degree of certainty and faith becomes transactional. The material blessings and health are often seen as a sign of God’s favor. The lack of vulnerable surrender and deeply seated fear is replaced with assumed God’s wishes for your life.

This approach mimics the effects of manifesting but adds external spiritualized validation (e.g., wealth, health, success as "proof" of faith). Dopamine is released in anticipation of receiving a blessing and the brain forms an association between faith and material or other reward. When prayers are not answered it can lead to spiritual crisis.

The neuro-effect here is dopamine-driven conditional faith, reinforcing transactional thinking with God, not deep relationship.

I trust You, Jesus.

St. Hildegard emphasizes that faith is not about controlling outcomes, but cooperating with divine wisdom through virtue. This is the opposite of manifesting. Instead of using techniques to "get" what one wants, Hildegard teaches that cultivating virtue brings clarity to see and follow God. This means faith does not guarantee specific outcomes but it grants the strength to endure suffering with trust.

The default mode network in our brain is a system activated during periods of rest, self-directed thought or introspection and dysfunction of the default mode network may contribute to rumination and self-preoccupation. Trusting Jesus requires activating those parts of brain, which is key for long-term reflection, surrender, and deeper meaning-making. Christian meditative and contemplative practices, such as Lectio Divina, the Jesus Prayer, Eucharistic Adoration, and meditative Rosary, engage neural structures and rewire the brain toward trust, detachment, and resilience as well as to empathy, patience and conditions nervous system for emotional regulation, countering anxiety.

Unlike manifesting which can create dopamine spikes, contemplative prayer increases serotonin which plays a key role in such body functions as mood, sleep, digestion, nausea, wound healing, bone health, blood clotting and sexual desire. It also increases GABA neurotransmitter that helps reduce stress and promote relaxation, developing deep peace and trust.

Brain Rewiring with Virtues

Virtue rewires the brain by aligning it with truth and grace. It strengthens internal resilience and detachment from outcomes. St. Augustine echoes this:

"Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward of this faith is to see what you believe."

Neuroscience supports this: Repeated prayer and virtue practice reshape neural pathways towards trust, patience, and surrender. This contrasts with manifesting which bends reality to one’s will and might create frustration and anxiety if desires are unmet. Virtue formation based on received grace rewires the brain to trust God rather than control life.