KRS-ONE Knows The Secret

[Calling Down The Earth] • This past year has seen an explosion in the mainstream media concerning a book entitled, "The Secret." This book has become a quick best-seller, filling window displays in Barnes & Nobles and Border's Books across America.

Such a fast push to the prime eye view of shoppers might elicit skepticism in anyone who has grown weary of massive marketing campaigns. Where is it getting it's financial backing from?

With that question fresh in your mind, I let you seek to figure it out. For the purpose of this blog today is not be one of investigative journalism. I'm on the road, and have many things to do (like figure out where I'm sleeping tonight), so forgive me if I refuse to play know-it-all for the purposes of a column.

While I'm at it, I'll also declare that I am not seeking to deconstruct and semantically critique a phenomenom like 'The Secret.' Nor will I provide a myriad number reasons as to why I find such mainstream manifestations of pop metaphysical subject matter annoying. Got no time to be disgruntled my friend, sorry. There is too much to be done in the world right  now than to sit around and pretend to be a grouchy critic.

In fact, I'll even go so far as to say that one central tenet espoused in this book seems very powerful and real to me. This tenet is what the author, Rhonda Byrne, has called the 'Law of Attraction.' This 'law,' (I'm not sure what scientific journals have tested the hypothesis of attraction, let alone proven the law of attraction) basically says that what one thinks and speaks has a tendency to manifest itself in one's life. This makes sense to me.

However, my toes do cringe as I walk past a window display of 'The Secret.' I clench my jaw and grumble a bit in that moment. Why? Because something just doesn't feel right to me; it upsets and frustrates me. Perhaps it's the way that such information is presented and it manifests in the packaging of the book.

For instance, Byrne writes in the forward, "I'd been given a glimpse of a Great Secret-The Secret to life. The glimpse came in a hundred-year-old book given to me by my daughter." So her little kid gave her an old mysterious book, I assume. Whooooooo, trippy. What was it? An old Theosophical text unearthed in her young daughter's closet?

Haha, just playin. But check it out, Byrne never provides the name of this hundred-year-old book. There is no footnote, no index, nothing. Maybe I'm just a book-worm, but I like to know where author's get their information from. Just give us one clue Rhonda.

So Byrne got this old book right. And, hey, what a coincidence that it's her book, "The Secret," that is made to look like a really old scroll. Just look at the cover of "The Secret." Notice the simulated papyrus. Doesn't it get you in a  "Da Vinci Code" state of mind. Yeah, "The Secret."

Again, I must re-iterate. I am not mad at Rhonda for this book, or the perspectives she bullet-points at the end of each chapter. You know, cause who has time to read a whole chapter these days.

Byrne writes that, "The Great Secret of Life is the Law of Attraction." And that, "Thoughts are magnetic. As you think thoughts, they are sent out into the Universe, and they magnetically attract all like things that are in the same frequency. Everything sent out returns to the source-You."

In 1997, KRS-ONE released an album called, "I Got Next." As far as I remember, it did not make a huge splash on the Billboard charts at the time; yet I would consider it, and most of Kris's work, to be a stalwart statement in the philosophy and culture known as Hip-Hop.

Any anthropologist or social scientist who wishes to truly study this subject would greatly benefit from listening to KRS-ONE (if you didn't know this already). This album, in particular, elucidates some elements that are integral in making any gathering of people a true Hip-Hop party.

So one such element is the role that the MC plays; the Master of Ceremonies who toasts the DJ and controls the crowd. No matter how much natural talent a rapper might have buzzing inside his or her brain, KRS might argure, there are some definitive steps one must take before calling oneself a masterful MC. I believe KRS. He would fit the description of a true Master of Ceremonies.

So to further expound upon his thesis of real Hip-Hop, KRS dedicated a song on "I Got Next" to this topic. It's aptly titled, "The M.C."

Why do I mention all this when I was just writing about "The Secret"

Well, because, apparently, KRS-ONE has known about this 'Great Secret' for years, and he even raps about it on, "The M.C.."

Here's what he has to say about it:

"As an M.C. you will study verbal magic/

But watch what you say because you'll attract it/

Control your subconscious magnet/

From pulling in havoc."

So perhaps it's just an aesthetic choice on my part, but I'd much rather learn the lessons of making my life more successful from KRS-ONE (which is an acronym for Knowledge Reigns Supreme Over Nearly Everyone), than a book that was made to look like some ancient 'Indiana Jones' scroll, packaged and presented for an audience who'd heard about it on Dr. Phil; and decided to dip into it between flipping through the pages of 'US Weekly' and 'People Magazine,' while sipping latte's at their local corporate chain bookstore.

Byrne writes, "The Law of Attraction says like attracts like." Based on this statement, I would say that an MC, and philosopher like KRS-ONE has attracted many individuals to the positve potential of Hip-Hop culture. Something Bill O'Reilly should look into.

By the way, KRS's acronym for Hip-Hop is, "Her Infinite Power Helping Oppressed People." Bullet-point that.