How the Secret Changed My Life: Real People. Real Stories.
Rhonda Byrne
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Contents
Introduction
How I Asked, Believed, and Received: The Creative Process
How I Used The Secret for Happiness
How I Used The Secret to Receive Wealth
How I Used The Secret to Change Relationships
How I Used The Secret for Health
How I Used The Secret for My Career
How I Used The Secret to Change My Life
Acknowledgments
Contributors by Country
About Rhonda Byrne
Dedicated to the one and only you
Introduction
Since The Secret was released to the world, tens of thousands of people have written to us to share the story of how they used The Secret principles to attract what they wanted: health, wealth, the perfect partner, the perfect career, a restored marriage or relationship, to bring back something that was lost, even to replace depression with happiness. By following the methods in The Secret, these people – from every culture and country across the planet – have transformed their life from what it was to something extraordinary. They did what the average person would have said is impossible. But these people knew that nothing is impossible.
Featured in this book are some of the most miraculous, uplifting, and inspiring real-life Secret Stories chosen from those we’ve received in the last ten years, and together they will take you on an unforgettable journey that will break the limits of your mind. These stories clearly demonstrate that no matter who you are, no matter where you are, you can use The Secret to create whatever it is you want.
Along with the Secret Stories, my words will guide you throughout the pages of this book with The Secret’s wisdom. If you’re new to The Secret, this will give you a comprehensive understanding of how to use its principles. If you’re already familiar with The Secret, it will act as a reminder of the simple things you can do to have a good life filled with everything you want.
Over the years I have been able to manifest all the desires on my seemingly never-ending list, but without a doubt, hearing from people about the miraculous ways they have changed their own lives has been the greatest gift The Secret has given me personally. Material objects and material things are great fun, and you should have whatever it is that you want, but being able to do something to help another human being have a better life brings with it a happiness that can never leave you. And ultimately, happiness is all that we ever want.
I want you to know how easily you can change your life, and it’s not by running around trying to force it into the shape you want. You change your life in the only way you can ever change it: change your mind, and then your life will change.
Rhonda Byrne
There are two kinds of people:
Those who say, “I will believe it when I see it.”
And those who say, “To see it, I know I must believe it.”
– The Secret Daily Teachings
How I Asked, Believed, and Received: The Creative Process
The great secret of life is the law of attraction, which says that like attracts like. What this means for you is that you are attracting into your life the experiences and circumstances that are like the thoughts and images you’re holding in your mind. Whatever you constantly think about, you will attract into your life.
If you think about what you want, and continue to think about it, you will bring it into your life. Through this most powerful law, your thoughts become the things in your life. Your current thoughts are creating your future life, and so by changing your thoughts now, you can change your life.
Once you understand The Secret, you can then use the Creative Process to attract whatever you want and live the life of your dreams. The Creative Process is made up of three simple steps: Ask, Believe, Receive.
First Ask
The law of attraction responds to any consistent thought you hold in your mind. Even if you ask for something extremely specific, you needn’t have any doubt that you’ll receive exactly what you asked for.
SINGING WITH STEVIE WONDER
Hi all, my name is John Pereira, and this is how The Secret worked for me. First of all, at the time I wasn’t doing too well, I was depressed and angry, mainly with a business partner my sister and I had. My sister had been pestering me to watch The Secret, and one day she made us all stop what we were doing and watch the movie. From that day on, I decided to give it a go and just practice it.
Two days later, I was at the gym reading the paper and noticed a concert date for Stevie Wonder on the 22nd of October, which is also my birthday. I said to my sister, “This is it. I’m not going to just meet him; I’m going to sing with him!”
I told everyone that I had met George Benson, I had partied with Jamiroquai, and now I was going to sing with the head honcho himself, Stevie. Everyone thought I was crazy. The next day when I was visiting my brother, I got up to make him coffee and asked him to pause the program we were watching on television. When I came back into the room, the screen was paused on WIN THE CHANCE TO SING LIVE ONSTAGE WITH STEVIE WONDER. I couldn’t believe it!
I went straight home to enter. You had to write in twenty words why you wanted to sing with Stevie, and words just flew out of my brain. After I submitted it, I asked my girlfriend if I should submit again. Just at that moment the computer crashed and never worked again. “Don’t worry,” I said to her, “this is mine, I don’t need to enter it again!”
A week or so had passed, and I was out having drinks with some friends. I looked over at one of my mates and said, “Do you know I’m going to sing with Stevie Wonder?” Again, another person looking at me as if I’m crazy.
The very next day I went home after work and said to my sister, “What am I going to do when I sing with him?” She said, “Just remember to take your time, because it will be over before you know it, so savor the moment.” I was about to have an afternoon nap when my phone started ringing. I answered it, and the guy says, “Is this John Pereira? And did you enter a competition?” I replied, “Yes.” He said, “Well, congratulations, you’re the national winner!” I screamed and started throwing my girlfriend in the air. I called my parents and screamed. I called my sister and started screaming. I called my brother and started screaming. And the friend I’d told the night before just replied, “Yeah, yeah” when I told him. He could not believe it.
So, if anyone doesn’t believe, BELIEVE! I’m living proof, and if you would like to watch it, here is the YouTube clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMftLNs_G6M.
– John P., Sydney, Australia
Here’s another amazing example of someone attracting a very specific desire using The Secret.
IT’S A MIRACLE
I found out about The Secret from The Oprah Winfrey Show. I truly believed every single word written in the book and spoken on the video. Then I received an email from The Secret giving me a link to download a check from the Bank of the Universe. So I downloaded the check and wrote an amount of one hundred thousand ringgit [Malaysian currency equaling about $25,000 U.S.] on it just for fun, and I pinned it to the small vision board near my dressing table.
Then I took a one-ringgit bill and added zeros with a marker. I wanted to write 100,000.00, but the space was so small that I managed to add just five zeros.
It ended up looking like 1,000.00, but I didn’t want to throw it away, so I just put it up there on my vision board with the check.
I looked at it every day and told myself that I believed it would happen. I didn’t really know whether my visualization exercise was correct, but I just did it every once in a while. And to be frank, as time went by, I kind of forgot about it.
Then, in early October, when I was paying my credit card bill at the service counter, I saw a pamphlet about a contest called “RM100,000.00 Dream Catcher SMS contest” that the credit card company was running. It started on July 5 and ended on October 15, but this was the first I’d heard about it. Then I thought, Well, I still have two weeks to send my entry; better late than never. So I did.
Then, at the end of the month, I received a call from the credit card company telling me that I had won second prize for the month of October. For that, I would get a cash prize of RM1,000.00. I was thrilled, because I’ve never really had much luck in big contests. I told my husband, and we were jumping with joy.
Two months after that, I received another call from the company, saying that I had been selected as one of eleven finalists to compete for the grand prize of RM100,000.00 and that the winner would be decided the following week.
That night I was sitting at my dressing table when I noticed my vision board. There was the RM100,000.00 check I had written three months before. My heart was beating fast as I noticed the one-ringgit bill that looked like RM1,000 rather than RM100,000.00.
I took the note and the check into the living room to show my husband. I said, “Sweetheart, I think I know why I won second prize for RM1,000. It’s the RM1 bill! Even though I ordered it by accident, God still delivered it to me! It’s The Secret in action!”
Then I was crying tears of happiness. The little voice inside of me kept saying I’d be the winner of the grand prize, that God (the Universe) had arranged the event, people, and circumstances to deliver my RM100,000.00 check to me.
Then I read the chapter on The Secret to Money and watched the video again. Every time I had a doubt that the prize was mine, I quickly replaced it with the image of me on the stage, smiling and holding the big mock check for RM100,000.00.
Before we left the house on the morning of the grand finale, my husband said to me, “Take the RM100,000.00 check that you wrote; you’re going to claim the real one today.” So I did.
Before entering the room, I took a last look at that check, visualized winning, and tried to cast off doubt. Then I noticed the remittance advice on top of the check: FEEL GOOD. I quickly grabbed my husband’s iPhone and opened the photo albums of my beautiful two-year-old daughter. Seeing her sweet smile made me feel so happy inside that I knew I was on the right track. Throughout the whole event, I just thought about my daughter’s smile and visualized winning.
And YES I DID!
I won the grand prize of RM100,000.00. When they announced my name, I felt as if I were having a déjà vu experience, because I’d had the same pictures rolling in my mind so many times before.
After delivering the mock check, the judge said to me, “When you walked into this room with the other ten finalists, you looked the happiest of all. Maybe that’s because you knew that you were going to win.”
So it really is a miracle. I wrote a bill for RM1,000.00 by accident and a check for RM100,000.00 on August 18, and on December 12, they both came true.
When I told my friends and family what had happened, those with doubts became believers.
– Enny, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
It may feel as if what you want is almost impossible to receive. But for the law of attraction, nothing is impossible and everything is possible, even if you’re asking for a miracle, as was the case with the story of Popeye, the runaway pug.
POPEYE
My twenty-one-year-old daughter and her dog, Popeye, a four-year-old male pug, had been living with us for four months, and I was Popeye’s caretaker during that time. When my daughter moved out, she took my beloved Popeye with her, and we didn’t hear from her for about two months. When I asked about Popeye, she told me that he had escaped from the yard at the house where she was staying and she could not find him.
I made up a flyer, took it to the copy shop, and had a hundred copies made. I put up posters all around the area where Popeye went missing. When I asked how long he’d been gone, my daughter said a month. I was shocked that she had not told us sooner. Statistics will tell you that if you don’t find an animal within the first three weeks, you most likely will not find him at all.
I received several phone calls about a pug in the area, and I always ran to wherever the caller said they had seen him. Then one day a caller said they had a male pug, so I rushed to the address only to find that it was not my baby. As time went by, I put up more and more flyers but got fewer and fewer phone calls. I put an ad in the paper and searched the neighborhood, spoke with people, and handed out more flyers.
Until then I did not know about The Secret. It came into my life when I took my son to Mississippi State University for a college visit and went to the bookstore on campus. The first time we went in, I purchased several items but not The Secret. I didn’t even see the book. But later that day my son wanted something else, so we went back to the store, and as we were getting in line to check out, I saw The Secret. I had no idea what it was, but the cover struck me, so I purchased it. After the weekend was over, I took the book home and began reading it. Then I realized why Popeye was not home yet. When he left, I put his bed in the garage. It had been in my closet, but it hurt me to look at it. I put the bed back in the closet, and I went to the vet and got his food. I still put up posters, but I also said thanks daily for Popeye being home. I so believed he was home that I would cry because I was so thankful.
For a couple of weeks, there were no calls of any kind, yet I never lost faith. Then one day I got a call from someone saying they had seen a pug in the area. At the time they saw him, Popeye had been lost only a couple of weeks, but they just wanted me to know there was still hope. I thought that was wonderful of them. Then a few hours later I received another call, and this man told me that Popeye was in Texas with his niece. He said that she had been visiting at the time Popeye went missing and had found him by the school, which was very close to where he escaped. She had walked around the neighborhood asking if anyone knew him but found no one. So when it came time for her to go home, she took him with her. Her uncle had been traveling for several months, so when he came home and saw my flyers around town, he called his niece and told her that Popeye’s family was hunting for him. He gave me her number, and I called and asked if the dog she had did Popeye’s trick, and sure enough, he did.
Now, you may be wondering how I would get Popeye back when he was in Texas and I was in Mississippi. Well, the rest of the story is that she lived fifteen minutes from my father, who picked up Popeye and is bringing him home to me when he comes for my son’s graduation!
– Marta, Mississippi, USA
Marta knew she had to get herself to the place of believing Popeye was home, which is no easy feat when a dearly loved pet is lost. She chose to take specific actions that were very powerful – such as bringing his bed back into her closet and buying his food – because those actions said that Popeye had returned home. Marta’s belief became so strong that it even caused her to weep with gratitude that Popeye had returned. That kind of belief is the second vital step in the Creative Process.
The Second Step: Believe
Ask, believe, receive – just three simple steps to create what you want. However, very often the second step, believe, can be the most difficult, yet it is the greatest step you will ever take. Believing contains no doubt. Believing does not waver. Believing is absolute faith. Believing remains steadfast despite what is happening in the outside world.
When you master believing, you have mastered your life.
– The Secret Daily Teachings
I BELIEVE!
About six months a
go, my boyfriend and I spontaneously decided to move to another city where he had lived before. He went ahead and moved in with his friend so that it would be easier for him to look for a job. It was hard for me, of course, because I missed him so, but I had already given notice at my job and planned to follow him a month later.
As time went by, however, nothing seemed to be working out. My boyfriend did not get the job he wanted, so he had been out of work for nearly a month. I had not found a new job either, and on top of that, I couldn’t find anyone to take over my apartment. If I didn’t find someone who could move in the day I was moving out, I would have to pay another three months’ rent, which we could not afford. My boyfriend and I were miles apart. I was lonely and almost desperate. Time and money seemed to be running out on us.
One weekend when I was visiting him, we found an apartment. But then we learned that the family who still lived there wouldn’t be able to move out until a few days after we were scheduled to move in. We had already scheduled the movers and couldn’t change the date. It all seemed to be a mess.
When I was really desperate and in tears one night about a week before the final move, I read The Secret. I chose two stones to be my gratitude stones, and while holding the stones in one hand, with the other I wrote down everything I was thankful for in my life and everything I wanted, especially for moving into my new life. I wished for a job, and for a vacation too. I wanted to find a job immediately, but I also wanted to have time to get to know the city and settle into our new apartment. I wished for a job for my boyfriend, and I wished that we could move into our apartment on the weekend we had planned and not one day later! I printed out two pictures of the house we were supposed to be moving into and wrote in big red numbers the date I wanted to move in. I carried one picture with me and put the other beside my bed. Also, I wished for a nice girl to move into my apartment on the day I would be leaving.
