Change We Can (Almost) Believe In

摘要

It's blistering hot, and i m walk-ing a stone labyrinth, wending toward a central clearing lined with crystals and chanting to angels. This is the Angel Valley Retreat outside Sedona, Ariz., and the New Age minister who runs it has instructed me to walk this maze while repeating the words "my higher self is guiding me." Only then will I feel the power of the land beneath me, the red-walled mountain behind me and the angels above me. I am a few hundred yards from the spot where three people died in October 2009. They were on a "spiritual warrior retreat" led by James Arthur Ray, a man with improbably white teeth who claimed he had been initiated into 12 shamanic orders. He had been a guest on Oprah and was featured in the best-selling DVD The Secret, and the nearly $ 10,000 weeklong course was his platinum self-help offering.