My thoughts on “The Secret” and The Law of Attraction

If you are not familiar with “The Secret”, it’s a modern redaction of the ancient Law of Attraction. I like the way Andreas Buttler, founder of Spiritologie puts it:

“All – and by that I mean actually just that, namely all – that you perceive and experience is exactly that, which you out of yourself, through your own causal thinking create, and indeed right…now!”

So when I see the Law of Attraction, I cannot forget my studies in Theravada Buddhism.

The first problem with the Law of Attraction is it presumes there is a You. The final realization in Buddhism is annicca, or no-self.

The second problem with the law of attraction is the that your thoughts and feelings create your reality. Well, most people are not conscious of what they are thinking subconsciously. And feelings of any sort show that you have fallen down the 12-dependant links of Origination into the Like-Dislike process.

Anyway, I sought sources far wiser than I to further confirm my suspicion and they had some excellent things to say.

Luonnon 1 point

My basic understanding of “The Secret” is that if you want something enough and “ask the universe” for it, you’ll get it. Assuming that summarized reasonably well, then there are two possibilities:

  1. That is basically wrong.
  2. That is basically right, and wanting something is sufficient to more often than not get the object of desire.

The first possibility: If The Secret is basically wrong, that invalidates the practice itself. Unless wanting something is in and of itself good somehow, why do it?

The second possibility: Based on my understanding of Theravada, this scenario would still not be a positive since — as you said — it’s just a form of craving. You want something, you get it, and then what? You don’t dwell in everlasting bliss having gotten the thing, grateful and joyful for the rest of your life; you then find the next thing to want. This next one will probably, based on the hedonic treadmill, be bigger and harder to get. Even if you get exactly what you want over and over and over again, you’ll never be satisfied. There are plenty people far, far richer than we will ever be who can have virtually anything and yet still strive for more or feel that they don’t have enough.

The problem is that none of these acquired things will ever be fundamentally satisfying. Never by chasing toys, status, relationships, or anything else external can you fill the hole. A person actively doing so is just feeding that impulse for more. Even if you could somehow get something that were wholly satisfying in every way, how could you guarantee that you wouldn’t lose it somehow? Would you be able to accept such a loss? If so, then why not skip ahead and accept never having it in the first place?

Buddhism’s approach is to try to minimize the power wants have over your psyche. You can see that you want a thing, understand that it’s just a thought, and let it go. Then, rather than taking this desire as an absolute imperative, a sense of identity, or a quest, you’ll be much more inclined to see things clearly and probably be happier.

WingChunist1 point

Insofar as a “person’s” thoughts create a cause or condition for further becoming, to that extent, our thoughts do shape what we get in the future. See the first two verses of the Dhammapada as well as the entire Iddhipada Samyutta (SN 51). Wholesome desire, chanda, does play a very important role in the teaching. It propels us down the path and is part of the raft that takes us to liberation. Once we do reach liberation, then we can fully jettison even wholesome desire. But until then, it’s a useful tool when guided by the Dhamma.

In the way that I was taught meditation, two of the things I do before a sit is to remind myself why I’m sitting and then make a determination to stick with the method for the duration of the session. These thoughts do not guarantee my sit will be fruitful but it does point the mind in the right direction and raise my success rate.

Where the law of attraction gets its wrong, in my opinion, is that they believe that the desire portion of the Iddhipada is sufficient to get what they want. AN 3.92 talks about how it’s not sufficient for a monk to say “May my mind be released from fermentations through lack of clinging/sustenance today or tomorrow or the next day.” But if they train in the conditions for that by cultivating heightened virtue, mind, and wisdom, then the flowering of liberation will come on its own time.

Also, the standard views of the law of attraction tend to push people toward eternalist viewpoints. They can also lead to incredible guilt and shame. If you internalize the belief that you can manifest anything through sufficient wishing practice, then fail to bring it forth, that means there must be something wrong with you. There’s a whole course industry dedicated to “helping” people improve their manifestation abilities, but it just liberates people’s money from their wallets, in my opinion.

They could take the iddhipada concepts and use quite mundane abilities to get what they want. Say they want a boat. First, they have a desire for a boat. Then they make the intention that they want to achieve that desire. Then they put forth the effort to make the intention manifest. While they are putting forth energy, they investigate the progress and methods they are using to see if they are on the right track.

If they really wanted to develop full-blown psychic abilities for manifestation, they should study and practice the rest of the iddhipada. But one of the sneaky things about it is that if you want to take those abilities far enough to do really crazy things then you have to get really good at jhana (SN 51.20). To get anywhere with that, you have to be practice much of the earlier parts of the teaching. By the time they got to those levels of meditative prowess, their desire for boats probably wouldn’t be there anymore.

Jhana4 1 point

 

All of it.

The Law Of Attraction states that people’s thoughts can directly change the universe, aka “magic”.

If people’s thoughts could directly change the universe there would be no need for The Four Noble Truths.

 

The Secret to Success

The secret is that there is no secret.

 

It’s about knowing what you want,

setting a plan of action and following

through.

 

That’s it.

This little gem came from Chris McLaughlin’s AIOP Team Build.

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Why you should not join Ambit

This is coming from a person who made RC. let’s keep it simple. First you dont get paid on consultants in the first level (MC – marketing consultant). You could have tons of consultants sponsoring tons of consultants and you would earn NOTHING on them, just because Ambit decided that you shouldnt be paid on them.

Next, the people above you get paid more on your business than you do. Consumer choice marketing got that one right and Ambit didnt.

Finally, I will let this ridiculous email directly from Ambit say the rest. I thought a network marketing business was about building walkaway residual income. Well not with Ambit!

Ambit Energy
Action Required on Your Ambit Business

Dear Terrence Brannon,

We’re glad to have you as an Ambit Energy Independent Consultant. We’ve noticed, however, you haven’t enrolled a new Customer or sponsored a new Consultant for a while. As stated in Section 10.2 of the Ambit Policies & Procedures document:

To remain active, a Consultant must sponsor a new Consultant or enroll a new energy Customer within the preceding four months, or maintain a minimum of 20 pending or energized Customer points. If a Consultant does not sponsor a new Consultant or enroll a new energy Customer in the preceding four months, or maintain a minimum of 20 pending or energized Customer points, the Consultant’s Ambit business will be placed into inactive status and no commission will trigger until the position is reactivated by sponsoring a new Customer or Consultant. This rule does not apply in the Consultant’s first year.

We show that you still have 15 days to maintain your active status. If you have any questions, please reach out to your upline, or call Ambit Energy Consultant Support at (877) 302-6248 Monday – Friday, 8:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m., or Saturday, 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. CT.

Thank You,

The Ambit Consultant Support Team

Why I left iMarketsLive

iMarketsLive has one outstanding pro: the CEO is right in the trenches with you and directly available. That being said, having sampled the 3 products of iMarketsLive (live trading room, harmonic scanner and signals), I think they are all good products. However, with the breakup of membership in IML between marketers and customers, I think you would agree that many customers (such as myself) only want the signals. I personally cannot justify paying for services I cannot use. I wrote to support requesting that we be able to purchase trading services on a per-trader basis. They logged the feedback, but of course nothing will change immediately. Because you can only follow 2 traders, I am effectively spending $75.00 per trader. I can find traders for $20 to $50 per trader with stronger records here:
https://www.mql5.com/en/signals/mt4

 

 

All the money I’ve lost in Home Business

  1. $2,000 in WCM777 – a ponzi scheme that supposedly provided loan money to hotels, etc
  2. $1,000 in Sports Betting with Steve
  3. $300 in Binary Options with Steve via Options Rider
  4. $5,000 is probably lost in Binary Options with CTOptions – a broker called me up and said “we will trade your money for 2 weeks and you can get back your deposit at 2 weeks regardless” – after doing well for 2 weeks they now have done nothing but lose money and make excuses.
  5. $8,000 following Michael Murrihy of Copy Our Trades – details
  6. $500 or so in UInvest
  7. $2,000 lost in London Metals Market – supposedly they did margin trading on Silver… called me up on the phone. First thjng he said was: “I’m checking on the information I sent you” .. and of course he had sent nothing.

My reply to Sri Sraddhalu Ranade on Money: How it works and why it doesn’t ?

In the video Sri Sraddhalu Ranade on Money: How it works and why it doesn’t , we hear the following from Sri Ranade :

We are in an age where everything is valued in terms of its price instead of other things such as knowledge, heroism or skill.

My response:

  • Previous ages based on barter suffered from lack of coincidence of want. The price is there so that there can be an exchange of value without having to have a coincidence of want. If you need a loaf of bread, what good is the fact that you can solve differential equations in and of itself? Nothing! And who needs to barter with you for that? Not the grocery store owner, most likely.
  • Furthermore, there are certain cryptocurrencies such as WhyCoin that are in fact based on Proof of Knowledge.
  • And finally do not confuse money with currency. The rupee, the US Dollar, the Euro are all NOT MONEY, none of them. They are not finite and they do not have intrinsic wealth. Update: later in the video he speaks of a time when the currency had intrinsic wealth.

 

Every age has an end, we are reaching the end of the financial cycle when all is valued by money alone.

My response:

Real money is not a physical object.

The dictionary doesnt agree with you. I would save the terms “money” and “currency” for what the dictonaary says and give the metaphysical predecessor that Sri Aurobindo talks about another name. Technically everything you see is consciousness, but it is not practical to label everything consciousness.

Active consciousness is female and witness consciousness is male:

That may be true in Indian mysticism but Chinese yin-yang theory inverts this.

The right use of money is to create the largest benefit.

Yes. This is very wise. Now, the vision of this will finally be entering India after a long, hard fight. As it stands for the past millenium and longer, the people of India and most of the world has been spending money separately instead of using the power of togetherness. That is changing as we speak. Currently, when money is spent for goods and services, you just get the product. Soon, all of the following will happen with each purchase:

  • you will save money
  • your two closest friends will earn money (from the fact that you saved money. and they were not even buying anything).
  • the environment gets helped
  • educational and medical supplies are provided for the needy

ALL of that with each purchase. It has been happening for 12 years in Europe, 4 years in the USA and will be entering India in March of 2016.

A single grain bursts out into hundreds of grains.

This is in fact how this system coming to India works… 1 becomes 4. 4 becomes 16. 16 becomes 64 and so on… from a single “seed” comes many fruit which then drop seed and produce more fruit.

Money flows out and comes back

Yes! Most purchasing involves only flowing out, with no coming back… but imagine if purchasing were a cycle where you got money back with each purchase and a number of people and initiatives were helped with each purchase? And do realize: this is not really what-if because we have been doing it for 12 years.

Poverty is not spiritual or divine.

Fascinating viewpoint.

Characteristics associated with Shakti are emerging, so women will play a more important role

Hilary Clinton president? 🙂

Layers of devaluing – from paper currency,  to stocks

Interesting. Never thought about stocks that way.