Sunday, November 29, 2009

Change Your Thoughts Change Your Life

That's been the message of Wayne Dyer...the positive thinking guru.

Dyer, who has claimed you can change your health - even your DNA - is now facing Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia, a slow progressing cancer.  Seems his positive thoughts didn't prevent that!

Maybe, just maybe...access to more family medical history may have been of more help to the former orphanage resident, than just thinking positively.

A bit of "Little Orphan Annie" syndrome?  Wish it away?

UPDATE: The one connection I found between Dyer and adoption:
I listened, on a call-in radio show, to this father who had given up his child for adoption and now, thirty years later, his child is famous. His son took his real name back five years ago. The father now wants to reconnect with the son he hasn’t seen since he gave him up for adoption. The father told this story on the radio. Everybody who called in talked about how they disliked this man and what he was doing, accusing him of only wanting contact with his famous son because he wanted money. Then callers said, "Let me tell you about what happened to me, with my father." Everyone who called in projected their own story onto this person’s desire to reconnect with his son. We have to learn humility—to see the world the way it is, not the way we are, and to see people the way they are, and not the way we are, and not to use ourselves and our stories as a justification or a rationale for the way everyone else ought to behave.  An Interview with Wayne Dyer
AND...there is another motivational speaker, Alvin Law, who was adopted.

Dyer's interesting philosophy: "Life itself is a sexually transmitted terminal disease."

9 comments:

SustainableFamilies said...

Have you heard about the James Ray incident, co-creator of The Secret?

The happiness movement I think really does wind up leaving people feeling bad about themselves, emotionally repressed, and guilty for illnesses and emotional suffering that are not their fault.

I don't think that's nice.

Byron Katie, another "it's all in your thoughts" guru, was going blind. So if she applies her philosophy to herself, she blinded herself.

Hmmm.

maryanne said...

Totally agree, S.F. A good book that is critical of the whole positive thinking idea run amok is "Bright Sided-How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America" By Barbara Ehrenreich, who also wrote "Nickel and Dimed" and several other good books. She is a breast cancer survivor and has a lot to say about all the cheery pink promotion around that awful disease, as well as how ignoring reality and thinking your thoughts control outside events may have contributed to our current financial mortgage mess.

Don't even get me started on The Secret and similar vile New Age narcissism! As to Mr. Dyer, I do not know his story but if he grew up in an orphanage and was not adopted, his records are not sealed so that is not his problem. But his belief system is, especially since he has foisted it on others. I hope he is seeing a good doctor, not some quack.

AdoptAuthor said...

HIS records may not be sealed but I doubt he even checked his parents' medical records and his position of having been in an orphanage might have made him more astute to the problem faced by adoptees in this regard...instead he has buried his head in lots of denial sand...

maryanne said...

I don't follow Wayne Dyer so was not aware he had a position on adoption records access. Does he?

AdoptAuthor said...

None that I am aware of either - that's my point.

I found one connection between Dyer and adoption. Go back and read the post - I updated with what I found.

maryanne said...

Also while it is helpful to have family medical history, knowing it can't really prevent your getting something like leukemia. It just pinpoints some things to look for in the case of diseases that have a hereditary component, which not all forms of cancer do.

AdoptAuthor said...

But given a choice between obtaining medical history and magical thinking, most doctors would suggest the former.

Knowing family history increases likelihood of testing for certain diseases, such as cancers and leukemia, and earlier detection often means a huge difference in treatment outcomes. Could mean life or death difference.

maryanne said...

Magical thinking is bad. Knowing family medical history is good, and can be helpful. But I do not see the connection with Wayne Dyer. There is no indication that he did not know his family medical history. There is no indication he has any views one way or the other about adoptee rights. Not everyone does, you know! The quote you found from him does not really indicate any opinion on adoption or reunions that I can see.

Because the man expouses magical thinking says nothing about knowing family history one way or the other. I know plenty of reunited people in adoption reform who also enthusiaticaly endorse magical thinking and various New Age gurus. The two things do not exclude each other, and do not really have much to do with each other.

I don't see why you used Dyer as an example of need to know medical history for adoptees. Lots of non-adopted people do not know much family history for a variety of reasons. It is helpful, but is not the be all and end all of medical treatment.

AdoptAuthor said...

I draw the speculative conclusion that this man was faced with a not very happy childhood - abandonment and an orphanage - and chose to ignore that reality and believe that his thoughts could make all right in his world.

Just my theory.

RussiaToday Apr 29, 2010 on Russian Adoption Freeze

Russi Today: America television Interview 4/16/10 Regarding the Return of Artyem, 7, to Russia alone

RT: Russia-America TV Interview 3/10

Korean Birthmothers Protest to End Adoption

Motherhood, Adoption, Surrender, & Loss

Who Am I?

Bitter Winds

Adoption and Truth Video

Adoption Truth

Birthparents Never Forget