Is The Secret aka LoA Offensive?

[Angela]

Akashic_Librarian, that post was as slippery as a greased pig. While I completely understand ordering LOA a la carte -- give it a try, use the parts that work for you, reap whatever rewards you perceive -- you are suggesting that to be skeptical of the discipline amounts to a personal attack. Not to mention that the skeptic is on the brink of becoming a "horrible, self-centered person" (that's not a personal attack, is it?)

Many proponents of LOA take the whole ball of wax very seriously indeed. Since such proponents make pronouncements that may be considered questionable or even dangerous (assigning blame), and as the idea has spread like wildfire on the Pavlina's sites, there is absolutely no reason why it shouldn't be intensely examined and questioned.

I can't see where reasonable, skeptical folks here have been "attacking people whose lives are better." And a delusional way of life may indeed have you living in a grand house one day and the hooscow the next -- just check out the news lately.

[Nicketas]

[quote=Markus74;21982]You mean, like children who get raped and murdered? If they want this, why should we pity them?


WHOA WHOA WHOA. Back up. You're putting words in my mouth while ignoring my dominant reality concept. Read my post again, specifically that section.

Ok, how can you change, or better, the world then? Or isn't that your main interest? Is it mainly just about changing yourself? And the others should look after themselves ... ?

Read my post again.

Those of us with more dominant & conscious intentions would do well to make it our responsibility to use the law of attraction to help those who are weak and have less power. Attract resources to ourselves in order to give to others while teaching them about the law and how to better their own lives.

Ultimately yes each person is responsible for his/her own life, but those who are being taken advantage of or enduring harsh circumstances without the power/resources to overcome(particularly children) should be taken care of via the methods I mentioned above and in my previous post.

[Nicketas]

This thread remind's me of steve pavlina's post entitled "Skepticism may be harmful if swallowed"

[icesar]

You know, come to think of it, I have found myself being less compassionate lately. I acknowledge that we are in our current situation largely by our own choices, but thinking like this has led me to be less compassionate towards others' problems. My first thought is usually something like "Ok, what did they do to attract this into their life?" How do you get past this?

[Angela]

Nicketas, I hadn't seen that post, and just went back and read it. Thanks.

In that post, Steve refers to skepticism as a mindset that can be self-limiting in a subjective reality model. I get it. and that ruthless defensiveness of that mindset manifests a continual mindset of ruthless defensiveness. d'oh.

Also in that article, Steve mentioned that skepticism is a useful tool for, and was originally used for, resisting dogma. In that regard, I think it's well placed here, because I see that a tendency towards dogmatic adoption seems to take place throughout these threads. LOA, and other experiments and tools that the P's have played with, is fun and creative and experiential. It's not "The Truth."

Then again, I am manifesting a Norma Rae mindset lately. "No Dogma!" and I appreciate people like Markus74 for their relentless puppy-like questioning. They should not be whacked by a rolled-up newspaper.

[Brutha]

Originally Posted by Markus74

Then tell me why these people are getting raped and/or killed?

So the victims didn't intend it? But others in this thread claimed that they had.
If the victims didn't intend it then did the criminals?

Their are three parts in your reasoning:
The Law of Attraction, the objective model of analysing and your metaphysical theory of morals.

Now you have those concepts and come to an judgement that you don't want.
Then you blame the LoA, without thinking whether the other concept may be the main problem.
You get the same problem with Chaos Theory, the objective model of analysing and your theory of morals.

Lets take a different explantion of your rape problem.
"a child is a child" is true.
"There are children that get raped" is true.
Therefore "When "a child is a child", there are children that get raped" is true.

Now you can blame mathematics just as well as you blame the LoA for being a theory that is "attributing crimes to the victims".

[Markus74]

Originally Posted by icesar

You know, come to think of it, I have found myself being less compassionate lately. I acknowledge that we are in our current situation largely by our own choices, but thinking like this has led me to be less compassionate towards others' problems. My first thought is usually something like "Ok, what did they do to attract this into their life?" How do you get past this?

See? That's one of the dangers of this delusion.

[Markus74]

Originally Posted by Brutha

Their are three parts in your reasoning:
The Law of Attraction, the objective model of analysing and your metaphysical theory of morals.

Now you have those concepts and come to an judgement that you don't want.
Then you blame the LoA, without thinking whether the other concept may be the main problem.
You get the same problem with Chaos Theory, the objective model of analysing and your theory of morals.

Lets take a different explantion of your rape problem.
"a child is a child" is true.
"There are children that get raped" is true.
Therefore "When "a child is a child", there are children that get raped" is true.

Now you can blame mathematics just as well as you blame the LoA for being a theory that is "attributing crimes to the victims".

You people keep telling that the LoA works and that people get what they intend, consciously or unconsciously.

I then apply that to real life examples and you all get defensive and don't really address the questions anymore.

Again:

From the perspective of a LoA believer, does the victim intend the crime or the criminal? Or is it just bad luck?

[wolfgang]

Originally Posted by Markus74

From the perspective of a LoA believer, does the victim intend the crime or the criminal? Or is it just bad luck?

That is a good question and I've heard LoA speakers say that. "yes you did attract that car acceident". I don't know that answer but like the LoA ideas and would like to have loose end like this type of question be understood in terms of, is that part of the LoA belief or an opinion left to individuals. Of coarse there's the karma idea that tries to scape goat, that LoA applies to many lifetimes too. Maybe that's the only way to explain you attract every event to yourself. What are the possible answers? Either we attarct everything we experience (by our vibe that may have been from other lifetimes) or there's some random element that sometimes we are in the wrong place at the wrong time. I might have posted way back in this thread that this question reminds me of the saying, "God moves in mysterious ways". That it's hard to comprehend what we get to experience from the biggest picture. Maybe it's a little of both - there's something about that we can attract what we experience, including bad things we don't want in our lives, AS WELL AS there's some random things going on (or grand mysterious out of our control things) that give us ugly things to experience.

[Brutha]

Originally Posted by Markus74

You people keep telling that the LoA works and that people get what they intend, consciously or unconsciously.

I didn't at all. What I discuss is the question what would happen if the LoA would work.
Discussing whether LoA is offensive if it didn't work is just silly (if the LoA didn't exist, it also can't be offensive, because something has to exist to be offensive), therefore you have to assume for the sake of your own argument that the LoA is true.

I then apply that to real life examples and you all get defensive and don't really address the questions anymore.

Again:

From the perspective of a LoA believer, does the victim intend the crime or the criminal? Or is it just bad luck?

Their are thought in the mind (a lot of LoA folks argue that their is only one consciousness, so if the victem is conscious that mind is his mind, it may also be the mind of the ciminal at the same time) that lead to the event of the crime.

Thoughts that lead to events are called intentions in the LoA.
That a similar topic like the word observe in quantum theory, the words don't necessary mean what to think the mean at the first look.
The word intent does mean something different then the word want in the LoA.

Therefore the victim intents the crime.

[Markus74]

Originally Posted by Brutha

I didn't at all. What I discuss is the question what would happen if the LoA would work. Discussing whether LoA is offensive if it didn't work is just silly (if the LoA didn't exist, it also can't be offensive, because something has to exist to be offensive), therefore you have to assume for the sake of your own argument that the LoA is true.

Of course I'm assuming this for this discussion. People are saying that the LoA works and that people get what they want, be it good or bad.

Hence my question: Does the victim intend the crime or does the criminal intend it? Did the Jews intend the Holocaust or Hitler? Etc. And there aren't many people in here eager to answer this simple question. I wonder why ...

Their are thought in the mind (a lot of LoA folks argue that their is only one consciousness, so if the victem is conscious that mind is his mind, it may also be the mind of the ciminal at the same time) that lead to the event of the crime.

The one consciousness theory is flawed as well and there's no evidence for it. There also would be a lot of weird moral consequences if the theory was true.

Thoughts that lead to events are called intentions in the LoA.
That a similar topic like the word observe in quantum theory, the words don't necessary mean what to think the mean at the first look.
The word intent does mean something different then the word want in the LoA.

Therefore the victim intents the crime.

So children and adults get raped and murdered not because they want it, but because they think about it? Did I get that right? Man, that's such a sick and offensive view ... I hope nobody tells that to a rape victim!

[thef0x]

I've just seen "The Secret" and spent 4 hours on a lengthy philosophical response/correction to the film.

I WANT MORE OPINIONS about the movie!!

If you would like to express any of the opinions expressed in this thread or otherwise, please PM me!

I'll be releasing the philosophical response tomorrow and I hope to write a follow-up piece with you guys and gals.

Please let me know

[Markus74]

Originally Posted by thef0x

I've just seen "The Secret" and spent 4 hours on a lengthy philosophical response/correction to the film.

I WANT MORE OPINIONS about the movie!!

If you would like to express any of the opinions expressed in this thread or otherwise, please PM me!

I'll be releasing the philosophical response tomorrow and I hope to write a follow-up piece with you guys and gals.

Please let me know

I'm looking forward to your analysis.

[Brutha]

Originally Posted by Markus74

Of course I'm assuming this for this discussion. People are saying that the LoA works and that people get what they want, be it good or bad.

Hence my question: Does the victim intend the crime or does the criminal intend it? Did the Jews intend the Holocaust or Hitler? Etc. And there aren't many people in here eager to answer this simple question. I wonder why ...

Violating Godwins law is rude, and to expect that someone goes down on your level of argumentation when you are rude is also rude.
And you seem to miss that I answered your question, despit the fact that you didn't respond to my arguments. I wonder why...

Here the question :
Simple Logic has the same consquence like the LoA in this context.
Their is a action done be the "vicitim" that preceds the "crime", therefore "When there is that action done be the "victim" their is the crime".
So why blame LoA and not Logic?

The one consciousness theory is flawed as well and there's no evidence for it.

The is no evidence for any theory for that matter.
Descartes "Cogito ergo Sum" is as good as it gets. That you think that a theory is flawed is no good argument against it.

There also would be a lot of weird moral consequences if the theory was true.

Believing in an other paradigmn always has weird consequences.

So children and adults get raped and murdered not because they want it, but because they think about it? Did I get that right? Man, that's such a sick and offensive view ... I hope nobody tells that to a rape victim!

In what are your morals based? You argue like you would base them in a higher power but that doesn't seem to be your view?

[Markus74]

Originally Posted by Brutha

Violating Godwins law is rude, and to expect that someone goes down on your level of argumentation when you are rude is also rude.

Who's Godwins?

In what are your morals based? You argue like you would base them in a higher power but that doesn't seem to be your view?

They're based on the principle of not harming innocent people, for example. Or that people have a right not to suffer, etc.

[Levent Okyay]

I'm not going to join-in with the argument but will rather go slightly off-topic, apologies in advance.

Markus74, you're receiving a lot of flak, and I think it's important to stand up for in what you believe in, even though I don't agree with you, kudos to you for not slowing down. I suppose you remind me a lot of me (without seeming condecending), specifically with relation to one time when I was in a heated logical argument and ended up disproving the foundations of logic (laws of thought), so eventually people stopped arguing with me pointing out that if I refused to accept the laws of thought argumentation was irrelevant; as you are ignoring the axioms on which this argument is based.

So I suppose, as a side note, what I'm suggesting is that you read up on formal argumentation, it'll will help you make your point more clearly, preventing a lot of repetition that's going on here. A lot of this thread seems to be going in circles without actually addressing any real issues.

apologies again for the off-topic,
have fun all.

[Markus74]

Levent: You're right of course. But it's not that important to me either and I'm too lazy right now

And English isn't my first language, so it's even harder.

[Nicketas]

Originally Posted by icesar

You know, come to think of it, I have found myself being less compassionate lately. I acknowledge that we are in our current situation largely by our own choices, but thinking like this has led me to be less compassionate towards others' problems. My first thought is usually something like "Ok, what did they do to attract this into their life?" How do you get past this?

Your lack of compassion comes not from the law itself, but your INTERPRETATION and limited understanding of it.

I find myself not only more able to maintain my personal boundaries, but also MORE compassionate towards other people.

Again, if you apply the dominant reality concept and understand human psychology, you can use the law of attraction to help people more than ever. The more you practice and understand it, the more positively powerful/influential you can become to help others no matter what thier circumstances.

Even if by empowering them to help themselves, because the law is extremely easy to teach and very universal. It's so simple that it's very hard for even the most pessimistic of people to reject, especially if you do a good job of expaining/framing it to them.

Selfishness is still selfishness and it has nothing to do with the law. The two are not intrinsically linked, YOU simply chose (consciously or unconsciously) to link them in your mind. So stop that

Yes people may still attract negative circumstances into thier lives but that shouldn't stop you from helping them, especially now that you are more empowered than ever.

Even Jesus (and buddha, for that matter...) could not convert everyone to his peaceful beliefs, even he could not convince absolutely everyone to stop hating each other, but he still helped countless people and the vast majority he came into contact with.

So did Ghandi. You think Ghandi acheived what he did without the law of attraction? Absolutely not.
Such a monumental feat would not have occured without serious use of the law. TWO HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE LIBERATED. It takes a vast amount of positive universal/emotional energy to accomplish that.

You have to remember that the law of attraction is simply energy manipulation, and energy can be used for ANYTHING..........

[Nicketas]

I should clarify that I think Markus' concerns/objections are very legitimate (even if not entirely accurate in regards to his understanding of the law), and I think it's important that anyone practicing the law of attraction be prepared to address such concerns to anyone they help teach it to.

[Akashic_Librarian]

Markus the LoA is not a Delusion. Its is a way of thinking that works. Just like Science works. The LoA works.

How it works, The Metaphysical Community don't really know. Just as The Scientific Community doesn't know how the universe started. its the same thing.

We are all in the same boat over this. No one knows how it works. All we know is that it DOES. I won't believe any amount of "Scientific evidence" that disproves the LoA because I KNOW it works. I have experienced it. I have felt it. So have many others. So you can't say it is a delusion. You Certainly can't say we are wrong and you definately can't say you are right and we are wrong.