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| Home Front: Culture Wars |
| Self-help gone nutty |
| 2007-02-13 |
| A craze called 'The Secret' blends Tony Robbins with 'The Da Vinci Code,' telling people to have it all without trying. Wow. Sounds interesting. Tell me more... WHEN MY SISTER arrived from New York over the holidays, she plopped a hand-tooled leather satchel on my piano bench and said, "See the beautiful bag I manifested for myself?" Gorgeous, indeed. But manifested? Well, I suppose that's easier than dealing in cash. "Manifesting," for those outside the self-help loop, is the big buzzword from "The Secret," a new DVD with a tie-in book featuring the ancient idea of having it all without trying very hard. If "The Secret" had a plot, it might go something like "Tony Robbins uncovers the Judas Gospel and learns to use the Force." The DVD is screened regularly at gatherings of the energy-healer crowd. The video opens with a "Da Vinci Code"-style shot: A man in a ragged tunic makes off with a hot papyrus. A voice-over assures us that an ancient secret, hidden from most of mankind, is about to be revealed. (Insert little conspiracy montage: A medieval priestly type privately unrolls the secret scroll; men in suits scheme in a smoke-filled boardroom.) Then motivational speakers take turns elaborating on this idea: If you want something, think of it with loving and positive feelings and it will "manifest." The concept apparently stems from the work of Esther Hicks, a famous channeler. Famous, huh? How come I've never heard of her? I never would have heard of "The Secret" if it weren't for my sister, the sort of person who has a spirit guide and professes to "massage energy." (Friends say the wrong sister moved to California.) But apparently it has found major cultural traction. It was featured on "Oprah" last week. The book is No. 4 on The Times' nonfiction bestseller list and No. 2 on Amazon (with the audio CD set No. 3). At my local Barnes & Noble, it was sold out. Oh, well...Oprah. Must be legit. Oprah wouldn't screw me... Americans are never too jaded for another get-rich-quick chimera. In "The Secret," real and sustained effort is unnecessary, even frowned on. The scheme lays out a "law of attraction" — a strange misreading of quantum physics — that asserts that the universe grants your wishes because you are the "most powerful transmission tower on in the world." Send out "wealth frequencies" with your thoughts and the universe's wealth frequencies will be pulled to you. Who thought this up, Al Gore? Here was my favorite bit: "Food is not responsible for putting on weight. It is your thought that food is responsible for putting on weight that actually has food put on weight." It's a position that seems to have a lot in common with President Bush's ideas about global warming. Carbon emissions warm the Earth only if you worry that they will. Ah. You knew an LA Time columnist had to sneak one in. Although, I think I'd see more democrats going for this. Something for nothing? Not my fault? What a deal... On the flip side, nothing — nothing — happens to people that isn't brought to them by their own persistent thoughts, and the book strongly implies that this includes those killed in the Holocaust and the World Trade Center. Under this philosophy, why bother contributing to Oxfam or worrying about Darfur? What a guilt-reliever. Near as I can tell, the whole idea is just a new spin on the very old (and decidedly not secret) "The Power of Positive Thinking" wedded to "ask and you shall receive." So it's not surprising that its author, Australian TV producer Rhonda Byrne, is best known for a show called "The World's Greatest Commercials." Warming over others' old work appears to be her area of expertise. She took the well-worn ideas of some self-help gurus, customized them for the profoundly lazy, gave them a veneer of mysticism — and she tapped right into that wealth frequency. What a pro. Maybe she's right. After all, Rhonda will probably get rich. See. There's your proof. Strange to say, people are buying it. Not just the book and DVD. The message. Therapists tell me they're starting to see clients who are headed for real trouble, immersing themselves in a dream world in which good things just come. The therapists obviously ought to visualize smarter clients. This surprises her? My sister says I'm over-intellectualizing. She, after all, had manifested a fine leather satchel. And I have to admit, if there were designer leather goods to be had out of this, I was interested. The reality was — drat it all — far more prosaic. Watching the DVD gave her the idea that she could afford this bag if she really wanted it, and so she went ahead and charged it. I say, if you need an Amex card to make a handbag appear, you're an amateur. Sounds like a scam...but that's just me. |
| Posted by:tu3031 |
| #3 I begin to see the upside of my sister being smarter than me. |
| Posted by: Grunter 2007-02-13 14:42 |
| #2 This concept has been bandied about for years, but it has a flip side. The basic concept is that everything in the universe is either a "push" or a "pull". People continually pull in events and things they want to experience "in their space", *or* push away events and things that they don't want to experience. This is done throughout the day to overcome the boring situation of life. That is, if we didn't do this all the time, then life would be very, very boring, with people endlessly hoping to be in the right place at the right time, and catching a chance event. We would still be living in caves without it. It is done so naturally that people aren't aware they do it, and if they do become aware of it, then they consciously interfere with the process, bungling it up. Again, while everybody has to both push and pull, most people are better at one than the other. Either getting more activity and stuff around them, or leading a more sedate life with fewer things by pushing events and stuff they don't want away. It also behaves like a single shot pistol, in that the energy used to pull or push has to recharge between uses. People also do it as a group, for bigger projects; even most of a nation might do it, for some international reason, like a war. As silly as it sounds, proponents of the idea are big on experimenting to find out if its works for an individual. Nothing much to it, really. Just start small and visualize some unusual, if not rare, object arriving in your immediate area, within 8-10 feet of yourself. After you do this, then think about other things while doing some unrelated activity for a length of time. This takes your mind off of it, helping the process to work. Alternative, if there is some onerous activity you wish to avoid, imagine it being canceled with you being notified soon enough so you can miss out. In theory, one or the other, or both of these things might happen. Some people feel strangely guilty about doing this, which interferes a great deal with their ability. On a final note, a friend who believed in this years ago noted that they thought they were really good at "pushing" stuff away, far better than "pulling". So he said he shouldn't ever "Visualize World Peace", as he would push it away and help to start a war. In his case, he felt he should "Visualize Thermonuclear Annihilation." |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2007-02-13 14:39 |
| #1 What's the francise fee? |
| Posted by: Spot 2007-02-13 14:06 |