There is No Secret: The Myth of the Law of Attraction

Hi…

I am a fan of the Secret, however, I must admit that this article has its merits.

For instance, in the book and video, all you had to do is visualize yourself driving the car of your dreams and presto you have it. Of course, I never got my dream car.

The problems is that IF the law of attraction granted me my dream car, that would mean that the person who gave up the car (dealer, private seller) would have given it up for nothing. Why would a dealer, private seller give up a $80,000 car for free? Well, he wouldn’t

So, I decided that instead of hoping a car would materialize, I would find ways to buy the car. Some ideas I came up with are

1) open a special savings account. The purpose of this special savings account would be to accumulate enough money for a big down payment or to pay for the car in “cash.” No financing.

2) Naturally, have a photo of your dream car in a place that will allow you to see it every day.

3) ask the Universe to help me find ways to make money to deposit into the special savings account, and

4) put a certain % of my weekly paycheck into that account

5) offer some service to the public to help me fund the saving account

Best wishes

Hiya there,
I am an immigrant in the Uk and I’ve read the Secret during a particular tough time of my life, occured two years ago. Since then I started to apply the law of attraction and I must say my life has improved. I carry on repeating myself that I have everything I need, and guess what? I DO have everythng I need and even more than what I actually need, whilst before to practice the secret I had no relationship, not many firends and no money depite working very hard. I must say, I believe in the law of attraction! (this is not spam bytheway!!) x

As someone trained in philosophy, critical thinking, metaphysics, even mysticism, I find the “Secret” a plague upon the suggestible. Worse yet, I know people stuck in perpetual victimhood because of it, and it’s incurable because they do not allow themselves to see beyond a fanatical “belief creates reality” paradigm.

If it were a drug, it would be criminalized. As a spiritual model, it’s pure hellish ignorance disguised as bliss.

I can’t believe you’re trashing this! I LOVE The Secret and in fact the Law of Attraction as well. I can’t believe it changed my life so much. This is a genuine testimonial. I live in South Africa

You could say that I’m a skeptical person. Like everyone here, we’ve all has our shares of unfortunate events, from which I, personally, believe was brought upon myself through constant negative thought.

To the author of this website, I thank you for an honest, non-biased (more or less) review. I always try and see both the pros and cons, supports and criticsms, before taking a side, therefore this site was particularly helpful to me.

With that said, I am a believer and I live by it. I ask and question the skeptics for debate’s sake; here’s my question: have you TRIED it? Now, don’t jump the gun and tell me you don’t need to experience it to know it’s something to avoid (murder, rape, drug addiction – you name it – do you need to experience consequences to know these things are harmful to your physical/mental well-being.

I’m not preaching. I am not shoving a bible in your face and questioning your logic. I simply ask the said question with utmost respect.

Like all religions, there’s an issue with scientific support for its validity. While one may approach it in a skeptical, perhaps pessimistic way, in the end, it must be mentioned: does religion offer anything bad for you? When I delve into the thought, I conclude that religion is good. Granted, the Bible is not perfect. Mistranslation, fanaticism, and just plain old hatred all contributes to its corruption and resultant periods of chaos. Stoning a cheating woman, hating gays, whatever it may be, I do not agree. It’s crap, plain and simple.

Let’s tie this in. The Secret is not a religion. It is a BELIEF like respective reasons for being a vegetarian or taking a side in politics.

The review seems to have approached the book in a different light from mine. It kinda connotes that if I were to dream about being a millionaire or learning to fly by no technological means – for example – that it can be done. That’s absolutely ridiculous.

One’s dreams can be achieved IF and ONLY IF his or her dreams are realistic to the individual. (This sort of ties in with the placebo effect, but for brevity’s sake, it basically means that if it’s real to you, then it can and will happen if you believe. Notice that when the book tells you to believe, it doesn’t tell you to believe you can get “it,” whatever “it” is. The book tells you to believe you already have “it.” Just as if you were to truly, blindly believe that the injection from a doctor was an anesthetic, when in fact you merely received a dud anesthetic, it has been proved to be just as effective.)

Finalizing point? Reassess your realities. Do this carefully and relatively to your own interests and benefits.
“It was unrealistic for a giant chunk of metal to fly in the air, but the Wright brothers didn’t see it that way. It was unrealistic for a glass bulb to provide light, but Edison thought otherwise.” – Will Smith, interview.

YOU decide what is real to you. If you don’t see a bunch of checks in your mail as a reality – I don’t either, if I may add – it will not happen. Most of us have been raised to believe that money is something that is earned. It’s a superb attitude, but in truth, nothing but a belief to have been hardwired into our minds. Haven’t you ever said, “I wish I can be rich?” This is a wishful reaction to your current reality. We naturally think of such things as pleasant thoughts and desires you’d like to see fit in your life.

This is a friendly suggestion.

Start small. Forget attracting a coffee to you everyday, or anything for that matter. Before exercising this law, it has to be mastered, just as our sense of balance is developed through growth and works in hand with the laws of force and gravity everyday.

Wake up and just really soak in the things you have to be grateful for, things for which you’ve hardly considered giving much thought (again, think small. Crawl before you can walk, as I like to say.)

Next time you have a bad morning, just sit and think about happy things to expect, even in that moment. I can GUARANTEE that this is of nothing but goodness coming your way.

THEN begin your small ventures – THEN you can start to turn your desires to realities.

This is the way I live my life, and I don’t exaggerate when I say my days are going by much more smoothly. Most importantly, I find myself happy, content, and ambitious.

It’s healthy to keep your own little debate, cautious doubts if you will, in your thoughts. I question it to this day, which is why I read this review in the first place. Maybe it is basically a load of crap. Maybe there is no mystical force (I cringed when I read that…) or such laws.
But I am noticeably happier. Life makes more sense to me. Solutions appear before me when I am in times of struggle. What more can I ask for from anything or anyone?

Thanks for reading. These were my thoughts. I apologize for the tangents… it’s been a long night.

P.S.
These are my theories. They’re not to be taken in an offensive manner.

Holocaust – Your country’s dirt poor to a point where a wheelbarrow full of cash barely buys a loaf of bread. A woman was mugged of her briefcase full of money, but the thief leaves the money and takes the briefcase because it is of more value.
We’ve all heard these. The field of sociology suggests that in times of brokenness, turmoil, and/or poverty, it is likely that an individual or a small group with promises (false or not) be risen to power by societal approval.
Hitler promised Germany a prosperous future. He REASSESSED the realities for the people who are all so wanting this terrible chapter to be over. In all respect, knowingly or unknowingly, he basically did a few vital things for his “perfect world:”
1. put the blame on Jews, prime example of scapegoating, and beat them down through antagonizing them. i.e., military force.
2. incite a belief that Germans, or perhaps the Aryans, are the superior race.
3. promised a brighter future for their country and children.
4. target the majority of the people, the lower class, who seems to have taken the worst blows, and earn their favor.

So where did the Jews go wrong? They didn’t. THEORETICALLY, if this law of attraction holds true, it must’ve meant that Hitler, a passionately angry and bitter, debatably a favored leader, wanted his reality more than the Jews. After a short while, it wasn’t just him but a considerable majority of favor from the nation and his followers, both by choice and force.

The law says whatever we think most often and passionately about, it can come true, yes?

Also notice how child soldiers, anarchy, rape, etc., happens in countries that are abused by a group in power. This power is usually obtained in more or less the same way, both by force and free will. Rwanda and North Korea are some good examples I can think of.

Just some food for thought. The Jews did nothing wrong at all and Hitler by most standards was an evil man.

You can ALWAYS question something. Approach your pondering at all the angles you want. You’ll find just as many faults in people and things as you could find the benefits and goodness. Cliché has it that whether you think you can or cannot, you are right.

Your realities are a result of your desires.

I think that too many also believe in black and white thinking, and when they hear about this amazing, newly “discovered” and “ancient” secret that the money-hungry writers of this sham book and movie wrote, they may assume that all that time in their lives, all those failures, difficult stages of finances, drawbacks or losses and discouragement was because they were thinking wrong. Oh dear, bad thoughts. So, they feel compelled to totally change their thinking fully, to the complete opposite as compared to before. They from black to white.

Bad thoughts cause bad things? No, they cause bad behaviour (if allowed to develop to that point) which implies bad choices which does what? Bad consequenses, and then comes the psychological part of it: “Did I attract all that bad stuff?” You have the Secret to thank for that.

Respectfully, get real and wake up. Please read a book on psychology and the psychology of behaviour, you will love it. It exposes everything this stupid faux pseudo-documentary talks about.

Oh and don’t forget the part about health: I have got to elaborate on this. I would honestly love to see a medical research study on a group of say, fifty people, a little overweight and less fit than the norm, and have them eat nothing but chocolate cake and pie and cookies for all three of their daily meals and not exercise, drink nothing but sodas all day, no water and take no vitamins or supplements either. Then, have them do cognitive tasks such as focused concetration, mental arithmetic, logic puzzles, and other intellectual tasks and see how well they do for a full month on nothing but shit foods and shit drinks. In addition, monitor their weight throughout the month and take weekly blood samples to check lipids and cholesterol, and glucose levels. Allow them NO exercise whatsoever, and see who’s full of energy each day.

After all, remember the Secret says you don’t need food, its just the thought of food that keeps us alive. Oh okay, have a person run two miles on a blistering hot day and give them no water before or after and see how well they do. No matter how much they think about water, they will still be dehydrated.
Take a starving kid and tell them to think about food, and they’ll be fine even though they are atrophied and suffering from nutrient deficiences and are famished? Are you shitting me? No one should take a course in nutrition from the Secret Queen Rhonda Byrne, they’ll end up in the ER from self-induced delusional starvation still thinking they are “attracting” food.

Thinking about food when you are REALLY hungry accomplishes one thing: It gets your attention off your growling stomach. Sometimes it can’t. Sometimes it makes it even worse. It does not feed you. Until you put food in your mouth, chew it, swallow it, and digest it are you truly fed. Don’t we all learn this when we’re two or three years old?

If a person wants good health, eat healthy and stick with it all your life. Don’t eat junk food, it is that simple. Again, all nothing but delusion, delusion from superior marketing and psychological susceptibility on the part of those who buy into it.

I have read The Secret and I’m in total agreement with your statements.

One of the paramount principles in science and logic is that correlation does not imply causation.

For instance, you play the lottery and think really positively about winning and then you actually win. This is no evidence that your positive thinking CAUSED you to win.

At best, your positive thinking might have caused you to play, which rather belongs to the realm hope and wishful thinking.

Many people start their own projects with good ideas, enthusiasm and lots of positive thinking but fail while others set mature or even conservative goals, considering pros and cons and succeed in the long run.

I agree with much of what you have written. While I agree that focusing on the positive and on the details of what we want can help us stay more motivated and be more persistent, driven and dedicated in our actions, I believe there is a huge piece missing – G-d! There is much beyond our understanding and saying that we can explain all the events that happen, both personally and on a larger scale, is something I firmly disagree with. We may have our perceptions and think we have some understanding of why things happen – but we don’t know all the details for sure. We can do our absolute best, think the most positively, visualize our success – and yes all these help – pray, etc. – This doesn’t guarantee the outcome. Sometimes what we think we want now isn’t for our ultimate benefit.