What a coincidence I just watch this movie this weekend as well and thought of bumping this thread.
I am a very skeptical person, but I tried to go into this with an open mind. I was given a brief outline of what the
secret is by someone at work who saw it on
Oprah.
I noticed that the movie seemed to consist of two different but similar ideas that were packaged as one. One idea I thought was good, nothing new, but could still benefit people. The other I thought shared a lot with the first idea, but had an illogical twist that could be very dangerous for some people.
Main idea of the
secret:
Positive thinking will result in positive results. Negative thinking will produce negative results. So whatever you have coming to you (positive or negative) is a direct by product of what you've thinking of.
Idea 1
Same as the main idea but coupled with action. Action is the key word here. You must take positive action in the direction of your positive thinking. Dwelling on negative things will only makes things worse. Fairly simple and straight forward. This part of the
secret is nothing new. It is essentially a common lifestyle/attitude being used by pretty much the whole of happy people in society.
Idea 2
This is the one that caused me lots of grief. It takes the main idea of the the
secret but adds the element of energy and the universe. Positive thinking sends outs positive energy into the universe which is then returned as positive results for the person thinking them. If this sounds the same as Idea 1, it is not. This uses the idea that the universe is always to remain in balance. They mention the idea of a catalogue quite a few times. Basically if you want money and think positively that you are going to make more money, the universe will answer your thoughts and give you more money in the future. Through the use of magic this happens, although in the movie they call it science.
On the other hand if you are dwelling on negative thoughts the universe will send you negative results back. If you are constantly thinking about getting harassed at work, you will. What's the solution to this? Thinking that you won't get harassed at work, and it will stop. Seems simple right? Well according this idea in the movie it is. This idea doesn't involve actually taking matters into your own hands, because it is out of your hands, it is in the hands of the universe.
So if you are thinking, what's the problem with this thinking? Sounds innocent enough. At first I thought this as well, until it got into the medical portion of the movie. Of course the idea is that positive thinking will get you better health, and negative thinking will get you worse health. Well they throw stress into this mix, which as far as I am concerned doesn't fit with this theory at all. They go on to say that you can heal yourself through positive thinking. I am not misquoting this or taking out of context, the movie outlines this quite clearly. As far as medical science is concerned thinking positively cannot heal you. I'll use an extreme example. Positive thinking cannot grow back a missing limb, no matter hard you try.
So on the other side of this theory negative theory will net you negative health. Again this is stupid. People with cancer are asking for it? This is just insulting on a level that I cannot express without mashing my keyboard into my desk. So I digress.
This line of thinking (whatever you have coming to you (positive or negative) is a direct by product of what you've thinking of.) can be taken to other, unexplainable examples by this theory. Such as the holocaust, or really any other atrocity. These "experts" could not possibly make the claim that all the Jews "had this coming" because of their thinking.
This "
secret" thinking is so short sighting and illogical it's borderline idiotic. This
secret fad is basically repackaged religion in the sense that, your life is not is your hands, but rather in the cosmic forces of the universe. Instead of praying, you think positively. Do we really need more people to refuse medical treatment because they are so gullible as to believe this? The reason I make this case was because there was a women who refused chemotherapy and to have her cancerous breast removed, because she opted for the "the
secret" positive thinking and better eating alternative. She had the backing of a homoeopathic "doctor" to administer this treatment.
Some of the experts, such as the chicken soup author, I feel sorry for. It is almost as if he selling short his hard work short for his book. Which he seems to be attributing it to an outside force. A lot of this logic falls into the
post hoc fallacy in my mind. "
after this therefore because of this. the mistaken notion that simply because one thing happens after another, the first event was a cause of the second event."
To conclude my lengthy post (sorry and thanks for reading) I feel that there is lots of good that can come from portions of the
secret. I know it may not seem that I support any of it from the tone of my post, but some of it is good. But some of it is in my mind dangerous and illogical. This "
secret" has not been something that has been used by the great minds throughout history. Although they will try and trick you in the movie by quoting famous minds. But rather this is not a
secret, but an attitude/mindset that they are selling (and selling lots of) for money, bottom line.
If you would like read more about the
secret, there is a good article about it by the Skeptics website.
The Secret Behind the Secret. It is an interesting critical read of the
secret book/movie, worth checking out.
