Book review: The Secret

I can let you into the secret straight away – it’s the law of attraction. Like attracts like. I don’t think I’m in danger of giving away too much of the plot by revealing that information.

If you’re at all familiar with New Age thinking it’s likely that you have come across this concept already. Ah, but the real secret – the real secret lies in learning how to apply this law.

In this respect, the author Rhonda Byrne appears to have fared admirably. “The Secret” – the book and the movie - have attracted huge interest with the help of astutely organised media hype.

Now here’s where the real genius lies - much of the book is based on contributed material. Great plan: get other people to do the work for you – throw in advice from some of the most eminent thinkers and philosophers of the age, plus a few movers and shakers from the self-help industry, and voila!

The book draws heavily on inspirational quotes from followers of the so-called "secret" – namely the basic universal principle that like attracts like - so good thoughts attract good things, whereas bad thoughts attract bad things.

The theory is simple enough in itself - putting it into practice is more tricky. So much of what we do is predicated on our belief system, without us always being aware of it, and we may need to change the way we think before we can begin to attract what we want.

Furthermore, focusing on what we don’t want, being a negative form of thinking, is likely to lead a state of mind which only attracts more of the same (ie whatever it is we don’t want).

Rhonda claims that "it is as easy to attract $1million as it is to attract $1" - a statement which follows on logically from the basic law, but while most people would find it easy to imagine receiving the smaller sum, it is much more difficult for them to imagine conjuring up a million from nowhere.

This is why the author suggests that we should start by thinking small - advice which is perfectly sound and which, in most self-help books, would be couched in terms of "aiming for achievable goals".

Rhonda claims all that we desire may be achieved simply by thinking about it and bringing it into being - trusting in the universe to provide rather than going through all that dull process of hard graft.

In the film of the Secret (which I have not seen) a woman is apparently portrayed gazing longingly at some jewellery in a shop window and is then shown wearing it.

This is where Rhonda's advice has attracted some criticism, on the grounds that it is appears to be encouraging materialism and greed and getting what you want without any apparent effort, going against the Protestant work ethic of getting somewhere in life through honesty, dedication and hard work.

While the book takes a somewhat simplistic approach to the whole idea, I'm not sure that the author is really suggesting that money in itself is the route to happiness.

Rather, the main message is that you should follow your dream and go for what you really want and with positive focus, you can turn your desires into reality. This comes with the rider that you should first get clear in your mind what it is that you actually want.