WW -
Sorry to respond so late. Here are two entries from Wikipedia discussing the origin of the LOA, first from Wallace Wattles' book
The Science of Getting Rich, and the second from Abraham-Hicks:
* * * * *
Wikipedia Entry 1
Rhonda Byrne told a Newsweek interviewer that her inspiration for creating the 2006 hit film The Secret and the subsequent book by the same name, was her exposure to Wattles's The Science of Getting Rich.[14] Byrne's daughter, Hayley, had given her mother a copy of the Wattles book to help her recover from her breakdown.[15] The film itself also references, by re-popularizing the term The Law of Attraction,[14] a 1908 book by another New Thought author, William Walker Atkinson, titled Thought Vibration or the Law of Attraction in the Thought World.
Wikipedia entry 2
Esther Hicks was a narrator and star of the original version of the film The Secret, as well as a central source of the film's inspiration.[3] The footage featuring Hicks was removed from the later "Extended Edition" after the film's creator Rhonda Byrne, who has been involved in contractual disputes and litigation regarding the film, rescinded the original contract covering Hicks' participation[4], and asked that Hicks relinquish her "intellectual property rights in these areas forever".[6] In an open letter posted on the internet, Hicks stated that she had been "uncomfortable with what felt to us like a rather aggressive marketing campaign," and that ultimately Abraham gave her the following advice: "Whenever you are given an ultimatum that says, 'if you don't do this, then we will have to do such and such,' it is best that you just let it go and move on. Otherwise there is always another, and this, and this, and this?"[6] The letter doesn't condemn Byrne, but clarifies why Hicks no longer appears in The Secret.
Hicks has since posted a video on YouTube further explaining her discomfort with The Secret and finally, her decision to discontinue involvement with the film.
* * * * *
So the Secret or Law of Attraction either comes from some bizarre writer named Wallace Wattles (
The Science of Getting Rich) which I have read and is full of obsessive instructions about concentrating on your material goals – he died broke. Or it was channeled from some non-physical being. Neither are particularly convincing.
Perhaps I was being unfair regarding “sound and fury signifying nothing.” My point was that it is not testable... If an event occurs which is favorable, how can you ever know whether a bunch of thinking created it or not. The issue is causality. Did the thinking cause the event??? Or did the event just happen? Regardless of what people say, until there is a direct causal link, fully demostrated and repeatable, another scientific law applies: the law of probability. Black swans are real...a blind squirrel finds a nut now and then, etc.
Is science the final proving ground? No, that would be your own experience, in these arcane matters of manifesting. I do not doubt that some people believe the LoA "worked" for them. But it is not a law of science (that's the claim, using that word) until causality can be proved. Now if A-H or Wallace Wattles or Rhonda Byrne had used the phrase "the 'apparent law' of attraction" it would be far less popular because that boring, qualified little assertion isn't very sexy.
None of my comments are meant to suggest that there is not some level of truth in the suggestions of the LoA -- it just ain't a law yet.
Regarding NDE's, until we've had one, the most we can say is that it "seems to resonate with me." Fascinating, comforting perhaps, even wonderful...and so are mediums like John Edward and James Van Praagh. But these people don't claim their experiences to be a "law," and they most certainly don't attempt to prove the causal process. So, from a scientific perspective, the LoA is far from a law...
* * * * *
Eckhart did encourage an aspiring actress to “be that actress now,” and not to obsess about some future condition.
Certainly thinking about the future has value in planning your use of time. None of that is a secret.
Andy
A person is not a thing or a process, but an opening through which the universe manifests. - Martin Heidegger
There is not past, no future; everything flows in an eternal present. - James Joyce