Perhaps you've already seen a movie called "The Secret." Perhaps a friend invited you over to watch it and together you rolled your eyes at how hokey it was. And then perhaps you went home, mesmerized by its message, vowing to change your life.

"The Secret" claims to have uncovered The Law of Attraction, which it says was known to elite thinkers for millennia but was suppressed by a series of unnamed institutions and rich people. Frenetic footage as the movie opens features men in robes, and men in wigs, and men dressed as Roman Centurions, all of them doing something mysterious involving scrolls of paper. This is followed by 90 minutes of interviews with self-help gurus, including "Chicken Soup for the Soul" author Jack Canfield. There are also short fictional segments depicting people receiving new cars, necklaces and boyfriends.

Through word-of-mouth and online viral marketing — and without a penny spent on advertising — 750,000 copies of "The Secret" DVD have been sold, plus nearly a million books based on the movie, and a million copies of the soundtrack. The numbers are likely to rise following an hour devoted to "The Secret" on Oprah earlier this week.

The gist of "The Secret" and The Law of Attraction is this: Our thoughts create emotions that have vibrations that attract similar vibrations; so whatever we focus on, good or bad, we draw to us; whatever we want — if we think, feel and act upon it — the universe will provide.

The Law of Attraction, under various names, is nothing new — although it's been dressed up now with quantum-physics terminology. The 2004 movie "What the Bleep Do We Know?!" was another version of the same idea, although it didn't create the same amount of buzz, or any wristbands ("Ask, Believe, Receive") or other paraphernalia (silver-plated Secret Lamps and silver-plated Secret Scroll document holders at $49.95 each).

According to Richard Cohn, whose company Beyond Words published the book version of "The Secret," Utah ranks among the top five states in sales. At Golden Braid Books in Salt Lake City, "we've sold hundreds of copies; we can't keep it in," says manager Wendy Wilburn.

"The Secret" sits on shelves full of other Law of Attraction-type books, DVDs and CDs, including predecessors such as Lynn Grabhorn's "Excuse Me, Your Life is Waiting," Michael Losier's "The Law of Attraction" and "Ask and It Is Given" by Abraham-Hicks (actually Esther Hicks channelling a group of beings who go by the name Abraham).