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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: The Anticult ()
Date: February 25, 2007 05:41AM

Check out the list of "books" by "Dr." Joe Vitale, one of the scam artists from The Secret. Here's a couple of them listed below.

[www.amazon.com]

Buying Trances: A New Psychology of Sales and Marketing by Joe Vitale

There's a Customer Born Every Minute: P.T. Barnum's Amazing 10 "Rings of Power" for Creating Fame, Fortune, and a Business Empire TodayGuaranteed! by Joe Vitale

The Power of Outrageous Marketing: Using the 10 Time-Tested Secrets of Titans, Tycoons and Billionaires to Get Rich in Your Own Business by Joe Vitale

How to Write and Publish Your Own eBook in as Little as 7 Days: How to Write and Publish Your Own Outrageously Profitable eBook in as Little 7 Days Even ... Type and Failed High School English Class! by Jim Edwards and Joe Vitale

The E-Code: 33 Internet Superstars Reveal 43 Ways to Make Money Online Almost Instantly---Using Only Email by Joe Vitale

The Greatest Money-Making Secret in History by Joe Vitale

Zero Limits: The Secret Hawaiian System for Wealth, Health, Peace, and More by Joe Vitale

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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: ON2 LF ()
Date: February 25, 2007 06:17AM

'mr. fire' has written enough books to keep a hypnotizing inferno burning for a long time. I wonder how warm and fulfilling he finds his hypnosis-fuelled fires? Getting burnt is about the only idea I get when I see those book lists. What on earth is hypnotic writing anyway? Is that where he hypnotizes people as they read his books, into thinking they need what he's peddling? I guess if group hypnosis works then mass hypnosis should work ok too. He's like the poster shark for 'the secret'! If you can get past the image of mounds of greasy food, a death trap speeding car, and a big fat tar emitting cigar, you can fall under hypnosis too :shock: Its a cue to run for me!

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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: The Anticult ()
Date: February 25, 2007 09:06AM

Steve Salerno takes on The Secret and Rhonda Byrne, and Joe Vitale.

He wrote the book--

Sham : How the Self-Help Movement Made America Helpless
by Steve Salerno
[www.amazon.com]

SHAMblog
Exposing the scams, shams, and shames of modern life.
[shambook.blogspot.com]

Thursday, February 22, 2007
The Secret, deconstructed.
[shambook.blogspot.com]


Friday, February 23, 2007
And, from the (drop) dead letter file....
[shambook.blogspot.com]

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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: skeptic ()
Date: February 25, 2007 09:16AM

Quote
The Anticult
Why doesn't he use the Miracle Secret to lose 100 lbs before he Attracts a heart attack?


Ha ha ha, very funny!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: DareDreamer ()
Date: February 25, 2007 12:21PM

It's about the Law of attraction,
Just as the ancient yin yang, there are the black and white
and the negative and positive in all things.
Only we do emit a vibration.
Just walk into a room where people have been fighting.
YOU KNOW IT.
Being critical of anyone else's success, or explorations is
really immature.
We once didn't know we could run a 2 minute, how do you
explain the world record now? And that the world is round, and that gravity is a law too. How about electricity? We've been to the moon haven't we?
We really can have anything we want.
Thoughts are things, vibrations, change your mind and change your life. I have, it is so very worth it.

No it wasn't Jack Canfields' idea. But can you blame him for creating more success, students and cash flow because of it? Bob Proctor has been teaching this stuff for over 40 years. He didn't even graduate high school, but I would trade my cash flow for his any day!
Maybe you should admire the folks who endorse this for their, greatness and guts and stop being so suspicious.
It's just a movie, a DVD and it's a LOT more reasonable than spending thousands of dollars and days and days processing your stuff in LGATS!
GROW UP PEOPLE! This is PLANET EARTH! :roll:

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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: The Anticult ()
Date: February 26, 2007 08:10AM

(excerpt)

[www.nytimes.com]

Quote

February 25, 2007
Shaking Riches Out of the Cosmos
By ALLEN SALKIN
THERE are some surprising secrets behind “The Secret.”

For one, most of the millions of people who have seen “The Secret,” a documentary that is the biggest thing to hit the New Age movement since the Harmonic Convergence, may not know that there are two versions of the film.

In both, “The Secret” intersperses interviews with authors and inspirational speakers who specialize in personal transformation with short dramatized episodes to deliver a message about how positive thinking will improve one’s health, wealth and love life.

The secret that the movie purports to reveal after millenniums of obscurity is “the law of attraction.” This principle, said to be known by an elite few, including Beethoven and 19th-century robber barons, holds that the universe will make your wishes come true if only you really, truly believe in them.

“Ask, believe, receive,” the movie instructs.

...

A book based on the movie, also called “The Secret,” which Ms. Byrne wrote in less than a month, jumps to No. 1 this week on the New York Times best-seller list of hardcover advice, how-to and miscellaneous books. “Secret” support groups have formed around the country. In Southern California, real estate brokers show the 92-minute movie to motivate sales representatives. Oprah Winfrey, in the first of two shows dedicated to “The Secret,” said its positive philosophy is the way she has long lived her own life.

In the film a woman says the law of attraction cured her cancer, but many followers settle for more prosaic victories.
...

But behind the success of “The Secret” is a seamier story about the origins of the film. It involves big money and what some participants say are the broken promises of Ms. Byrne. The star of the first version of the movie, released in March last year, demanded to be cut out of the current version, which has been on the market since Oct. 1.

That star, Esther Hicks, 58, has been promoting her own version of the law of attraction with her husband, Jerry Hicks, in books and seminars for two decades. “We teach that you keep saying it the way you want it to be, and if you keep saying it the way you want it to be, the universe will line up and give you exactly what you’ve said you wanted,” Ms. Hicks said.

Ms. Byrne had promised Ms. Hicks 10 percent of DVD revenues to appear in “The Secret,” both parties said. But they had a falling out, and Ms. Hicks could not even bring herself to watch Ms. Byrne this month on “Oprah,” the movement’s moment of triumph.

In a backhanded compliment Ms. Hicks said, “I’ve got to give Rhonda credit,” adding that her former collaborator has shown a monomaniacal dedication to the law of attraction. “I’ve never seen anybody do that like she’s doing it,” Ms. Hicks said. “And never mind honesty, and never mind doing what you said you were going to do, and never mind anything. Just stay in alignment.”

Although “The Secret” is an overnight phenomenon, its message of think-and-grow-rich is but the latest version of a self-help formula dating back more than a century, with roots both secular and religious, and branches that have included Napoleon Hill’s best-selling “Think and Grow Rich” in 1937 and Norman Vincent Peale’s “Power of Positive Thinking” in 1952.

J. Gordon Melton, the director of the Institute for the Study of American Religion in Santa Barbara, Calif., traces the origins of “prosperity consciousness” to 19th-century Christian Science. “It’s always waiting for slightly different forms of expression, the same old message,” he said.

Last Sunday evening the Hickses relaxed in their $1.4 million luxury bus parked outside the Rancho Cordova Marriott near Sacramento, where they had just finished a six-hour workshop on the law of attraction in the hotel ballroom. Three hundred people had paid $195 each to hear Ms. Hicks, a former secretary, summon otherworldly spirits she says speak through her. The spirits, who collectively use the name Abraham, answered participants’ questions.

“I don’t have a lover yet,” one woman said.

Abraham, whose speaking voice is rounder, quicker and more computerlike than Ms. Hicks’s natural voice, replied by repeating the woman’s phrase roughly 20 times and then explained it contained its own negativity, which was leaving the woman paddling upstream on the river of life.

The audience applauded.

The Hickses spend most of the year traveling the country, leading workshops based on the teachings they say Abraham has given them. They record the workshops and have 10,000 subscribers, who pay up to $50 a month for CDs and DVDs of Abraham’s wisdom.

When Ms. Byrne asked Ms. Hicks to appear in “The Secret,” as the most prominent interpreter of the law of attraction, she agreed to give the Hickses approval over much of the movie, according to a contract. But when the couple saw the first cut, they were livid. Ms. Hicks’s voice, chaneling Abraham, was used as narration throughout the film, but her face was never shown.

After negotiation, Ms. Hicks’s image was edited into the film and it was released, ultimately netting the Hickses $500,000 from sales, Ms. Hicks said. But the couple were unhappy with the distribution. They said they understood it would be shown first on Australian television, but instead it was being sold as an Internet download and later as a DVD.

Cynthia Black, the president of Beyond Words Publishing, a New Age imprint, who is both a longtime friend of the Hickses and the publisher of Ms. Byrne’s book version of “The Secret,” tried to broker a peace. She enlisted the help of Jack Canfield, the author of “Chicken Soup for the Soul,” one of the “transformational experts” who appears in “The Secret” (and whose nephew Zach Canfield says he used the law of attraction to score a date with the hip-hop singer Lady Sovereign). But Mr. Canfield was also unable to bring the parties together.

The Hickses consulted their lawyer, and Ms. Byrne in turn demanded changes to the contract, both sides said. No agreement could be reached. Ms. Byrne moved forward with a second version of “The Secret” without the Hickses. Advised by their lawyer to sue, the Hickses said they declined because litigation would take energy from their own pursuit of the law of attraction. “We don’t sue,” said Mr. Hicks, a former circus acrobat and Amway distributor.

Ms. Byrne does not seem overly troubled by the rupture. “I’m grateful to have had the journey with them for the time that we had,” she said, sitting on a plush chair next to a honeysuckle candle in her apartment in Santa Monica, Calif. [b:95b3a86cc7]With a glittering silver circle affixed with false-eyelash glue to the center of her forehead[/b:95b3a86cc7], she related how she had mortgaged her home in Melbourne, where she worked as a television producer, to finance “The Secret” and also [b:95b3a86cc7]received an investment from a former Internet executive in Chicago, Bob Rainone[/b:95b3a86cc7]. The cost of the films was about $3 million, Ms. Byrne said.

...

Without the Hickses’ 10 percent cut, Ms. Byrne and her Chicago investor will reap millions in additional profits. None of the film’s other self-help gurus were paid. But “even though money was involved,” Ms. Byrne insisted, “it was never about that.”

And the Hickses agreed. “We earn millions of dollars a year” already, Mr. Hicks said.

No, the clash seems mainly over who deserves credit, and the wave of mainstream publicity, for this latest version of prosperity consciousness. The Hickses have preached the law of attraction while traveling with Abraham for 21 years. Ms. Byrne’s exposure to the notion is more recent: she was going through a rough patch in her life in 2004, when her daughter gave her a copy of “The Science of Getting Rich,” first published in 1910.

...

By contrast, Ms. Hicks reads no self-help or spiritual material, she said, wanting to keep her mind clear for Abraham’s messages. Without knowing what others have written, friends of the Hickses said, it is easy to understand why they believe they did the most to popularize the law of attraction before “The Secret.”

“Some of the people who are in the movie, I agree, have clearly listened to Abraham tapes, said Ms. Black, the publisher. “But Abraham has never said ‘This is just mine, don’t share it with everyone.’ ”

For the second version of “The Secret,” Ms. Byrne used Lisa Nichols, an author of “Chicken Soup for the African-American Soul,” and Marci Shimoff, an author of “Chicken Soup for the Woman’s Soul,” to fill gaps left by Ms. Hicks’s removal. (The DVD of the Hicks version of “The Secret” is going for $104 on Amazon.com.)

...

What the Hickses say bothers them most about the second version of “The Secret” is that those who watch it are not receiving enough explanation of the law or being told that its discovery was made by “vibrationally accessing broader intelligence,” Ms. Hicks said.

Bringing forth the voice of Abraham as she sat on a buttery leather seat in her motor home, speaking of herself in the third person, she said, “Esther’s concern is that they will destroy this information because they do not really know it.”

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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: Madshus ()
Date: February 26, 2007 08:22AM

Quote
DareDreamer
We once didn't know we could run a 2 minute, how do you explain the world record now?

I explain it as a sub-four minute mile, not two...

The current world record in the mile is 3:43.13, set by Hicham El Guerrouj of Morocco on July 7, 1999. The current women’s record is 4:12.56 by Svetlana Masterkova of Russia, set on August 14, 1996.

You might want to have a better 'awareness' of things you are talking about before trying to come off as someone who knows more than others. Since you got this one wrong, maybe you are wrong about some other things too.... now take a deep breath and think about it.

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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: ON2 LF ()
Date: February 26, 2007 09:06AM

Quote

Bringing forth the voice of Abraham as she sat on a buttery leather seat in her motor home, speaking of herself in the third person, she said, “Esther’s concern is that they will destroy this information because they do not really know it.”

an angle most people wouldn't dream of...feigning dissociative and or multiple personality disorder to give the snakeoil a more authentic/appealing 'flavor'! :shock:




Quote

We really can have anything we want.
Thoughts are things, vibrations, change your mind and change your life. I have, it is so very worth it.

so, are you now a mega millionaire, rolling in luxuries, friends, health and 100% emotional, psychological, and spiritual fulfillment/contentment? Is there anything left in this life for you to strive for...I mean, to hope for? If we have the secret, what reason do we possibly have for getting out of bed each day? What do you add to a life that is 110% complete?
....I'll take a cherry with that please....to go as well.... :wink:

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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: Jack Oskar Larm ()
Date: February 27, 2007 03:54AM

100% is only the tip of the iceberg for the typical consumer. It's the pattern of wealth-gathering: take, take, take. Coupled with the mindset indicated by DareDreamer's post, I think this manic money grab is a substitute for conscience and understanding. I mean, when is enough enough? I don't want to sound like a bleeding communist. I can accept that we all need a level of financial independance. I think those pictures of Vitale lapping it up is indicative of this 'new' mania. It's clear, to me, that the New Age (New Thought) movement (at least these new consumerist factions) are motivated by greed. If I believed in a god (a Christian god), I think I'd be shaking my head at all the baggage these people will have to try and get through the proverbial Eye of the Needle.

Dirty money. That's what it is.

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The Secret (a movie)
Posted by: The Anticult ()
Date: February 27, 2007 07:11AM

Its important to emphasize what was said in the New York Times about Rhonda Byrne. Hicks openly, in the NYT said that Rhonda Byrne is "dishonest", and does not keep her word.
She called her a liar in the NYT.

Quote

“[b:f2ff980f5b]And never mind honesty, and never mind doing what you said you were going to do, and never mind anything[/b:f2ff980f5b]...

There is no mention of "ethics" or even morality in The Secret. As a matter of fact, they literally say, [b:f2ff980f5b]"if it FEELS good, it IS good[/b:f2ff980f5b]". The people in the Secret say that time and time again.
That is the Ethics of Rhonda Byrne and the Secret.

[b:f2ff980f5b]It IS good, if it FEELS good[/b:f2ff980f5b]. (think of how perverse that really is).

For example, pedophiles also believe the same thing, and pedophiles also believe that their victims are "attracting" them. Rapists also hold the same beliefs, as well as almost all criminals, as they think their victims "deserved it" which means they "attracted it". (most cult leaders believe the same thing).
The self-righteousness of "if it feels good to me, then it IS good" is sociopathic.

So its not a surprise that beneath the glitz, there is a very ugly lack of basic Ethics. Rhonda Byrnes "ethics" in the Secret are really the opposite of any decent ethical system since the Romans. The Romans also thought "if it feels good for us, then it is good" and that those who were beneath them deserved to be there. The Romans also knew the Secret.

When you look just under the hood, the entire belief system shows how perverse and erroneous it is, and just falls apart.

Rhonda Byrne was in her 50's, about to go bankrupt and lose her company, and DESPERATE. So she came up with this idea for a pop-psyche sellout mimic of 'What The Bleep', and pushed it to the wall, taking no prisoners.
That is not a Secret, that is just merciless exploitation of the ignorant masses for money.
The lesson is that the mass public will buy almost anything, and playing to the lowest common denominator sells.
The Secret is that it pretty easy to dupe the mass public if you are willing to lie to them, and tell them what they want to hear.



[www.nytimes.com]

Quote


February 25, 2007
Shaking Riches Out of the Cosmos
By ALLEN SALKIN
...
But behind the success of “The Secret” is a seamier story about the origins of the film. It involves big money and what some participants say are the broken promises of Ms. Byrne. ...

Ms. Byrne had promised Ms. Hicks 10 percent of DVD revenues to appear in “The Secret,” both parties said. But they had a falling out, and Ms. Hicks could not even bring herself to watch Ms. Byrne this month on “Oprah,” the movement’s moment of triumph.

In a backhanded compliment Ms. Hicks said, “I’ve got to give Rhonda credit,” adding that her former collaborator has shown a monomaniacal dedication to the law of attraction. “I’ve never seen anybody do that like she’s doing it,” Ms. Hicks said. “[b:f2ff980f5b]And never mind honesty, and never mind doing what you said you were going to do, and never mind anything[/b:f2ff980f5b]...

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