Making Sense Of The Secret
Tuesday, January 18th, 2011The purpose of this article is to explain some of the ideas used by people who have read The Secret. The book that inspired The Secret was written over a century ago so some of the language may sound “cute.” People thought and talked in a different way back then, and often you have to give them the benefit of the doubt that when they said for example “men” what they really meant was “humanity”.
This was really an exciting time. The discoveries of science were forcing people to re-think their relationship with life, the universe and everything. The works of people like Edgar Cayce, Charles and Myrtle Filmore and Ernest Holmes were causing people to think in new ways.
A new world of creativity was opening up before people. Key to this process were the advances of science. We learned that we had an effect on the universe in which we found ouselves.
The effect of these new ideas was not limited to spiritual circles. The idea of Positive Mental Attitude, Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich, the fields of art, literature, music and many others were strongly altered by this shift in thought.
Many people may think the philosophy of the New Age culture sounds like The Force of Star Wars fame, which “surrounds us and penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together.” This view of a universal substance that is everywhere present is described in many of the world’s great religions and is described by Wallace Wattles as “a thinking stuff from which all things are made, and which, in its original state, permeates, penetrates, and fills the interspaces of the universe.”
The “new concept” that occurred 100 years ago was that we could directly impress our thoughts upon this “formless substance” and create our experience of life. No more pleading for the mercy of a Supreme Being! Such an idea was very transformational to the mindset of the time.
One thing is for sure: it’s good to have choices. How can we know the unknowable? It makes sense to this writer that we are free to live our own lives and to make our own choices.
Do you believe in astrology? Whether you do or not, it should not dictate the way you live your present life! I would not like to find out in the end that my ultimate fate depended on whether I mumbled certain chants or rubbed magic beads in a certain order.
“Thoughts held in mind produce after their kind”. It’s precisely what the New Agers, the Positive Mental Attitude people and the optimistic folk have been trying to tell us all this time. The Secret is a secret because we don’t see it right in front of us!
It really makes for an interesting study. The book that inspired The Secret is titled The Science of Getting Rich. Published over 100 years ago, it is in the public domain today. Look for more information in the next paragraph.
Adam Dillinger owns the Self Help Hotline and has been involved in self improvement and New Age thinking since childhood. He is happy to offer a free copy of the book that inspired The Secret. You can learn more about it here.
