The Secret - Been there, done that

A few years ago, I decided I would stop speaking negatively and only think positive thoughts. By making this change in my life, the universe would have to respond to the positivity flowing from my aura and give me what I want. After all, it's biblical belief (and I've grown up on biblical belief) that the power of life and death is in the tongue; basically that words have the power to change a life. So, I determined that I would stop blocking my blessings and speak only good things.

I decided to put this belief to a test, although I won't divulge the details to save me some embarrassment. Anyway, I began speaking this particular thing I wanted as though it already existed in my life, declaring it for myself, even though the odds were definitely not in my favor. It wasn't so much far-fetched as it was out-of-reach. And the result of this experiment? Very odd looks from friends who nervously began to doubt my sanity when I declared I would receive this near impossible thing. I persisted and managed to ignore their negativity - for about a couple of weeks. But those censoring looks got too much for me and I gave up on my quest. Better to go without than for folk to think you're a candidate for the loony bin. The result was that I felt even more powerless than before because now I knew without a doubt, no matter what measure of faith, that I couldn't manipulate the universe to my liking.

Until a few weeks ago, I was totally out of the loop about the new "it" book, The Secret, until it got the ultimate christening by High Priestess Oprah and then I couldn't turn a page anywhere without the title popping out at me. Although I am not curious enough to buy the book, from what I've read in reviews The Secret basically gives credence to my original experiment, but takes it a few steps further. According to its mantra, you can manifest good things just with positive thoughts. Conversely, you can also bring bad karma to you by your negative thoughts. This last seems to be the gist of controversy, because it seems to say people who suffer bad or horrendous events have somehow brought these things onto themselves. Anyway, this just seems to be old biblical news repackaged with a price.

Author Emily Yoffe decided to test the premise of The Secret for herself, with amusing results. At least, she got a new kitchen floor out of it.

As for me, I don't know if I'm up for another test, but hey, who knows? My list of needs is growing and I'd love to get what I want just by closing out the negative thoughts. Maybe my experiment needs to be a concerted effort this time, so I'll just enlist some friends and screw their looks that say, "Sharon, please." And together we'll send up so much positivity that I'll get a new kitchen floor, too.