HASH V1:CH1 The Secret

In this installment of Hardcastle's Adventures in Self Help, I dive into Chapter 1 of The Secret by Rhonda Byrne. Each chapter of The Secret contains "Secret Summaries" at the end which I've . . . edited . . . to better reflect reality. Enjoy!


So, positive thinking. I think if you know about this book's existence, you know that's basically the rule. It comes wrapped up in lots of redundancy, fluffy words, and sciencey-sounding stuff. And since there's sciencey stuff, it must be real science.

"You are the most powerful magnet in the Universe! You contain a magnetic power within you that is more powerful than anything in this world, and this unfathomable magnetic power is emitted through your thoughts."

Fuckin' magnets, how do they work?

Byrne says that when you use negative words like “don't,” “not,” and “no,” the law of attraction manifests the thing you are thinking of and disregards the negative adverb for whatever reason. She provides a list of examples, along with the message received by the universe:

-“I don't want to spill something on this outfit."
---“I want to spill something on this outfit and I want to spill more things.”
-“I don't want a bad haircut.”
---“I want bad haircuts.”
-“I don't want the restaurant to give away our table.”
---“I want restaurants to give away our tables.”
-“I don't want my conservative Christian family to disown me if I come out of the closet.”
---“I want to cut all ties with my family and while you're at it, Universe, make sure I'm continually demonized and denied rights by the society I live in.”
-“I don't want to become yet another Congolese woman that has suffered rape.”
---“I want to have my body violated by a violent stranger and the authorities that ought to protect me or convict the rapists can continue looking the other way."
-“I can't afford to have a child right now, so I'm on birth control.”
---“Whoops! My birth control's effectiveness somehow went from 99% to 0%.”
-“I don't want to die of starvation, if only where I lived wasn't plagued with poverty.”
---“Who needs food anyway, and corrupt leaders and bad economies are awesome.”
-“I don't want lung cancer or emphysema, so I'm not going to smoke cigarettes.”
---“I want ALL the respiratory diseases, so breathing will suddenly become dangerous for everyone."
-“I want my spouse to stop beating me.”
---“I have too many teeth, and too few bruises and broken bones.”

Okay, only the first three were in her book. Notice the difference between the ones she wrote and the ones I made up? The ones I made up are real, life-shattering problems rather than annoyances or frustrating but surmountable obstacles. Facing very real threats such as rape or spousal abuse, and being aware of these threats, means inviting them because the Universe doesn't register you saying "I don't want that."

So the Law of Attraction is essentially a cosmic frat boy rapist. That or Ronda Byrne--who can formulate a law that, when extended to its logical conclusions, means people who are starving just aren't thinking about food hard enough—has never been truly hungry in her life.

“What you are doing now is creating your future life . . . Because you are always thinking, you are always creating. What you think about the most or focus on the most, is what will appear as your life."

Sentences like this, I feel, are what make the patent bullshit in the book digestible to others. Sentences like this are true. Being a negative person tends to invite negative situations, but Byrne seems not to understand that it is because your thoughts affect your actions. 

According to Byrne your career in a prestigious architecture firm is not because of your diligent studies in college, your years of developing your talent for both design and geometry, or that your dad and your boss have the same alma mater. It's because the entire time you were working, you were thinking about becoming an architect, so the Universe created a job opening just for you! Aren't you special.

Sounds a little mystical, right? Well, fuck you, Doubting Thomas. It's science. Check out this bit of scientific evidence:

“Quantum physicists tell us that the entire Universe emerged from thought!”

Hmm. Do they? Which ones? Because I'm pretty sure I have like, a handful of books at home written by actual physicists about actual physics and none of them mention this anywhere. Turns out, she just meant “a physicist.” That guy is Dr. Fred Alan Wolf, and this is his contribution:

“I'm not talking to you from the point of view of wishful thinking or imaginary craziness."

I'm pretty sure saying that doesn't make it true, but continue.

“I'm talking to you from a deeper, basic understanding. Quantum physics really begins to point to this discovery. It says that you can't have a Universe without mind entering into it, and that the mind is actually shaping the very think that is being perceived.”

While it is true that our understanding of the laws of the Universe have only been developed through a very subjective human filter, and while it is also true that observing objects on the subatomic level has an effect on their properties, I was under the impression that understanding exactly what that means or how it happens was still a central question in the field of quantum physics. Well, rest easy, quantum physicists! Fred Alan Wolf figured it all out. Too bad he won't share any of his work for peer review.

Secret Summaries:

The Great Secret of Life is that victims are to blame for their misfortune.

The law of attraction says like attracts like, so when you think a thought the cosmic karma frat boy rapist genie doesn't hear the word “no” and sends you only the subject of the thought, because it understands concepts like “money” but not concepts like “language and grammar.”

Thoughts are magnetic, and thoughts have a frequency. As you think about how we have tools to measure both magnetic force and frequency, disregard that thought, because you might start thinking negative thoughts about the author's scientific chops and then the Universe will throw the book in the trash for you.

You are like a human transmission tower, receiving my pablum passively through the pages of this book. If you want to change anything in your life, you are wasting time by reading it.

Your current thoughts are creating your future life. What you think about most will appear as your life, but in a mystical woo-woo sense rather than a sensible psychological application of human efficacy.

Your thoughts become things. Sandwich sandwich sandwich. Goddammit, Universe, I didn't want any fucking mayonnaise!