The Secret: There and Back Again (and there again!)

My next stop on the Spirituality Express was The Secret. (A book and movie created by Rhonda Byrne about using the Law of Attraction to create the life of your dreams.)

I bought the book and read it every day. I bought the DVD and watched it constantly. I created my "vision board". For those who don't know, it's a bulletin board covered with pictures of my wildest dreams - house, car, yacht, career, body; pictures of the life that until then, I hadn't even allowed myself to fantasize about. I got myself a "gratitude rock" to keep in my pocket as a daily reminder to be grateful and feel the feeling of gratitude as often as possible.


It was such a huge relief to know that I control my experience in the world. I was absolutely elated to learn that as long as I thought positive thoughts and truly believed in my own power that I would be as happy and successful as I had dreamed when I was a kid. I was walking on sunshine.


I got deeper into the law of attraction. I read and studied the Abraham books (Abraham-Hicks Publications) from cover to cover. In fact, I embarked on a 30 day workbook of daily activities that were created from the Abraham teachings. I read several books by other contributors to The Secret including the Conversations With God books by Neale Donald Walsch. I spent hours on The Secret website reading about the experiences of others who were on this journey and posting about my own experiences.


I stopped watching the news (the news is never positive), and even stopped watching my favorite shows like American Justice and Cold Case Files in order to stop emitting those negative thought signals out into the world, thereby attracting less negativity back to me.


During this time my contract ended at my job and I got a new job that paid twice what I had been making. I stopped procrastinating and finally signed up for acting classes, which I had wanted to do for 15 years but for some reason just didn't believe I could. I put together and almost completed a project I had been working on for a decade but again, never thought I could really finish. I had an inspired idea for a non-profit charity organization, created a website for it and began promoting the website in every way I knew how.


I was happier, more productive and more hopeful than I remember ever being. I had more self esteem, too. What others thought of me was less important because I knew that I was a unique, blessed and special person with so much to offer. I believed it in my very core.

Then something really bad happened. It isn't important what it was, but just that it was one of the most horrible things that has ever happened to me. It was one of those experiences that sends a shockwave through your entire life.

On top of the shock of the actual event was the realization that I had spent all that time and energy and put my heart and soul into The Secret, having been told that my life would be forever changed for the better, and instead, one of the worst events of my life happened. So at that point the spell was broken and I couldn't invest any more of myself into working that plan. It was obviously a sham and I had bought into it.

So life went back to the way it was before The Secret. I stopped meditating, I quit doing the daily work, I took down the "vision board", I put my "gratitude rock" in the junk drawer and started watching the news and true crime shows again. The Secret...HAH...what a let-down...

After a couple of months of being back to "normal" again I had stopped working on my charity idea, I hadn't completed the 10-years-in-the-making project that was so close to being done, I was unmotivated and uncreative, and truly unhappy. It occurred to me that I had been so much happier, more confident, motivated and productive when I had believed in and studied The Secret! The bad thing that had happened to me would still have happened even if I wasn't doing The Secret. Bad things happen to people some times. It's just a part of life.

Regardless of whether The Secret was real or not, I had been happier when I was studying it. It was another clear message to me that I need spirituality in my life. Maybe not The Secret, or maybe not ALL of it, but I could take the jewels, the parts of it that rang true for me and put them in my pocket.

So, with all the jewels I have collected so far (from The Secret, from people I've known, experiences I've had, places I've been) I am off on the life-long journey in search of the glorious life!!

Feel the Fear and Blog Anyway!!

I never thought I would create a blog - never felt I had anything I needed to share that others would be interested in reading. Now I am at the beginning of a search that I want to document and for whatever reason, I have the desire to share it as well. One thing I have learned is that it is none of my concern whether anyone reads and makes sense of it or not. My part is just to share it. So here goes...


I am in search of a glorious life.


In my 35 years I have taken many paths I hoped would lead to ultimate happiness. I have also taken no path, attempting to accept that life was simply what it seemed: work, TV, eating, sleeping; and not trying to find out what, if anything, was underneath it all. But having tried it both ways, I am now 110% sure that there is something out there. So I have begun my search in earnest.

To start, let me fill you in on some of my background.

I was born into the LDS religion (Mormon). Virtually anyone who has been born into an organized religion can probably relate. Up until a certain age/awareness level, I accepted that religion as the truth. Up until that point it never occurred to me that I had a choice or that I might question the validity and truth of the teachings I received there.


I remember one Sunday when I was about 15 years old, my Sunday School teacher shared with the class that he had at one time questioned his faith. He'd had trouble believing some of the teachings and felt that somehow he was being "duped". BUT that he had prayed hard about it and had come to believe that the doctrine really was true.


I think that was a turning point for me - realizing that it was actually possible that it wasn't true.


I began to question many of the teachings, which I will not go into here as it is most definitely not my intention to bash anyone or alienate anyone. Suffice it to say that, to me, much of the doctrine defied logic and it seemed I was expected to just believe it was all true on blind faith.

So I soon came to the conclusion that Mormonism and organized religion as a whole were not for me. I couldn't believe in the kind of God that might or might not let you into Heaven depending upon which church you attended.

For a very short time I thought I didn't believe in any kind of God at all. I think that was partly because I wasn't really aware yet that there were other options besides organized religion. Or rather, I was aware, but had always been taught that it was all a bunch of hoodoo and my mind took some time to open after being closed to it for so long.

When I was 19 or 20 I met my husband, who had spent some time living in a Buddhist temple. Every once in a while he would share insights with me that he had picked up there. If I had anxiety, for example, he said "You know, thoughts aren't real things. In the Buddhist temple, they told me I can watch my thoughts and acknowledge them, but know they are not real." At first, I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about but after a time and asking questions and getting answers, I began to comprehend and internalize more of what he meant.

Around that time I was given a book called "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" written by Sogyal Rinpoche. The person who gave it to me knew I was going through some heavy duty anxiety and she said this book had changed her life. I read it and it was indeed a life changing book. It opened my eyes more to Buddhist teachings and so much of it totally rang true to me. I was also given a couple of books written by Deepak Chopra, which were incredible as well. I think that's really when the seed was planted.

Most of my early twenties, however, were spent partying like a rock star. There wasn't a whole lot of searching going on for quite a few years, except searching for a record deal and for a good party.

My next real contact with spirituality happened when I went into AA at the age of 27. The partying had taken a toll on my psyche, my reputation and my self-esteem. I was ready for a spiritual intervention. The first week I was sober my Dad passed away suddenly of a heart attack. I'm so glad I was just starting AA at that time because I truly felt I was in the right place and that I had found the support I so badly needed. AA is a spiritual program for recovery in which you get to choose your own higher power. That was an amazing and fantastic concept to me! I found an incredible sponsor, worked the program and stayed sober without a single slip for two years. Then my beloved sponsor moved away and I slowly fell out of AA.

But by then I knew that spirituality was the number one thing that had been lacking in my life. After that, I continued to meet people who seemed to be placed in my path who taught me more and more about what was truth. The one-ness of everything.

My next post will finish filling you in on my background and then it's on to join the story in progress: the search in real time, as it's happening....Thanks for reading and MUCH LOVE!!