Letters to the Editor
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OK...
In the end, there are few people in this world who have been successful who have not applied a version of the concepts in "The Secret" -- talk to any CEO, any entertainer, any athlete, and they will tell you that the first element in their rise to success was believing that they would succeed and not dwelling on all the things that might go wrong.
Yes, but did those same people also claim that the "secret" of their success was that they never, ever associated with -- or even so much looked at -- anyone who wasn't 100% successful and perfect? That's one I've never heard before. Although I suppose the people who overtly espouse this viewpoint are easier to deal with, in a way, that those who claim they care about those less fortunate but really don't. At least if someone is overtly a bigot, you know what you're getting.
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*sigh*
In the end, there are few people in this world who have been successful who have not applied a version of the concepts in "The Secret" -- talk to any CEO, any entertainer, any athlete, and they will tell you that the first element in their rise to success was believing that they would succeed and not dwelling on all the things that might go wrong.
Oh please. This is so facile. How many CEOs and entertainers have you talked to? Many people have doubts and fears and succeed through hard work and often times, good luck. I know "luck" is a bad word to the Secretrons, but many famous and successful people mention that luck played a role in their success.
And, negative thoughts do not cause negative things to happen to people. Good grief. That's called magical thinking.
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But, but Anna!!!!
I was so looking forward to not having a soul!
I mean, I have a conscience, although I've tried to kill the thing a million times. But, I'm not an 'initiate' so I was thinking, cool, you know, no soul. Maybe I could start having that second candy bar without guilt. Blow cigarette smoke in someone's face.
Blast.
Fine. ::mumbling to self::
Well, if it must be anyone, you seem to be the perfect sort.
Soul-sister it is. I wouldn't mind being an emu either.
They get to spit wherever they want.
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Irresponsible thought and behavior
Hi Sirena. This is jc. Just wanted to clarify that I'm not the one who brought up whether the world is finite or not. I'm the one who asked the cancer question that you haven't answered yet. You intimated twice but haven't said outright what I believe you know is morally or spiritually wrong to believe. You see, I think that every time you believe someone attracts something horrible to them, a spirit guide dies in a stupefying industrial accident across the universe.
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Well, er, not quite...
I have seen "The Secret" and while I do have some problems with it, from a perspective of mysticism, there is also truth in it. The problems I perceive are not what the author complains about - essentially the radical idea that we are responsible for our circumstances. While this seems bizarre to adherents of the world's religions and the general public, it's actually an essential element of the esoteric teachings of many of the world's mystery schools for thousands of years (dating back well before the Egyptians.)
The author is offended at the "blame" aspect of this level of taking responsibility, and what I can offer is that the original spiritual teachings "The Secret" is based on aren't interested in blame but rather understanding the role of cause and effect. Blame is the obsession with what you've done wrong in the past, but the spirituality of radical responsibility for your circumstances focuses on the "now": what is it that you are doing now? How does it bring about your future? It is only through this emotional non-attachment to outcome that in fact you can see the link. Otherwise, if you're doing something "wrong", you have already accepted your powerlessness in the situation, since you've let someone else tell you what's right and wrong as they are relative judgments.
The problem I have with "The Secret" is with the issue of non-attachment. "The Secret" only teaches half the mystical lesson: that you affect your circumstances. The other half is non-attachment. But the people in "The Secret" are strongly attached to the outcomes, and because of that very attachment this approach cannot succeed in the long run because the attachment contains in itself the fear of loss. That fear ends up being something that the person using "The Secret" focuses on, by definition, and thus brings about loss using the same mechanism that "The Secret" offers to bring about gain.
So my problem with "The Secret" is that it purports to offer a shortcut to enlightened instant manifestation, but in fact it contains the seed of its own ineffectualness by avoiding the difficult issue of non-attachment.
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JC
You made me spit up my diet coke, and I'm not even an emu yet.
hee hee
How about everytime a Secretron has a negative thought, a bell rings somewhere and a spirit guide gets a biscuit?
Or, everytime a 'Secret' initiate has a negative thought, I get a free eyeroll.
Or, everytime a 'Secret' initiate claims a child brought cancer on himself or herself, the initiate gets a poke in the eye from his or her spirit guide?
Whether or not a thought is negative is somewhat subjective, you know. For example, no one here but me may even like the simple and dignified emu. Hard to believe but ...
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re: various posters
You'd have to have actually watched the film to get this, but dwelling on what is NOT working in the world does NOT make it a better place. Look at all the bitching we all participated in leading up to the last election. Did it change anything? NO, because we were focusing on being anti-Bush rather than being pro-Kerry (the "anyone but Bush" bumper stickers, ect.) The film directly addresses how we can improve the world, not through denial, which is an unconscious process, but by consciously envisioning the changes we want to see happening now.
John Adams. One of the most negative people ever. Lived a great life though - accomplished a few things. He was anti-almost-everything, an angry little man. Thank goodness.
Let's take Gandhi, since you brought him up. His momentum started in South Africa when he wasn't allowed to take a seat on a train. Anti-being-jerked-around-by-assholes. Gandhi didn't just pretend that hanging on to the back of the train was a happy fun ride; he got pissed and he did something.
The proof is in the pudding people...will everyone who watches "The Secret" have their lives miraculously transformed? No, they won't, because it takes discipline, determination and hell of a lot of courage to decide to no longer be a whiny victim and to start actively co-creating their own realities, which we are doing unconsciously anyway, whether you believe it or not. (Just look at how Oprah and "The Secret" teachers are being viciously attacked now. Now imagine this is your own family/friends/coworkers. Not so fun.)
Oh, but honey. Oprah and the teachers attracted those vicious attacks, they must secretly want to be attacked!
Re: Emily - we are on opposite ends of the religious spectrum. Nevertheless I would like to shake hands with you. Keep on shining. Even if you can't convert any of the brainwashed nitwits, your posts keep the rest of us from feeling as if we've fallen down the rabbit hole.
Re: slamming head on desk. Yeah, me too.
Re: Locutus - are you really leaving? Do you have a blog? I'll miss you - using profanity well is an art form I appreciate.
And I'll freely admit that the message of "The Secret" is so simple that it is easy to turn it into a charicature of itself. The notion that our thoughts are powerful enough that consistent application of positive thoughts can help a person create positive outcomes for themselves is not that looney-tunes or even all that new-agey. It is not the same as "magical thinking" -- the notion that you can will something into existence merely by wanting it.
El wrongo. This is clearly NOT the message of "The Secret". The Secret does, in fact, state that the Universe (capital 'u') responds to magical thinking. About a quarter of the letters here contain some variant of this argument, which makes me worry about people. You can't simply ignore the parts of the message you don't like and say the message says something different. Well, I guess you CAN - in Secretland.