Do you believe in Magic? The Secret behind the law of attraction

This week self-help writer Rhonda Byrne gave us her latest offering -The Magic, an instruction manual on how, by harnessing the power of your mind, you can change your life for the better.

For anyone who doesn’t know Rhonda, she is the author of The Secret, a film and book which took the world by storm a few years ago with the promise that simple changes to the way you think can open the floodgates  to a torrent of abundance and good fortune to come your way.

I was encouraged to read the Secret by my other and better half who, with a constantly positive outlook on every aspect of life, swore that at the root of every success or lucky turn were the simple principles held in this book.

As one to dwell on negativity, I used to spend my waking hours worrying about things that usually never came to anything. I went through life under a constant black cloud of pessimism.

So when the answer to my problems came along apparently in the form of this small book, I grabbed it with both hands.

I have no affiliation to Rhonda Byrne or any  advocates of the ideas she teaches, but as I sat by the sea in Greece lapping up the words with growing gusto, I felt someone had come into my dusky angst-ridden mind and thrown on a giant light bulb.

The premise is based on thousands of years of philosophy passed down through spiritual figures such as Bhudda and the Dalai Lama, and history’s greatest achievers, Einstein and Edison and others.

That was the selling point for me. As one who is constantly striving to achieve and do better, I was often thwarted by my own self-doubt robbing me of the belief that I either deserved, or was capable of great things.

But by the time I had put down the Secret I was half way there to kicking my self-doubt demons into touch, and felt armed with the tools to keep them in check.

The theory is simple, your life and everything in it, including your health, bank balance, possessions, career, education and relationships is a reflection of the thoughts you hold in your mind.

To be clear - your mental images and beliefs gradually form the living world you see and experience around you.

At the base of this theory is the law of attraction - which governs that whatever you think about, dwell on, picture and dream about you  will gradually draw into your life.

For example, if you constantly think of wealth, happiness and health, this is what you will experience in life.

If you focus daily on illness, poverty, unhappiness, and debt - these are the images you will gradually mould for yourself - whether you like it or not.

It actually makes sense, if you think that everything you do or have started off with an initial idea.

If you have a formulaic mind like mine, taking this on face value is difficult, and I was hungry for an explanation. Although I believed it, I wanted a scientific answer to how it worked.

The simple answer is, there isn’t one, and here is where you have to exercise a bit of faith.

Byrne explains that there is a force out there in the universe that moulds and shapes the world and has an influence on our individual life experiences.

Some people feel comfortable calling this God, I don’t.

But it comes with a variety of other labels - mother nature, the universe, the cosmos, the light, the subconscious mind, choose whichever one you prefer.

I don’t believe in a old man with a long grey beard sitting atop the clouds listening to my wishes no more than I do the tooth fairy.

The one that works for me is an intelligence far greater than anything I am able to comprehend somehow fueling the universe. I just don’t and probably never will know what this is, but it is something infinitely bigger than the world we see.

Whatever it is, it governs the world we live in, everything we see, hear, feel, touch, taste and smell  and everything else outside our sensual capability.

Every thought you have is an electrical impulse, and as such carries a frequency which tunes in to this force which responds by sending back to you images, thoughts and experiences on the same frequency.


Hence, the thoughts you send out gradually draw into your life things which match the frequency of those thoughts.

After reading the secret I went on a rampage of information gathering about the mysterious law of attraction, I wanted endorsement from as many people that its theories were true.

I read self-help book after self-help book before moving on to books on how to succeed in business, how to push your levels of achievement, and how to excel.

These were written by respected and influential authors such as Paul McKenna, Napoleon Hill, and if you count the Bible, where the messages are there albeit slightly better hidden, God.

Many were pre-Secret, including Byrne’s own inspiration - The Science of Getting Rich, by Wallace Wattles.

But through all of them there was the same common thread - your life and everything you experience in it is based on the seeds you plant in your head.

Focus, visualise, and concentrate on the things you want with total faith you will get them, and they will come your way.

Focus on all the things you don’t want - and sure enough, theses are the things that you will see growing all around you.

Applying these principles is not easy, when your bank balance is down to zero and you have a pounding headache, it is hard to think positively.

But that is the consolation, the knowledge that you have to work at it makes it believable, you have to train your mind, and work at it daily before you see results.

Your mind is like a plot of fertile land. Plant good seeds, tend and water them with positivity, pulling out destructive weeds of self-doubt, and you will end up with a flourishing garden.

Ignore it, let ugly weeds grow un-checked, feed them with negativity and self-doubt, and your life will be a direct reflection.

“Your beliefs become your thoughts. Your thoughts become your words. Your words become your actions. Your actions become your habits. Your habits become your values. Your values become your destiny.” - Mahatma Gandhi

I am in the process of reading The Magic, and although it has tips on how to supercharge the law of attraction and build on the theories in the Secret, it is the same thing in a different package.

But it is still fun to read, and I don’t blame Ms Byrne for one minute for capitalising on it.

On a final note, here is my favourite example of the power of positive thinking.

Madonna (Ok, but you knew it was coming), before she became the most famous woman in the world, was living on the streets of New York trying to get a job as a dancer.

She had no money and slept on the floor of a disused synagogue eating pop corn because it was the only thing she could afford.

She auditioned over and over again for parts in dancing troupes, but was turned away from each and every one of them, one after the other after the other.

There came a time when she was sitting on a fountain in Lincoln Square having been turned away from what felt like the 100th audition.

She had been told she was wasting her time and would never make it in the entertainment business.

She had no money, no friends, no home, and a daytime job behind the till at Dunkin’ Donuts.

But in her head, she was already the best and  most successful performer in the world.

She had, without the faintest shadow of doubt, an utter belief she was going to make it big.

Her mind simply did not allow the concept of failure, and at that moment, she was never surer that she was going to be the biggest star the world has ever seen.

And the rest, as they say, is history.