The stunning thing for me in the Law of Attraction is the idea that 'we invariably become what we think about most.' I gradually came to understand what this in fact means.

Travel with me in my discovery of just what that statement entails.

We hear the formulation that I freely choose what images and thoughts to give my attention to. Moreover, those images and thoughts that I voluntarily return to, repeatedly, control the vibration (or frequency) that my mind and body fall into, which in turn controls what is attracted into my life.

The metaphor I use for the mind and body is this: imagine the physical universe as a cosmic forest fire in which each individual tree on fire is an individual mind and body.  The flow of energy visually occurs like in that image, as I imagine it.

So, I turn to my own existence. I am a soul, a non-physical spirit, and I presume that my spirit's 'essence' must be the thoughts and feelings produced in and by my mind.

Is there evidence that thoughts have power, that is actual power in the material universe? Thomas Troward, in one of the three new chapters he added to later editions of his "Edinborough Lectures on Mental Science", gives evidence by referring to Hippolyte Barraduc's work with the 'biometre', an instrument that measures the intensity of force or power allegedly exerted by a subject's thoughts. The actual instrument consists of a bell jar with two copper needles suspended inside. Extensive precautions are taken so that nothing material inside the jar, or in the immediate vicinity outside the jar, is allowed to exert any measurable influence on the copper needles.

Troward himself experimented with Barraduc's instrument and found that when he stood in front of it, and composed his mind into a state of entire relaxation, the two needles 'moved' to register the following readings: Left, 20 degrees; Right, 10 degrees. Then when he put his mind into the strongest mental attitude he could, the needles moved to quite different readings: Left, 10 degrees; Right, 30 degrees. Two doctors and other observers were present and verified that nothing was present that could have materially caused the needles to move.

Troward was convinced this registered the material impact, or actual energy, the frequency level, exerted by his thought waves as they radiated from his mind, much like radio, television or satellite waves. I don't find this particularly farfetched. It's plausible that thoughts, as an electromagnetic phenomenon, are in fact waves, and that their 'force', or frequency, would therefore presumably be measurable.

In this context, the Law of Attraction speaks of thoughts as falling into three categories, ones I initiate or create, ones I receive from other minds (subconsciously, I gather), and ones I receive from, or send to, what Wallace Wattles referred to as a 'formless substance' that permeates the physical universe.

My mind then is a nucleus within that clot of fiery energy in the forest fire of the universe, to render it visually. And my mind's thought-waves have a measurable power level.

Stop and consider that there is truly only one thing that you have absolute freedom to control -- your own thoughts. No one can cause you to think something that you don't want to think. Any other aspect of our existence is subject to external coercion, but not our thoughts. We are utterly free inside our own minds, free to think whatever we wish.

But how do I literally 'become' what I think about most? How is it that the content of my most habitual thoughts is drawn into my life? This is one of those aspects of the Law of Attraction you either suspend your disbelief over, or reject. The thoughts I think, I send, inadvertently, into the formless substance. Once there (which is immediate because it's all around us) they are 'impressed', and produce a version of the content of those thoughts. That's admittedly a rather nightmarish idea on its face, but it has a strange resonance for me. The one thing I have absolute freedom to do as I wish, my thinking, draws to me, very gradually, the very thing I give my thoughts over to. 

I truly become what I freely choose to think about.

The implications are staggering, 'if' we accept this as in any way a plausible picture of what the universe is. If so, then the universe is a living entity, an infinite field of conscious and benign energy, one of whose forms is 'thought'. It is a field in which each of us constitutes an energetic, individual part.

The implication are threefold: 1) mind manifests and controls the body (and its health), 2) mind controls what is attracted into its life, and 3) mind becomes what it gives its attention to.

The moral message within The Secret is profound. It is breathtakingly optimistic and empowering. I choose to suspend my disbelief in the weaker elements of its argument.