The Secret : Movie Review

I'd been hearing all the fuss but believe it or not just saw The Secret, which orignally came out in 2006-just the other day. Being familiar with Esther and Jerry Hicks, I was already knew about the general concept promoted by The Secret (intention-manifestation and the law of attraction) but had never actually seen the movie. In the event you haven't seen it, or if you just want to hear my opinion, here is a mini-review.

The secret is presented in a quasi-documentary format with interviews of experts interspersed with sometimes cheesy low-budget scenes depicting various events. Multiple experts present points of view, including some I'd heard of like Bob Proctor, John Gray, Fred Allen Wolf and John Hagelin. Others I wasn't so familiar with, such as the Rev. Michael Beckwith. Most of the speakers were impressive and the discussion was always interesting. Overall I really liked The Secret and the cheesy scenes I am complaining about were a minor sideshow.

The movie does present “the secret” in a definite, easy to understand way. The basic idea is that your thoughts and feelings act to create your future through the “law of attraction”. The law of attraction doesn't just bring good things, it can bring the bad into your life as well. You might think of “the universe” as being kind of neutral on what's good or bad for your life. So whatever you direct your energy towards, through the law of attraction the universe is going to give you more of it.

We've all seen examples of how this works. You might have an Uncle Joe who always seems to be down on his luck. No business he starts makes a profit, his relationships never seem to work, and maybe he's always in debt. Hate to say it but this is all up to Uncle Joe. He's focusing his energy on what already is-the negative aspects of his life like being in debt-and attracting more of the same. People like Joe often go through life complaining about their situation. Bad news is, while its good to get things off your chest, by talking about it and focusing more energy on bad things, you're manifesting more bad things into reality! So stop already! Lesson one is stop thinking about bad things in your life. Turn a negative into a positive. If you're in debt, do not focus energy by worrying about the debt. Instead start visualizing prosperity.

So Uncle Joe is not someone you want to emulate. But on the other side you've got Aunt Sally, who can't seem to do anything wrong. She has a business idea and it makes her a fortune. She lives in a fabulous house by the beach with her wonderful supporting husband. Everything Sally touches turns to gold.

This is because whether Sally realizes it or not, she's using the law of attraction in a way to manifest good outcomes in her life. Call it the power of positive thinking. The good news is that you can do this too. I've just started working on this in my own life, and while my results are preliminary, I guarantee it works. With my newfound knowledge I've also figured out how bad things in my life that kept happening over and over again were almost caused, no according to the movie were caused-by my negative thought patterns.

When it comes to the law of attraction, thought and feeling are both important. But feelings are more powerful and what really gets the law of attraction going. It starts with thoughts then gets manifested via feelings. Here's an example from my own personal life that was a negative outcome. I was dating a gal who always seemed to cancel dates at the last minute. When this happened, I would wake up that morning and have the thought she was going to cancel. Dwelling on the thought turned it into an overwhelming emotional sensation. The thought had become a feeling. Sure enough, an hour or two later this would manifest in reality with the dreaded phone call.

You might be tempted to say that I was just reading into what happened based on her past behavior. But I don't think so. When I didn't get the feeling – that overwhelming sensation from my gut that it was about to happen-it didn't happen. Being familiar with some of the writings on these concepts by the Hicks, I began to nip in the bud when I'd have thoughts of her cancelling dates. It took some practice, but as soon as I eliminated the though of this happening from my mind, reality followed suit. She stopped the behavior from then on.

OK without revealing too much of the movie here are a couple of tidbits. Here is a little blueprint for success-a three step plan to open the door to what you want:

• Ask the universe for what you want

• Believe it

• Receive it

The second step is important. How many of us pray for what we want, then leave it at that? Then things don't quite work out. Prayer is important, because to manifest something in reality we have to start by letting the universe know our desires. But we can't stop there. Its so crucial to really believe its going to happen. This will take some mind training to get this going for you, but you can do it. Use visualization. In one example from the movie, a guy said look at your hands-hold them in front of you and study them in detail. Then close your eyes and visualize your hands-wrapped around the steering wheel of a new sports car. WOW I thought that was a great exercise. The idea is visualize the good outcome in your life and do it over and over and over.

Here is another great story from the movie. A guy who was an author thought, boy it would be nice to make $100,000 a year. He already had a book out, but it wasn't selling much. But he taped a “$100,000 bill” on the wall so he could look at it every day and focus his energy on making that much money.

One day he was in the supermarket check out line and glanced at the National Enquirer. He thought to himself, boy it would be nice to advertise the book in there, maybe I could make the money that way!

Seemed like a ridiculous thought, but then a few weeks later he was giving a talk and met a reporter there. She said she really liked his talk and wanted to interview him. Guess where she worked? National Enquirer! After she wrote the article, his sales soared and he made more money than he could possibly dream of!

Some important lessons there-pay attention to details! The universe is feeding you information and signs you might not be consciously aware of if you're not paying attention. More-be ready to act when the opportunity arises.

One minor point I don't like about the movie, is that it jumps from speaker to speaker in an attention-deficit disorder style presentation. A speaker will talk for maybe 9 seconds, then it jumps to a different speaker, then back again. In a sense, this was helpful because it provided a unified presentation as each expert talked about a given concept, but I thought it jumped around too much and found that mildly irritating.

In conclusion, I highly recommend The Secret. Why don't we all start practicing these principles-really practice them-so that we all become more prosperous and the world becomes a better place? I leave you with a quote from a man who was paralyzed and thought to be a vegetable due to an airplane accident. He ended up walking out of the hospital on his own, and was featured in the movie. He said “Man becomes what he thinks about”. The doctors were saying he would never speak, breath on his own or walk again. But in his mind, he kept visualizing himself walking out of the hospital. And that's exactly what happened.