Zip, zap, zoom your way to happiness!

Every once in a while The Secret’s main perp Rhonda Byrne comes out of hiding to share a bit of mystical wisdom via a newsletter she calls the The Secret Scrolls. On her April 5 message, to which my friend Tony alerted me the other day, Rhonda waxed profound about the importance of being You:

The other thing I want you to know is that whatever you choose for you is right! You cannot get it wrong. If you have chosen something for you, it is right! You cannot fail. It is impossible for you to fail, because how can you fail at being You? You are the perfection of you, because nobody else can be you. You have got You down pat! Do you appreciate that you are an outstanding and total success at being you, right where you are now?

Well, as far as I was concerned that was enough inspiration to last for weeks. It was certainly enough to recharge the narcissistic passions of Secretrons everywhere. But Rhonda wasn’t finished. She had another gift to share, one that she says was inspired by one of the stars of The Secret.

The last gift I want to share with you has been inspired by Mike Dooley's Notes from the Universe. Mike Dooley, one of the featured teachers in The Secret, creates daily notes which he sends out free via email. These notes are written from the perspective of the Universe, and they are lighthearted, fun, and a delight to receive. Every note inspires through insights into the law of attraction.

I have recommended Mike's notes to so many people. If you would also like to receive his free gift of personalized Universe Notes, here is the link to receive them:

http://www.tut.com/mmm.shtml

Mike Dooley's Note from the Universe which inspired me in this Scroll was:

Probably, not necessarily, but probably, the shortest distance between here and there -- between today and the life of your wildest dreams -- runs through joy, as much of it as you can possibly stir up.But, that's only if you're in a hurry.

Zip, zap, zoom -
The Universe

Rhonda concluded:

And so if you do want to "zip, zap, zoom" and receive everything and anything you are dreaming of for You, know that it is through your joy - your happy feeling inside. It is the fastest path. Your joy - you feeling good - is the shortcut to everything you want. That is why they were the final words I wrote in the sand in the film The Secret.

My friend Tony was in utter despair after reading this message. He wrote, "We humans crawled from the primordial soup, evolved for millions of years, created science, technology, and philosophy, produced a civilization capable of landing a man on the Moon, and THIS is what is now the most popular craze in America…"

Although the message did not produce quite that level of despair in me, I do have a few worries, and not all of them concern the intellectual bankruptcy of our modern age. As a matter of fact, in my ongoing effort to be more tolerant and understanding of "the other side," I have decided to look at things from Mike Dooley’s point of view. And I am honestly concerned that Dooley – whom I like because he sort of resembles Bill White, the mayor of my fair city – could be facing some serious problems down the road.

To begin with, one of Dooley’s brands is "TUT," an acronym for "Totally Unique Thoughts." There are a couple of problems with this claim. First of all, a thing is either unique or it isn’t, so the word "totally" is totally unnecessary. Further, the very uniqueness of Mike’s thoughts is questionable. If it turns out that these thoughts are not, in fact, unique, he could be facing some lawsuits from disgruntled, literal-minded customers somewhere down the line.

But there’s an even bigger problem. I fear that Dooley might have bitten off a little more than he could chew by picking The Universe as his imaginary friend.

As you may recall, when we discussed imaginary friends yesterday, I warned about possible pitfalls one faces when fabricating an imaginary pal. My point yesterday was that being too specific can cause credibility problems – yes, even in a profoundly gullible target market – therefore hindering the profitability of your brand. I cited Esther and Jerry Hicks with their buds Abraham, and JZ Knight with her pal Ramtha, as excellent examples of successful brand creation. The Hicks team and JZ were smart to create disembodied individuals, eschewing physical descriptions or other defining details that could easily be debunked. Anastasia’s creator, on the other hand, gave his fantasy gal pal a physical description, a chronological age, and a more or less specific geographical location. And I thought that was potentially a big mistake.

The pitfalls of specificity are obvious, but when it comes to make-believe buddies there’s also such a thing as being too general. Although Neale Donald Walsh has enjoyed success with his imaginary pal God – and I am not for a moment suggesting that God Him/Her/Itself is imaginary, only that Neale’s God is – I think that for the most part it is a mistake to get too ambitious. Although it could be argued that The Universe is not imaginary, and that there’s more tangible evidence of its existence than there is of God’s, I still feel that for Mike Dooley to claim that The Universe is sending him messages – which he in turn is willing to share with others – places a serious strain on his credibility.

"Well, that sure hasn’t cut into his success!" you might be saying. "And he is, after all, one of the featured teachers in The Secret, so he must be doing something right."

Okay, you have a point. Sooner or later, however, I fear that even Dooley’s most ardent and gullible fans are going to stop and ask themselves, "Hmmm. I wonder if Mike Dooley is REALLY getting messages from The Universe. After all, The Universe is a pretty big place! And can the Universe really talk? And if so, does It speak English?"

And Dooley’s problem may be even worse than mere over-reaching, as I discovered on a site I found:

Some folks might know Mike Dooley as the very inspirational author of Infinite Possibilities. Many consider Mike their ‘teacher.’ But for thousands of others around the world, Mike is known simply as ‘The Universe’ – a fun-loving and very wise friend who arrives in an email message every morning.

If I am reading this web site correctly, it is possible that Mike actually thinks he is The Universe. And that could be very bad news for Mike, credibility-wise. There could even be some mental-health issues here. Even Neale, whose mental health may be a bit questionable at times, doesn’t claim to actually be God.

There’s one other potential problem too: The Universe’s "Zip, zap, zoom" sig file could possibly embroil Mike Dooley in a huge copyright battle with Mazda. Companies these days are very jealous of their copyrights, and will go after anyone who seems to be even remotely stepping on their intellectual or creative property. And let's face it: even The Universe is no match for rabid copyright attorneys.

So, Mr. Dooley, I’d be careful if I were you. Totally.

And now if y’all will excuse me, I’m going to zip, zap, zoom my way out of the blogosphere and back into my real world – at least I think it is real – to help The Rev get ready for tomorrow’s big Easter food fest.