Discover the Gift directed by Demien Lichtenstein

[kingbling7524]

I just watched this pretty cool self help movie called Discover the Gift and I was wondering what you guys thought of New Age Thinking in American culture? What the people had to say in the movie was very nice and helpful. I really liked what they had to say. I was just curious what you thought.

 

[sparkchaser]

Mumbo jumbo.

 

[Will]

I read another book 'The Gift', at the time without any prior knowledge of it and the movement that seemed to spring up around it. I generally agree with Sparkchaser on this one. Whilst I am all one for positive thought, the book and the whole movement that's cropped up around it is almost cult-like and highly illogical.

I stumbled across a pro-active thinking/empower yourself via the universe forum whilst doing some internet research around the same time, and the group were berating people for having terminal illnesses by saying they basically didn't 'want recovery enough' or people who were poor for 'not wanting' to be rich, even subconsciously.

What. a. pile. of. poo. and also quite nasty.

Also - is this really New Age? Acquiring the moniker doesn't necessarily make it so.

 

[beer good]

I'm a little curious about Barbara Ehrenreich's book on positive thinking:

Smile! You've got cancer | Barbara Ehrenreich | Society | The Guardian

 

[sparkchaser]

Have you read the one star reviews of it? Haters gonna hate.

 

[Will]

I think the problem is that some people ascribe emotions and sentimental feeling to hearing news (granted, in some cases this isn't bad or wrong, but a genuine human reaction - say to a tragedy etc).

They hear the economy tanks or that they're ill - so they block out the news which 'causes' the unpleasant emotion - which they will label as negative. Then they just think in a manner which ignores the news and thus they feel better - which they label positive.

News and thinking are just interpretations of events. It's the humans that attach the good or bad emotions and sentiment to them (positive and negative). And this attachment, and how we then interact and interpret said attachment are quite arbitrary, and I fear, possibly why problems crop up, as some use it as a way of life, others as just one of many things in life to guide them.

 

[kingbling7524]

I do agree that people should not substitute reality for a happy thought, but when it comes to daily living, you know the small moments, people should just illuminate happier feelings for others. Any way I forgot to show you the link for DTG, maybe you might want to check it out and do a little more research on this stuff for yourself.

Discover the Gift : The Blog