Books & Movies: The Secret

<p>For additional notes and resources check out Douglas’ <a href="https://www.douglasjacoby.com/secretmp3/" target="_blank"><strong>website.</strong></a></p><p><strong>Introduction</strong></p><p>One spring day towards the end of 2004, Australian Rhonda Byrne discovered a secret - <i>the secret laws and principles of the universe</i>. Almost immediately her life was transformed, as she began to put into practice what she had learned. And in that moment her greatest wish, and mission, were to share this knowledge with the world.</p><p>In <i>The Secret,</i> a book and video and website, Rhonda Byrne offers us a better way of life. If we can envision what we want, truly believing it will happen and willing to act on our dream, then it will happen. We'll get what we desire. We can see debts disappear. We can lose weight. We can become millionaires. (No wonder it's so popular!) It was also made into a pretty nice feel-good movie (despite some questionable philosophy).</p><p>"You are God in a physical body. You are spirit in the flesh. You are Eternal Life expressing itself as you. You are a cosmic being. You are all power. You are all wisdom. You are all intelligence. You are perfection. You are magnificence. You are the creator, and you are creating the creation of You on this planet." (<i>The Secret, </i>p.164. New York: Atria Books, 2006).</p><p>Guests on Oprah, backing up Byrne's claims, share rags-to-riches stories. If you want to be like them, you will want to know "The Secret." Byrne promises things will go our way -- the universe will work for us -- when we learn the secret.</p><p>As I tuned in to Oprah, I heard the following words from guests on her show:</p><p>"We have an absolutely unlimited power within us... We are all just energy... Thought and feeling control the flow of energy."</p><p>"We all have our own magnetic power... The thoughts we think -- our feelings -- send out a wave into the universe, and anything that's vibrating in a similar level gets attracted into our life."</p><p>Thus "we create our