The Secret

Posted 1/1/09 (By Travis)

1/1/09 Neoperspectives.com

I recently had opportunity to listen to The Secret, by Rhonda Byrne on audio CD and thought it was excellent. It approaches the path to enlightenment/happiness/success, whatever one wants to call it, in the genre of self help, with some emphasis on financial success, mixed with liberal doses of eastern philosophy, but using western syntax, with almost historical perspective. Certainly this unique format facilitates passage of valuable truth to those who otherwise might not receive it.

The general theme is that our thoughts make up who we are, what we attract to us, and therefore what will transpire in the future. By changing our thoughts, a very possible phenomena, we can change our future, change who we are, and increase our happiness.

If we worry about something excessively, we are increasing the likelihood that this bad event will transpire, by its constant addition to our thoughts. But the reverse is also true; if we don't worry about a future event at all, if we believe a positive outcome has already transpired, if we act as if we have already achieved a goal, then we shall no doubt achieve it.

Like attracts like is another premise; negative thoughts attract negative outcomes, doubt attracts failure, jealousy attracts insecurity, while desires, addictions, and vices attract unhappiness. Indeed, the mind is so interconnected, the neural pathways crisscross and interconnect on such a dizzying level, that one can see how this would be true. In fact, this paradigm is merely expressing in a different way the eastern law of Karma.

But again, the reverse must also true. Positive thoughts attract positive outcomes. Humility results in exultation, love of others produces reciprocal love, putting oneself last often results in triumphant personal success and happiness.

These sorts of patterns can even be seen in the medical field, although one has to be careful how one expresses perception. Although there are many cases of strength, perseverance, and positive motivations in patients, it is also likely that many patients in the hospitals and clinics were predisposed to their health problems by their unhealthy lifestyles, stemming from unhealthy mental states, stemming from unhealthy thoughts.

An ER attending once told me that many of the people in the ER or trauma rooms for shootings, stabbings, and fights received their just rewards, as their injuries were often caused by self defense of their victims or revenge for abhorrent transgressions; he even went so far as to suggest women in after being battered by their significant others had a great deal of responsibility for their situations. "They are not angels," he offered.

You can see how this sort of worldview can be perceived as insensitive and callous. Indeed, this brusqueness transpires even at Yoga Ashrams, where adverse events causing an individual great pain are brushed off by others without empathy as Karma, in the vein of, "you deserved it."

This sort of cynicism is rooted in the reality of 'like attracts alike' and 'thoughts create our world and future', but should not result in diminished compassion for people suffering as a result of these laws, but rather an increase in our efforts to help them understand the root causes of their situations and how they can break adverse cyclic patterns in their lives.

In fact, sufferings and undesirable events we personally experience are ideally viewed as joyous reminders of improvements we need to make in our own lives.

There were some chapters diverted to focus on financial wealth. A delicate digression because financial wealth is certainly subservient to overall happiness and well being, although the latter can also indirectly predispose to the former, a phenomena The Secret seizes on. After all, there is no shortage of miserable wealthy people. Neurosurgeons, for example, amongst the wealthiest of doctors, in terms of financial earnings, have the highest divorce rate in the medical profession. The point is that positive thoughts: visualizing, asking, believing, can result in increased personal success and happiness, and indirectly, financial plenty. Many, although of course not all, people who have achieved great financial success are good people, kind and generous souls, who have achieved a measure of control over their thoughts and attracted their success (including in their particular cases some combination of wealth creation, job creation, and technological advancement/discovery) by their love of others, emotional control, and strength of their higher mind. People of great wealth often give large sums back to their communities and to charitable projects. Is it not true, the more that is given the more that is received? These folks are practicing the lifestyle they likely had before they became wealthy: the lifestyle, and I am speaking of mental lifestyle, which created their wealth for them in the first place.

Happiness is created, it is not taken from anyone, there is not a set amount of happiness and suffering in the aggregate human spirit, and neither is their a fixed amount of financial wealth in the pie. Wealth can be created, literally out of thin air, by anyone.

Industry, thrift and self-control are not sought because they create wealth, but because they create character.

- Calvin Coolidge

Like any good work, there are subjective criticisms worthy of mention. The emphasis on material wealth, if not viewed in the context of more general happiness and success could be a turn off. Certainly a penniless hermit can be more 'successful' and happier than the richest businessmen, and wealth should rarely be a primary focus, but a thoughtless possible byproduct of self improvement. And, as mentioned, it is also important not turn the realities of natural law into judgment against others. Just because someone has applied these methods of changing and monitoring thoughts and other practices leading to a successful and happy life does not make him or her better than anyone else. After all, it is still unclear to what extent our own volition can drive this positive change.

The author tells a compelling story about a young woman who believes she is ready for a relationship, thinks about this future reality, prays for it, accepts it as fact, but does not meet her life partner until she really begins to believe it; parking her car on one side of the garage, and moving her clothes to one side of the closet. If not explained with proper context these actions can seem reckless, a feckless gamble. For example, should one not wear a seatbelt because the mere inherent thought or action invites a wreck? Similarly, monetary charity cannot be driven by desperate want for material value. It must be given with the intention of receiving nothing in return, as part of a habit rather than a one time event, only then, paradoxically, might one be rewarded.

This leads us to, perhaps, my strongest criticism of The Secret, which is the indirect emphasis on the specific nature of requests. For example, praying for a certain amount of money or meditating on the success of ones business, even attempting to align oneself with the 'energies' of a certain residency or graduate position. :) While such practices can be beneficial, they skirt dangerously around predisposition of subconscious arrogance, resulting in the superimposition of one's own will over God's; despite The Secret's admission that the 'how', how the the fulfillment of short term goals comes to pass, is best left to the universe itself.

It appears self evident that we are often mistaken about our own role in this interconnecting computing human matrix. We allow our short term personal likes and dislikes and desires to shape our intentions and aspirations for the future; reminiscent of the country song 'thank God for unanswered prayers'. Surrender to a more objective decisions maker, which can be called God's Will, chance, energy, good, etc... would be a better option. I don't think short term prayer, energy alignment, and thought synchronization are ill-advised, but just that they should be coupled with more objective, general, and long term intention and surrender.

A last point, which is brought up more as a discussion than a criticism, is the mechanism by which synchronizations and 'like attract like' thoughts and benefits occur. The more 'scientific' mechanisms were discussed in 'Good Karma, Bad Karma', yet it appears Byrne subscribes to neither of these, although I doubt she would argue their existence and effect. She seems to implicate a more existential spiritual mechanism. What the 'Celestine Prophecies' refer to as spiritual coincidences of sorts, which appear to have both meaning and message. In other words, she is saying our thoughts affect a most fundamental energy/vibration, which in turn create the future and present around us, including observed improbable coincidences and connections, both good and bad, if it's even worth judging them as so. Additionally, when our minds are most calm and peaceful the prevalence of said events/coincidences, including positive coincidences apparently unrelated to our base energies/thoughts/personalities, appears to increase.

This may seem a bit fantastic, but I have always believed there exists a close relationship, even perhaps a degree of synonymousness, between randomness, coincidence, free will, and God's will, and Byrne describes her observation of phenomena resulting from this eclectic mixture, without fleshing out the exact mechanism. In the end, we might even question the ultimate value of such naked purist intellectual inquiry.

In conclusion, I think this book is a worthy read/listen. It approaches common direction from a different path. In the vein of Dr Amen, in his title, 'Change your Brain Change your Life' (although he is taking the pharmaceutically route, a complimentary path with its own value), Byrne's 'change your thoughts change your life' is even more illuminating, especially upon investigation into how one might accomplish this goal. Surely only through positive spiritual practices, deep introspection, focused intention, and meditation/prayer can significant change be achieved.