Showing posts with label Ehrenreich. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ehrenreich. Show all posts

2023/07/05

The market for wellness is more about capitalism than prolonging life - Big Think

The market for wellness is more about capitalism than prolonging life - Big Think





HEALTH — JULY 8, 2019
The market for wellness is more about capitalism than prolonging life
In Natural Causes, journalist Barbara Ehrenreich questions our obsession with wellness.



Photo by Darren Gerrish/WireImage
Twiggy (R) and Gwyneth Paltrow on stage at In goop Health London 2019 on June 29, 2019 in London, England.
KEY TAKEAWAYSJournalist Barbara Ehrenreich writes that a for-profit medical system needs healthy patients — hence, the demand for yearly examinations and constant screenings.
Certain human cells are not in favor of our continued existence, making the concept of "wholeness" questionable.
Ehrenreich concludes that the market for wellness is more a function of capitalism than health.

Derek Beres
Copy a link to the article entitled http://The%20market%20for%20wellness%20is%20more%20about%20capitalism%20than%20prolonging%20life
Share The market for wellness is more about capitalism than prolonging life on Facebook

Share The market for wellness is more about capitalism than prolonging life on Twitter

Share The market for wellness is more about capitalism than prolonging life on LinkedIn



Fans of the “lifestyle” website Goop were recently disappointed by the company’s U.K. wellness summit. Apparently, the $5,700 entry price did not match the hype. Instead of offering credible post-summit customer service to deal with the blowback, Goop’s representative claims the “true value” of the summit was more than $8,000.

In other words, Goopies should be grateful for the bargain.

Gwyneth Paltrow’s oft-criticized company is an easy target. Day after day, the website churns out sciencey articles — that is, posts that state “science says” without any actual science behind the pushed claims. The replication problem in clinical trials is well known: results from one study are not repeatable. Yet companies such as Goop in particular, and the wellness industry as a whole, tend to find small sample sizes with questionable results and run with it.


Whether marketing the hottest “ancient healing herb” or pimping nootropics for brain optimization, the underlying catalyst for the multi-billion dollar wellness market is truly ancient: the fear of death. That much was true when Ernest Becker won the Pulitzer for making such a claim in 1973, and it is equally true when Barbara Ehrenreich published Natural Causes: An Epidemic of Wellness, The Certainty of Dying, and Killing Ourselves to Live Longer last year.

Ehrenreich wears her muckraking badge proudly. The author of 21 books, she wrote about living on minimum wage in the service industry in her 2001 book, Nickel and Dimed. For Natural Causes, she puts her Ph.D. in cell biology to use by exposing the façade the wellness industry uses to rake in massive profits.

Having successfully battled breast cancer, Ehrenreich notes that she’s sworn off annual physical exams and the battery of tests that go along with it. At 77, she’s just about reached the average life expectancy of American women. She’s ready to die when her time comes and has no further plans on extending her time here. Her contention isn’t with medicine, but the profit-making nature of its purveyors:




Top Stories00:1401:005 brilliant books told in thesecond-person perspective

“How is a doctor — or hospital or drug company — to make money from essentially healthy patients? By subjecting them to tests and examinations that, in sufficient quantity, are bound to detect something wrong or at least worthy of follow-up.”



‘I am old enough to die’: Barbara Ehrenreich questions our longevity obsession



www.youtube.com
‘I AM OLD ENOUGH TO DIE’: BARBARA EHRENREICH QUESTIONS OUR LONGEVITY OBSESSION

The small percentage of early detection successes does is not worth the massive costs of unnecessary tests, many of which lead to treatments that do more harm than good. Despite the seemingly good intentions of regular PSA screenings, she writes that there has been no overall decrease in mortality since that public health campaign began in the late ’80s.

What’s worse, the radiation and hormonal therapies attached to over-diagnosis leads to actual problems, such as cardiovascular disease and incontinence. A similar problem occurs with colonoscopies: at a cost of up to $10,000, they’ve been found no more effective at detecting cancerous polyps than the examination of feces for traces of blood.


Health care costs Americans $3.4 trillion. Hundreds of billions of dollars are spent in the last days and weeks of a patient’s life in what proves to be a futile attempt. Here Ehrenreich’s academic training shines. While the wellness industrial complex seeks out means for lengthening telomeres, she focuses on an overlooked cell: macrophages, “cheerleaders on the side of death.”

The focus of modern wellness is holism; Ehrenreich considers our bodies differently. We’re not a single system but rather a number of confederations, some of which want to wrest control from others. Cancer cells (as Siddhartha Mukherjee has so eloquently written) are not foreign invaders; they’re an inherent part of our biology. Should we not try to stop their incessant growth? Of course not. We need to understand them for what they are, however.

Ehrenreich spends chapters explaining the (sometimes) murderous plight of macrophages. They play life-threatening and -ending roles in many inflammatory processes, including cancer, as well as acne and arthritis, all well beyond the fold of conscious control. She even goes as far as to note that these cells have agency:

“Second by second, both the individual cell and the conglomeration of cells we call a ‘human’ are doing the same thing: processing incoming data and making decisions.”





Writer and journalist Barbara Ehrenreich on November 27, 2018 in Amsterdam, Netherlands, where she was awarded the Erasmus Prize 2018. Photo credit: Patrick van Katwijk / WireImage



Every day, this body that I usually consider a unified “I” is really a battleground for competing forces. Humans assign agency to inanimate forces; we offer it freely to other species. At a cellular level, however, there is an agency we are not aware of. Instead of fighting it, understand it. Ehrenreich suggests the cultivation of an important quality to aid in this quest: humility.

“For all of our vaunted intelligence and ‘complexity,’ we are not the sole authors of our destinies or of anything else. You may exercise diligently, eat a medically fashionable diet, and still die of a sting from an irritated bee. You may be a slim, toned paragon of wellness, and still a macrophage within your body may decide to throw in its lot with an incipient tumor.”

Subscribe for counterintuitive, surprising, and impactful stories delivered to your inbox every Thursday





Fields marked with an * are required










































































Ehrenreich does not criticize staying healthy. She discusses her own struggles and triumphs with gym culture; even still, she exercises regularly. Her problem is treating the human body as a clumsy burden to be overcome; equally, as an infinitely wise biological organism primed for optimization. Many of our cells — what “I” is composed of — have no interest in sustaining our lives. A number of them even bet on and actively instigate our destruction.

Beyond her stretching regimen and time on exercise machines, Ehrenreich writes, “I pretty much eat what I want and indulge my vices, from butter to wine. Life is too short to forgo these pleasures, and would be far too long without them.”

Personally, I’m on team Grace Jones, who, until last month, was Britain’s oldest woman. Shortly before passing at 112, she revealed the true secret of longevity: a nightly shot of whiskey. Futurists can swallow copious amounts of resveratrol while their acolytes chug Soylent for optimal. . . indigestion? I’ll place my bets on something a bit more ancient, like fermented grain mash.

Leaders in the wellness industry thrive at the top of Maslow’s pyramid while their acolytes sell questionable goods down the steep divide. Those at the bottom shrug their shoulders at the scent of privilege. Culturally, we do need to spend more time engaging in healthier behaviors. We just have to educate ourselves to better understand the parameters. That begins, as Ehrenreich concludes, with redefining the place we are all assured to end up:

“You can think of death bitterly or with resignation, as a tragic interruption of your life, and take every possible measure to postpone it. Or, more realistically, you can think of life as an interruption of an eternity of personal nonexistence, and seize it as a brief opportunity to observe and interact with the living, ever-surprising world around us.”



Stay in touch with Derek on Twitter and Facebook.

** Barbara on Living With a Wild God at Miami Book Fair




Barbara Ehrenreich on Living With a Wild God at Miami Book Fair


Detroit Public TV45K subscribers



Subscribe


<__slot-el>




20









Share





Download




Clip






2,844 views Dec 8, 2014Rich Fahle interviews author Barbara Ehrenriech about her book, Living With a Wild God: An Unbeliever’s Search for the Truth About Everything at Miami Book Fair International 2014. Watch more interviews at • Book View Now: Mi... FROM THE PUBLISHER: From the New York Times bestselling author of Nickel and Dimed comes a brave, frank, and exquisitely written memoir that will change the way you see the world. Barbara Ehrenreich is one of the most important thinkers of our time. Educated as a scientist, she is an author, journalist, activist, and advocate for social justice. In LIVING WITH A WILD GOD, she recounts her quest-beginning in childhood-to find ""the Truth"" about the universe and everything else: What's really going on? Why are we here? In middle age, she rediscovered the journal she had kept during her tumultuous adolescence, which records an event so strange, so cataclysmic, that she had never, in all the intervening years, written or spoken about it to anyone. It was the kind of event that people call a ""mystical experience""-and, to a steadfast atheist and rationalist, nothing less than shattering. In LIVING WITH A WILD GOD, Ehrenreich reconstructs her childhood mission, bringing an older woman's wry and erudite perspective to a young girl's impassioned obsession with the questions that, at one point or another, torment us all. The result is both deeply personal and cosmically sweeping-a searing memoir and a profound reflection on science, religion, and the human condition. With her signature combination of intellectual rigor and uninhibited imagination, Ehrenreich offers a true literary achievement-a work that has the power not only to entertain but amaze.






Key moments

View all






Living with a Wild God
0:02


A Moving Passage in the Book
1:35


Steps toward Finding the Truth
5:44


The Event at Lone Pine
7:15


I'M Not Tidy Enough
13:37


A History of Women Healers
14:18


This Is a Very Personal Book
14:59


Barbara Ehrenreich for Open Source : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Barbara Ehrenreich for Open Source : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Barbara Ehrenreich for Open Source
Topics podcast, health care, politics
Barbara Ehrenreich in conversation with Christopher Lydon 
on her book Natural Causes. April 2018.

===


Christopher Lydon - Wikipedia


wikipedia.org
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › C...



·이 페이지 번역하기

Christopher Lydon (born 1940 in Boston, Massachusetts) is an American media personality and author. He was the original host of The Connection, ...


Open Source with Christopher Lydon | Christopher Lydon in ...


radioopensource.org
https://radioopensource.org



·이 페이지 번역하기

Open Source with Christopher Lydon ... history: Eileen Myles grew up in Boston/Cambridge and moved to New York in 1974 to become a poet. Chris with Eileen .
Shows · ‎Podcast · ‎About · ‎Donate

2023/07/04

Barbara Ehrenreich: Natural Causes : 1 hour video, Internet Archive

Barbara Ehrenreich: Natural Causes : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive
movies 1 hour
Barbara Ehrenreich: Natural Causes


Publication date 2018-06-17
Usage Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0

Publisher Seattle Community Media
====
How to live well, even joyously, while accepting our mortality is a vitally important philosophical challenge. Author and cellular immunologist Barbara Ehrenreich shares insight from her latest book Natural Causes: An Epidemic of Wellness, the Certainty of Dying, and Killing Ourselves to Live Longer, and tackles the seemingly unsolvable problem of how we might better prepare ourselves for the end—while still reveling in the lives that remain to us.

We tend to believe we have agency over our bodies, our minds, and even over the manner of our deaths. But Ehrenreich shares the latest science which shows that the microscopic subunits of our bodies make their own “decisions,” and not always in our favor. Ehrenreich is joined onstage in conversation with KUOW’s Ross Reynolds. Together they delve into the cellular basis of aging and shows how little control we actually have over it, starting with the mysterious and seldom-acknowledged tendency of our own immune cells to promote deadly cancers. Ehrenreich describes how we over-prepare and worry way too much about what is inevitable. Join Ehrenreich and Reynolds for thoughtful considerations of the aging process (and our control over it) and the offer of an entirely new understanding of our bodies, ourselves, and our place in the universe.

Barbara Ehrenreich is the author of over a dozen books, including the New York Times bestseller Nickel and Dimed. She has a PhD in cellular immunology from Rockefeller University and writes frequently about health care and medical science, among many other subjects.

Ross Reynolds is the Executive Producer of Community Engagement at KUOW. He creates community conversations such as the Ask A events, and occasionally produces arts and news features. He is the former co-host of KUOW’s daily news magazine The Record and KUOW’s award–winning daily news–talk program The Conversation.

Thanks to Seattle Town Hall and Elliott Bay Books
Recorded 5/2/18

2023/02/20

The Secret (2006 film) - Wikipedia

The Secret (2006 film) - Wikipedia


The Secret (2006 film)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Secret
The secret 2006 dvd.jpeg
DVD cover
Directed byDrew Heriot
Written byRhonda Byrne
Produced byPaul Harrington
Rhonda Byrne
CinematographyJohn Hall
Noel Jones
Matt Koopmans
Edited byDamian Corboy
Daniel Kerr
Distributed byPrime Time Productions
Release date
  • March 23, 2006
Running time
91 minutes
CountriesAustralia
United States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$3.5 million[1]
Box office$65.6 million[2]

The Secret is a 2006 Australian-American spirituality documentary consisting of a series of interviews designed to demonstrate the New Thought "law of attraction", the belief that everything one wants or needs can be satisfied by believing in an outcome, repeatedly thinking about it, and maintaining positive emotional states to "attract" the desired outcome.

The film and the subsequent publication of the book of the same name attracted interest from media figures such as Oprah WinfreyEllen DeGeneres and Larry King.

Synopsis[edit]

The Secret, described as a self-help film,[3][4] uses a documentary format to present a concept titled "law of attraction". As described in the film, the "Law of Attraction" hypothesis[5] posits that feelings and thoughts can attract events, feelings, and experiences, from the workings of the cosmos to interactions among individuals in their physical, emotional, and professional affairs. The film also suggests that there has been a strong tendency by those in positions of power to keep this central principle hidden from the public.

Teachers of the law of attraction[edit]

The film includes interviews with individuals who describe themselves as professionals and authors in the fields of quantum physicspsychologymetaphysics, coaching, theologyphilosophyfinancefeng shuimedicine, and personal development, who are called the "secret teachers". Some of them, on their websites, promote the film and their connection to it. A few of the persons' brief appearances do not speak of the "law of attraction" in their interviews, so their support of the concepts is assumed by viewers.

People who focus on the law of attraction who are interviewed in the film and have later been featured on prominent American TV shows are John Assaraf,[6] Michael Beckwith,[7] John Demartini,[8] Bob Proctor,[9] Jack Canfield,[10] James Arthur RayJoseph Vitale,[11] Lisa Nichols, Marie Diamond, John Gray and Bob Doyle. Others involved in the film who have spoken of their strong belief in the Law of Attraction, include Esther Hicks and Jerry Hicks[12] (original edition only),[13] Mike Dooley, David Schirmer, and Marci Shimoff. Others interviewed in the film who voice very similar views without using the phrase "law of attraction" include Lee Brower (board member of WorldVuer), Hale Dwoskin, Bob Doyle, Cathy Goodman, Morris E. GoodmanJohn Hagelin, Bill Harris,[14] Ben Johnson,[15] Loral LangemeierDenis WaitleyNeale Donald WalschJohn Gray and Fred Alan Wolf. NY Times bestselling authors of The Passion Test, Janet Bray Attwood and Chris Attwood, are not featured in the film, but they arranged 36 of the 52 interviews done for the movie.[16] The Attwoods are included in the credits at the end of the film.

Foundations in New Thought ideas[edit]

The authors of The Secret cite the New Thought movement which began in the late 18th century as the historical basis for their ideas.[17][18]

The New Thought book The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace Wattles, the source Rhonda Byrne cites as inspiration for the film, was preceded by numerous other New Thought books, including the 1906 book Thought Vibration or the law of attraction in the Thought World by William Walker Atkinson,[19] editor of New Thought magazine. Other New Thought books Byrne is purported to have read include self-help authors like Prentice Mulford's 19th-century Thoughts Are Things; and Robert Collier's Secret of the Ages from 1926.[12]

Portrayal of ideas preceding the New Thought movement[edit]

The Secret website cites the Emerald Tablet, said to be written by Hermes Trismegistus (purportedly a "secret teacher"), as... one of the most important historical documents known to mankind".[20] Byrne posits that the earliest trace of "the secret" occurred in the Emerald Tablet,[21] followed much later by the Rosicrucians — a "secret order that espoused many of the ideas of The Secret."[18] Mention is made of Victor Hugo and Ludwig van Beethoven's supposed membership in the order as well as Isaac Newton's purported work in translating the tablet.[20] However, no evidence has been shown to support these claims.

Carolyn Sackariason of the Aspen Times, when commenting about Byrne's intention to share The Secret with the world, identifies the Rosicrucians as keepers of The Secret.[22] Neither the word "Emerald Tablet" nor "Rosicrucian" are spoken in the film; however, at key transition points the screen image rapidly zooms in on the word "Rosicrucian".[18]

Production[edit]

The film was created by Prime Time Productions of MelbourneAustralia with Rhonda Byrne, executive producer; Paul Harrington, producer; and Drew Heriot, director. Gozer Media of Collingwood, a suburb of Melbourne, is the design house responsible for the visual style and feel of the film and book.[23][24][25] Byrne's company TS Production LLC, a Hungarian company, is responsible for marketing and distribution of the film and book.[26] Byrne commented about the research she did prior to making the film:

So I sat down and did a huge list of everything I had read ... and when I finished the list I handed it to them [the film production team]. They said that's impossible, you couldn't read that many books in a year, two years, and I had read all of those books in two and a half weeks – and well, that's The Secret.[27]

Byrne's inspiration for creating The Secret came from reading the 1910 book The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace D. Wattles.[4] The film was done as a project for Australia's Nine Network. Nine put up less than 25% of the $3 million project[28] with additional funding from mortgaging Byrne's home and from an investment by Bob Rainone, "a former Internet executive in Chicago".[12] Rainone became the CEO of one of Byrne's companies, The Secret LLC, and is described by Byrne as "delivered to us from heaven".[29]

Shooting of the interviews was done in July and August 2005 with editing "effectively completed by Christmas time".[30] About 55 teachers and authors were interviewed[28] at locations including Chicago, Aspen, Alaska,[30] and a Mexican Riviera cruise (interviewing Esther Hicks).[31] The film uses 24 of these teachers in the "Extended Edition" of the film. The first edition featured a 25th teacher, Esther Hicks, known "as the most prominent interpreter of the Law of Attraction". Since the first release of the DVD, Esther Hicks declined to continue with the project. Her 10% share of sales netted the Hickses $500,000. As a result of this, scenes with Esther Hicks, are instead narrated by Lisa Nichols and Marci Shimoff.[12] No other "secret teachers" received compensation for their appearance in the film — revealed by Bob Proctor in an interview[32] on Nightline.[33]

Betsy Chasse, one of the producers, directors, and screenwriters for What the Bleep Do We Know!? interviewed Paul Harrington, the co-producer of The Secret. In the interview, Harrington gave this description of Byrne's production methods: "We used the law of attraction during the making of the program. We went very unconventional, in terms of scheduling and budgeting. We allowed things to come to us... We just had faith that things would come to us."[30]

Channel Nine, after viewing the completed film, chose to not broadcast it. A new contract was negotiated with all DVD sales going to Byrne's companies (Prime Time and The Secret LLC). In hindsight, Len Downs of Channel Nine commented, "we looked at it and we didn't deem it as having broad, mass appeal". The film was eventually broadcast by Channel Nine at 10:30 pm on Saturday, 3 February 2007.[28] Downs reported that "it didn't do all that well".[4] The film was sold on DVD and also broadcast online through streaming media.

Marketing[edit]

Packaging[edit]

The film has been described as a "slick repackaging" of the Law of Attraction,[34] a concept originating in the New Thought ideas of the late 19th century.[18] In producing the film, the law was intentionally "packaged" with a focus on "wealth enhancement" — differing from the more spiritual orientation of the New Thought Movement.[35] One of the film's backers stated, "we desired to hit the masses, and money is the number one thing on the masses' minds".[36] A review in salon.com described the packaging of the products related to the film as having "a look... that conjures a 'Da Vinci Code' aesthetic, full of pretty faux parchment, quill-and-ink fonts and wax seals.[37]

Choosing to package the film's theme as a "secret" has been called an important component of the film's popularity. Donavin Bennes, a buyer who specializes in metaphysics for Borders Books, stated "We all want to be in on a secret. But to present it as the secret, that was brilliant." [4]

Marketing campaign[edit]

The movie was advertised on the Internet using "tease" advertising and viral marketing; techniques in which the specific details of The Secret were not revealed. Additionally, Prime Time Productions granted written permission to individuals or companies, via application at the official site, to provide free screenings of the film to public audiences. Optionally, the DVD could be sold at these screenings.

The book[edit]

A companion book by Rhonda Byrne was published called The Secret (Simon & Schuster, 2006). The Secret was featured on two episodes of Oprah[38][39] — and as the film reached number one on the Amazon DVD chart in March 2007, the book version of The Secret reached number one on The New York Times bestseller list.[36] For much of February through April 2007, both the book and the DVD versions were #1 or #2 at AmazonBarnes & Noble, and BordersSimon & Schuster released a second printing of 2 million copies of The Secret — "the biggest order for a second printing in its history,"[40] while Time reported brisk sales of the DVD through New Age bookstores, and New Thought churches, such as Unity and Agape International Spiritual Center.[36] Like the movie, the book has also experienced a great deal of controversy and criticism for its claims, and has been parodied on several TV shows.[41]

Reception[edit]

Gross[edit]

The estimated domestic DVD sales in the US in 2007 exceed $56 million, and eventually topped $65 million.[42]

Critical response[edit]

The Secret has been described as a "self-help phenomenon",[43] a "publishing phenomenon",[35] and a "cultural phenomenon".[3][44]

Several critics wrote about the Secret in relation to self-help in general. Julie Mason, of the Ottawa Citizen, wrote that word of mouth about the film spread through Pilates classes, "get-rich-quick websites" and personal-motivation blogs.[45] Jane Lampman, of the Christian Science Monitor, described The Secret as a brand promoting Secret-related teachers, seminars and retreats.[35] According to Jill Culora, of the New York Post, fans of The Secret have posted on a wide range of blogs and Web forums accounts of how shifting from negative to positive thoughts made big improvements in their lives.[40]

Jerry Adler of Newsweek called it "breathless pizzazz" for a tired self-help genre;[4] "emphatically cinematic" and "driven by images and emotions rather than logic";[46] a blend of Tony Robbins and The Da Vinci Code;[3] and "the Unsolved Mysteries of infomercials".[46]

In 2007, The Secret was reportedly being discussed in "e-mails, in chat rooms, around office cubicles, [and] on blind dates".[40] It is recognized as having a broad and varied impact on culture.[40]

American TV host Oprah Winfrey is a proponent of the film and later the book. On The Larry King Show she said that the message of The Secret is the message she's been trying to share with the world on her show for the past 21 years.[47] Author Rhonda Byrne was later invited to her show along people who vow by The Secret.[48]

Some critics were bothered by the film's focus on questionable wealth enhancement, including promises that the universe will give you material goods "like having the universe as your catalog."[49]

According to a March 2007 issue of Skeptical Inquirer, the central idea of the film "has [no] basis in scientific reality", despite invoking scientific concepts.[50]

Within businesses using the DVD for employee-training and morale-building, author Barbara Ehrenreich called it "a gimmick" and "disturbing", like "being indoctrinated into a cult".[51]

UFC former champion Conor McGregor claims The Secret played a role in his rise to fame. McGregor has said his first reaction on watching the DVD version was: “This is bullshit — but then something clicked for me.” He and girlfriend Dee Devlin, who manages his finances, started focusing on small things they wanted, such as a parking space closest to the doors of a local shopping centre. He said: “We would be driving to the shop and visualising the exact car park space. And then we’d be able to get it every time.” They then began visualizing wealth, fame and championships.[52]

Parodies[edit]

The concept was parodied on Parks and RecreationThe Chaser's War on EverythingIt's Always Sunny in PhiladelphiaThe SimpsonsBoston Legal and Saturday Night Live.[53][54][55]

Legal controversies[edit]

A Current Affair, an Australian newsmagazine airing on The Secret's co-funder Nine Network, carried a 14 May 2007 segment titled "The Secret Stoush". Australian author Vanessa J. Bonnette is interviewed, and Bonnette—when referring to the book version of The Secret—asserts, "that is my work and Rhonda Byrne has stolen it".[56] Bonnette and a reporter compare her book to Byrne's on the use of the "TV transmission" analogy. Bonnette's book, Empowered for the New Era was released in 2007 as a second edition. Bonnette, at her website, claims 100 instances of plagiarism.[57] Byrne's marketing company, TS Production LLC, has responded with a lawsuit to restrain Bonnette.[26] From the statement of claim:

Analogy between frequency transmissions, including a television station transmission via a frequency, and humans and human thought is used by many persons in the field of self-help and motivation.[26]

David Schirmer, the "investment guru"—and only Australian—in the film, has his business activities under investigation by the Australian Securities Investment Commission (ASIC). This was reported on 1 June 2007 by A Current Affair in a segment titled "The Secret Con"[58] with those words and The Secret logo appearing in the background behind the newscaster. The show initially confronted Schirmer in a segment titled "The Secret Exposed", aired on 28 May 2007, with complaints from people who say Schirmer owed them money.[59]

On 12 February 2008 Bob Proctor's company, LifeSuccess Productions, L.L.C. successfully sued "investment guru" David Schirmer, his wife Lorna, and their several companies (including LifeSuccess Pacific Rim PTY LTD, Schirmer Financial Management PTY LTD, LifeSuccess Productions PTY LTD, Excellence in Marketing PTY LTD, and Wealth By Choice PTY LTC) for "misleading or deceptive conduct".[60]

In August 2008, The Australian reported that Drew Heriot (director) and Dan Hollings (Internet consultant for The Secret) were in a legal dispute with Rhonda Byrne over pay from the project.[61]

Film footage featuring Esther Hicks was removed from the later "Extended Edition" of The Secret after the film's creator Rhonda Byrne rescinded the original contract covering Hicks' participation.[62]

Releases[edit]

Paul Harrington, the producer for the film, reported that broadcast TV—instead of the Internet—was initially planned as the medium for the first release:

...we had as our vision to go out to the whole world in 24 hours on television. It was a grand vision, which we weren't able to pull off for various reasons. We were trying to force, to control the "how" of the universe, when what we were supposed to do was just focus on the vision...[30]

Release dates[edit]

The Secret premiere was broadcast through the Internet on 23 March 2006 using Vividas technology. It is still available either on a pay-per-view basis via streaming media (or on DVD at the official site for the film). A new extended edition of The Secret was released to the public on 1 October 2006. The Australian television premiere was on Nine Network on Saturday, 3 February 2007.[28]

Future releases and spin-offs[edit]

Plans were announced in 2007 to produce a sequel to The Secret and a spin-off TV series.[36][63] The drama film The Secret: Dare to Dream, starring Katie Holmes and Josh Lucas, was released on July 31, 2020.[64]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "budget". The numbers. Retrieved 29 July 2013.
  2. ^ "Gross". The numbers. Retrieved 29 July 2013.
  3. Jump up to:a b c Klein, Karin (13 February 2007). "Self-help gone nutty"Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 21 February 2007. Retrieved 13 January 2007.
  4. Jump up to:a b c d e Adler, Jerry (5 March 2007). "Decoding The Secret"Newsweek. Retrieved 8 May 2008.
  5. ^ American Heritage Dictionary
  6. ^ "John Assaraf Neurogym Review & Brain-A-Thon Host"The Law Of Attraction. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
  7. ^ "Michael Beckwith – The Law Of Attraction"The Law Of Attraction. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
  8. ^ "Dr. John DeMartini – The Law Of Attraction"The Law Of Attraction. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
  9. ^ "Bob Proctor – The Law Of Attraction"The Law Of Attraction. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
  10. ^ "Jack Canfield: Success Principles Review"The Law Of Attraction. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
  11. ^ "Joe Vitale – Law Of Attraction Practitioner Certification Review"The Law Of Attraction. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
  12. Jump up to:a b c d Salkin, Allen (25 February 2007). "Shaking Riches Out of the Cosmos"The New York Times. Retrieved 12 May 2007.
  13. ^ ""Esther Hicks" explains the secret behind "The Secret."". Youtube.com. 28 April 2007. Archived from the original on 19 December 2021. Retrieved 11 December 2012.
  14. ^ "Meet Bill Harris John Gray (U.S. author)work=centerpointe.com". Retrieved 11 December 2012.
  15. ^ "Meet Ben Johnson". IslandGratitude.com. 28 December 2019. Retrieved 29 December 2019.
  16. ^ Attwood, Chris (10 July 2018). "Chris Attwood, Founder and President of The Beyul"LinkedIn.[dead link]
  17. ^ della Cava, Marco R. (29 March 2006). "Secret history of 'The Secret' ". USA Today. Retrieved 4 May 2007.
  18. Jump up to:a b c d Melanson, Terry (11 April 2007). " Oprah Winfrey, New Thought, "The Secret" and the "New Alchemy"". Illuminati Conspiracy Archive. Retrieved 2 May 2007.
  19. ^ Atkinson, William Walker (1906). Thought Vibration or the Law of Attraction in the Thought World. Cornerstone. ISBN 978-1564596604. (Out of copyright, published on the Internet Archived 5 June 2007 at the Wayback Machine)
  20. Jump up to:a b "The secret teachers". TS Production LLC. 2006. Archived from the original on 16 June 2007. Retrieved 6 June 2007. — page at official website of The Secret film.
  21. ^ Sunderland, Kerry (7 March 2007). "The secret to self distribution" (PDF). QPIX News. Archived from the original (PDF) on 30 August 2007. Retrieved 17 May 2007.
  22. ^ Sackariason, Carolyn (6 February 2007). "The big 'Secret' is finally out". Retrieved 4 June 2007.
  23. ^ "The Secret Press Release" (PDF). TS Production LLC. 2006. Archived from the original (PDF) on 21 April 2007. Retrieved 21 May 2007.
  24. ^ "Gozer Media visual effects & graphic design". Retrieved 5 May 2007Gozer worked closely with the producers ... to develop the visual style of the show. We supplied all visual effects and other graphical components for the show and its subsidiaries. — navigate web: motion > The Secret
  25. ^ Byrne, Rhonda (2006) [2006]. "Acknowledgments". The Secret. Hillsboro, OR: Beyond Words. p. xiv. ISBN 978-1582701707Goze Media, for the creation of the superb graphics and for impregnating them with the feeling of The Secret.
  26. Jump up to:a b c Robinson, Russell (31 May 2007). "Self-help gurus take plagiarism battle to court". Herald Sun. Archived from the original on 30 March 2009. Retrieved 15 June 2007.
  27. ^ Two part interview of Rhonda Byrne made before the release of the film: Storr, Julie Ann (2005). "The Secret will be revealed in 2006 – part 1 interview". Nibbana. Archived from the original on 26 June 2007. Retrieved 22 May 2007. and Storr, Julie Ann (2005). "The Secret has been Revealed – part 2 interview". Nibbana. Archived from the original on 26 June 2007. Retrieved 22 May 2007.
  28. Jump up to:a b c d Le Plastrier Aboukhater, Jacinta (1 February 2007). "Not a secret for long"The Age. Retrieved 12 May 2007.
  29. ^ Byrne, Rhonda (2006). "Acknowledgments". The Secret. Hillsboro, OR: Beyond Words. p. xiv. ISBN 978-1582701707.
  30. Jump up to:a b c d Chasse, Betsy (1 July 2006). "A Conversation with The Secret co-producer Paul Harrington". The Bleeping Herald. Archived from the original on 29 April 2007. Retrieved 21 May 2007. — this is an interview by one of the producers for the film, What the Beep Do We Know!?
  31. ^ Hicks, Esther. "Jerry & Esther's Statement on 'The Secret'". Retrieved 22 February 2007.
  32. ^ McFadden, Cynthia (23 March 2007). "Transcript With 'Secret' Contributor Bob Proctor" (PDF). ABC's Nightline. Retrieved 21 May 2007.
  33. ^ McFadden, Cynthia; Sherwood, Roxanna; Weinberg, Karin (23 March 2007). "Science behind 'The Secret'?". ABC's Nightline. Retrieved 19 April 2007.
  34. ^ Flaim, Denise (12 March 2007). "It's mind over what matters". TMCnet.com. Retrieved 1 May 2007.
  35. Jump up to:a b c Lampman, Jane (28 March 2007). " 'The Secret,' a phenomenon, is no mystery to many ". Christian Science Monitor. Retrieved 10 May 2007.
  36. Jump up to:a b c d Ressner, Jeffrey (28 December 2006). "The Secret of Success"Time. Archived from the original on 8 January 2007. Retrieved 18 January 2007.
  37. ^ Birkenhead, Peter (5 March 2007). "Oprah's ugly secret"Salon.com. Retrieved 1 May 2007.
  38. ^ Oprah. 8 February 2007. Discovering The Secret. – text summary
  39. ^ Oprah. 16 February 2007. One Week Later: The Huge Reaction to The Secret. – text summary
  40. Jump up to:a b c d Culora, Jill (4 March 2007). "A 'secret' Oprah Craze Hits New Yorkers"New York Post. Archived from the original on 29 September 2007. Retrieved 10 May 2007.
  41. ^ Christopher F. Chabris and Daniel J. Simons, Fight ‘The Power’The New York Times 24 September 2010.
  42. ^ "The Secret (2006) – Financial Information"The Numbers. Retrieved 18 February 2019.
  43. ^ Dundzila, Reverend Vilius (10 April 2007). "Not sold on The Secret"The Advocate. Archived from the original on 27 September 2007. Retrieved 10 May 2007.
  44. ^ Dawes, David F. (3 May 2007). "Pop culture's best-kept Secret". Christian Info Society. Archived from the original on 12 May 2007. Retrieved 10 May 2007.
  45. ^ Mason, Julie (4 February 2007). "The secrets of the secret"Ottawa Citizen. Archived from the original on 11 October 2007. Retrieved 10 May 2007.
  46. Jump up to:a b Beato, Greg (1 April 2007). "The Secret of The Secret". Reason Magazine. Retrieved 1 May 2007.
  47. ^ "YouTube"www.youtube.com. Archived from the original on 13 August 2013. Retrieved 18 February 2019.
  48. ^ "Discovering The Secret". Retrieved 18 February 2019.
  49. ^ Jeffrey Ressner (28 December 2006). "The Secret of Success"TIME. Retrieved 16 October 2015.
  50. ^ "Secrets and Lies"csicop.org. 29 March 2007. Retrieved 16 February 2015.
  51. ^ Ehrenreich, Barbara (27 February 2007). "The Secret of Mass Delusion"The Huffington Post. Retrieved 29 October 2009.
  52. ^ Harvey, Oliver; Sun, The (26 July 2017). "Conor McGregor: 'The Secret' changed my life". Retrieved 18 February 2019.
  53. ^ "Nut Job of the Week"The Chaser's War on Everything. Sydney, Australia. 16 May 2007. Australian Broadcasting Corporation.Official site
  54. ^ "The Secret Connections"Imdb.
  55. ^ Beverley, James A. (2009). Nelson's Illustrated Guide to ReligionsISBN 978-1418577469.
  56. ^ Ben Fordham (News Caster), Vanessa J. Bonnette (interviewee) (14 May 2007). The Secret Stoush (Television production). Sydney, Australia: A Current Affair. Retrieved 12 June 2007.[permanent dead link] — requires Windows platform.
  57. ^ Vanessa J., Bonnette. "Secret Scandal". Archived from the original on 19 June 2007. Retrieved 11 June 2007I have reason to believe that Byrne has infringed copyright of my work to the order of 100 (plus) citations that constitute as plagiarism according to Australian Copyright Council...
  58. ^ Ben Fordham (News Caster), David Schirmer (subject) (1 June 2007). The Secret Con (Posted video). Sydney, Australia: A Current Affair. Retrieved 6 June 2007.
  59. ^ Ben Fordham (Newscaster), David Schirmer (subject) (28 May 2007). The Secret Exposed (Television production). Sydney, Australia: A Current Affair. Retrieved 6 June 2007.[permanent dead link] — requires Windows platform.
  60. ^ "LifeSuccess Productions, L.L.C. v Excellence in Marketing Pty Ltd ACN 087 507 695 & Ors" (PDF). s3.amazonaws.com. Retrieved 2 March 2021.
  61. ^ "The secret of Rhonda's success"The Australian. 28 September 2012. Retrieved 11 December 2012.
  62. ^ Guilliatt, Richard (23 August 2008). "The secret of Rhonda's success"The Australian. Archived from the original on 21 February 2009. Retrieved 5 April 2009.
  63. ^ Pursell, Chris (26 March 2007). "Telepictures Shoots Secret Pilot". TV Week. Archived from the original on 16 July 2007. Retrieved 13 July 2007.
  64. ^ Hipes, Patrick (14 February 2020). "'The Secret: Dare To Dream' Trailer: Katie Holmes & Josh Lucas Brave The Storm". Deadline. Retrieved 17 February 2020.

Further reading[edit]

External links[edit]