The Secret - New Age Hype or Truth?
The Secret, it seems is the next big thing to hit the web, the blogs, the television, Newsweek Magazine and even your neighborhood video rental store.
Oprah has gotten behind The Secret and given it the highest visibility possible; bringing its message into potentially every home in America. Newsweek did a feature article on The Secret, as did the New York Times. Their contributions were to bash soundly what they so obviously did not understand.
Is The Secret hokum or spiritual truth? In my view the basic principle of the Law of Attraction is total truth. Having said that, I believe that The Secret suffers from being written and marketed by a total spiritual amateur, Rhonda Byrne, an Australian TV producer who got her inspiration from a 1911 book on how to get rich. She literally fell in love with the book and as a result The Secret is unabashedly materialistic and simplistic. Too bad she had not discovered The Science of Mind by Ernest Holmes instead! The Law of Attraction is not about BMW's or 5 Karat necklaces. Its about the creation of the life you want and deserve for you and for those around you. You use this Law by changing what's inside of you.
Dr. Michael Beckwith, a panelist on the video and the Oprah presentation of The Secret is one of the most successful and talented Science of Mind ministers in America and when he speaks about The Secret he clearly and powerfully emphasizes the spiritual components of the Law. Ms. Byrne apparently hasn't discovered that side yet but I believe that she will.
As I read the Newsweek article I was aghast that the author, Jerry Adler, trivialized and poked fun at what is simple common sense and the basis of the teachings of Jesus, with which Mr. Adler perhaps may be unfamiliar.
Of course your thinking creates your life - what else could? You are the only one in your world that has been present every moment of your life. You are the prime mover of your life! It is not about blame, its about responsibility. You are what you think, speak and believe. What you focus on, what you expect, what you fear, what you believe is what you draw to you. Your inner life is the magnet that draws the experience of your outer world to you. It is not hugga bugga or the ravings of some New Age cult, it is basic Spiritual Law - as a man thinks so he is.
We are nothing but our thinking, speaking and choosing. We are not what we eat or what we wear or what we drive - we are what we think and what we allow into our minds. We imprison those who poison a body but do nothing to those who poison minds and souls every day with incredible filth and violence on TV, Cable and the Internet each day and night in this nation.
The Secret teaches that the Law of Attraction draws to you what you think and believe. That is true, "as within, so without", but that is not all there is to it. The Secret teaches a truth but only a small part of that truth. The rest must be told-a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing.
In Science of Mind we teach that you Treat (affirmative prayer) then move your feet. You move your feet by taking action in alignment with the Truth you have just created with your prayer work. You act with an assumption that its done!You don't just visualize what you want and it falls into your lap as The Secret implies.
You create a living, vibrant mental picture of what you want to experience or how you want to live and then you move in. You mentally take occupancy of this new state of mind you have just created. You cannot use The Secret effectively unless you think FROM THE END. Think of the quality, thing or feeling you desire as already done - get your mind into it and the body must follow. Idle daydreaming or simple visualization will not cut it. You have to own your desire, you have to claim it as your birthright as a creation of the most high God.
The great weakness of The Secret is that God is absent for the most part and so the intention behind it appears shallow and somehow crass. Put God at the heart of The Secret, use it for Good for all around you, not just the almighty YOU, and you will have discovered the Kingdom of Heaven.
The great strength of The Secret and the debt we owe Ms. Byrne is that she got the Word and the Truth of The Law of Attraction to the masses in a way that 180 years of New Thought teaching has not done. She is a brilliant marketer and packager and we all owe her a debt of gratitude.
Now let's take this basic "you can have it all" tool and put some spiritual meat on it. Let's give it a heart and a soul and then Ms. Byrne will have something to be really proud of. She could be the woman who began the great change of Mind and Heart that this land and this planet so desperately needs. Let's send her a copy of "The Science of Mind" and suggest she read it, then she can go back out and really teach!
Oprah has gotten behind The Secret and given it the highest visibility possible; bringing its message into potentially every home in America. Newsweek did a feature article on The Secret, as did the New York Times. Their contributions were to bash soundly what they so obviously did not understand.
Is The Secret hokum or spiritual truth? In my view the basic principle of the Law of Attraction is total truth. Having said that, I believe that The Secret suffers from being written and marketed by a total spiritual amateur, Rhonda Byrne, an Australian TV producer who got her inspiration from a 1911 book on how to get rich. She literally fell in love with the book and as a result The Secret is unabashedly materialistic and simplistic. Too bad she had not discovered The Science of Mind by Ernest Holmes instead! The Law of Attraction is not about BMW's or 5 Karat necklaces. Its about the creation of the life you want and deserve for you and for those around you. You use this Law by changing what's inside of you.
Dr. Michael Beckwith, a panelist on the video and the Oprah presentation of The Secret is one of the most successful and talented Science of Mind ministers in America and when he speaks about The Secret he clearly and powerfully emphasizes the spiritual components of the Law. Ms. Byrne apparently hasn't discovered that side yet but I believe that she will.
As I read the Newsweek article I was aghast that the author, Jerry Adler, trivialized and poked fun at what is simple common sense and the basis of the teachings of Jesus, with which Mr. Adler perhaps may be unfamiliar.
Of course your thinking creates your life - what else could? You are the only one in your world that has been present every moment of your life. You are the prime mover of your life! It is not about blame, its about responsibility. You are what you think, speak and believe. What you focus on, what you expect, what you fear, what you believe is what you draw to you. Your inner life is the magnet that draws the experience of your outer world to you. It is not hugga bugga or the ravings of some New Age cult, it is basic Spiritual Law - as a man thinks so he is.
We are nothing but our thinking, speaking and choosing. We are not what we eat or what we wear or what we drive - we are what we think and what we allow into our minds. We imprison those who poison a body but do nothing to those who poison minds and souls every day with incredible filth and violence on TV, Cable and the Internet each day and night in this nation.
The Secret teaches that the Law of Attraction draws to you what you think and believe. That is true, "as within, so without", but that is not all there is to it. The Secret teaches a truth but only a small part of that truth. The rest must be told-a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing.
In Science of Mind we teach that you Treat (affirmative prayer) then move your feet. You move your feet by taking action in alignment with the Truth you have just created with your prayer work. You act with an assumption that its done!You don't just visualize what you want and it falls into your lap as The Secret implies.
You create a living, vibrant mental picture of what you want to experience or how you want to live and then you move in. You mentally take occupancy of this new state of mind you have just created. You cannot use The Secret effectively unless you think FROM THE END. Think of the quality, thing or feeling you desire as already done - get your mind into it and the body must follow. Idle daydreaming or simple visualization will not cut it. You have to own your desire, you have to claim it as your birthright as a creation of the most high God.
The great weakness of The Secret is that God is absent for the most part and so the intention behind it appears shallow and somehow crass. Put God at the heart of The Secret, use it for Good for all around you, not just the almighty YOU, and you will have discovered the Kingdom of Heaven.
The great strength of The Secret and the debt we owe Ms. Byrne is that she got the Word and the Truth of The Law of Attraction to the masses in a way that 180 years of New Thought teaching has not done. She is a brilliant marketer and packager and we all owe her a debt of gratitude.
Now let's take this basic "you can have it all" tool and put some spiritual meat on it. Let's give it a heart and a soul and then Ms. Byrne will have something to be really proud of. She could be the woman who began the great change of Mind and Heart that this land and this planet so desperately needs. Let's send her a copy of "The Science of Mind" and suggest she read it, then she can go back out and really teach!
Labels: secret
posted by Rev. Dore' Jacques Patlian at
2:42 PM
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