The Law of Attraction, James Ray, and Sedona

There's been a lot of press lately about this "The Secret" so-called "guru," James Ray, and the sweat lodge tragedy that happened in Sedona, Arizona under his watch; so far, three people have died from it and many more were injured. I've been following that with interest, because I'm a believer in the Law of Attraction, and of course that incident has given a lot of LOA detractors fuel for their fire. They say that we LOA believers will say that number one, the victims attracted this circumstance to themselves, and that number two, James Ray will simply get off scot free because he can simply ignore what happened and put his attention on "something else," thus making this "unpleasant" incident simply go away.

I think they're wrong. I do NOT believe that these victims "attracted" the situation to themselves so that they could die (and I do not believe the gag worthy statement someone said, that they were just "having so much fun in the nonphysical" that they didn't want to come back).

I DO believe these victims gave their power over to James Ray to such an extreme extent that they wouldn't even listen to their own bodies when their bodies screamed that they had to get out of that sweat lodge or perish. Instead, they listened to James Ray tell them that they had to do what HE said -- so much so that they continued to ignore their own well-being to the point where they died. Why did they give their own personal power up so much that they got themselves into that circumstance in the first place?

James Ray is even more responsible for what happened. If he really DID believe in the Law of Attraction, he would know that it's about personal responsibility and self-empowerment -- and that's what he would be teaching. Instead, he was telling these people that they had to listen to HIM, or be failures. Anybody who really believed in the Law of Attraction would be saying that these people should be listening to themselves first and foremost. (And actually, he does say that in what he writes; apparently, it's not part of his personal behavior, though.) He wouldn't be on an ego trip.

But that's what it was. It was a pure ego trip for him, in my opinion, which means that he's a charlatan. Because if you really believe in the Law of Attraction, you know that you have to be wary of your ego, and you have to keep an eye on it; you don't let it control you. You also know that you can't be a fake. You can't pretend to be one thing, but really be something else. That's because the Law of Attraction draws experiences to you based upon who you really *are*, not on who you "pretend" to be. And James Ray is living that out right now -- which is exactly what he deserves.