Do you ever get upset by other people’s criticism? Do you get offended when another does something you disapprove of? Do you feel pushed around and hurt by someone else’s actions? Then there’s room for progress in your moral outlook that will take you to a more peaceful place!
Mary Baker Eddy wrote,
“It is our pride that makes another’s criticism rankle, our self-will that makes another’s deed offensive, our egotism that feels hurt by another’s self-assertion” Miscellaneous Writings, p. 224.
When the human mind gets upset, angry or offended, it often blames someone else for its unrest. But the finger of blame is pointed in the wrong direction. Other people do not control our thinking. We do. We decide what our reaction is going to be and then express it accordingly.
For instance, with criticism, we make a choice to feel offended or not. Some criticism is merited and needs to be honestly assessed and considered. Much criticism is not merited and needs to be discarded as baseless. There doesn’t need to be a heated emotional reaction. If there is, what reacts, but the human ego?
It’s pride that is offended. It’s ego that fears competition, and self-will that feels pushed around. And these are selfish characteristics of the mortal mind that we want to be free of anyway.
So, if you’re getting heated up by other people’s opinions, criticisms, or beliefs, you can find peace by disempowering them in your mind. Don’t give them god status over your state of thought. Be clear that they do not control what you think, how you think, or how you’re going to respond. You do! And you can respond with elegant grace, wisdom and love that have a healing effect.
To stay free of angst, honor the one Mind over all—the Mind of God—which has the final say in all matters. The one Mind doesn’t react with anger or fear, but with love and compassion, insight and intelligence. And as a child of God, you reflect the divine disposition to always be a healing presence.
You don’t have to get upset anymore. Love unselfishly instead. It’s the healing way.
Just beautiful. This is the path to being what the world needs a lot more of – statesmanship. Thank you Evan for this post. What a true joy to read.
Thankyou Evan. I REALLY needed to read this every day for the last 2 weeks!
Think I’ll pin this up somewhere that I can read it all the time.
Thank you, Evan! I’m discovering that so much of Life is about letting go of the human ego and growing Godward, Spiritward. Yikes! Not always easy! I’m learning that staying more God-Centered, Centered in the One Mind, is a great help in overcoming reactions to other people’s words, actions, etc. I once heard that “ego” stands for “edging God out”! Another Yikes! Onward and Upward!
Thank you Evan. A great message so needed in the world today. I learned how our thinking can control us back in 1959 – both from a man at work and three years later after becoming a member of CS and studying “Love Thine Enemies” by MBE. At work a man asked me why I looked like I wanted to crawl under a desk when going to the cafeteria. (I had been raised in a poor but loving household in a very small town and was now working in a city in a large division of a world-wide corporation, and had to walk thru the middle of about 100 desks to the cafeteria.) I told him it was because I felt everyone was talking about me. He looked at me and said “you are beautiful but what makes you think you are so important that everyone is talking about you!” Although jarred by his statement at the time, I realized that evening it was all in my mind. He was the one that brought me out of my shell back then for which I was so grateful. Most grateful though to Mrs. Eddy.
Great story! Thanks for sharing.
MARY ANN is right on target. Mortal thought is all about itself. Criticism from it only boosts itself. It’s not interested in any one really. That’s the human being expressed. We don’t want that. All we want is to learn God’s Love for all and for that to be expressed.
Great Comments! I’m not sure I understand the difference between “human” and “mortal” in Christian Science. Is “mortal mind” another name for the “human ego” or is it okay to be human as long as we know that we are spiritual, not mortal?
Hi Bev,
Generally speaking, human is above mortal. Mortal stands for the basest aspects of material mindedness. It’s the primitive mortal mind that seems stuck in a material world. The human mind is a seeming mixture of the material and spiritual. It’s the field of “tares and wheat” that Jesus mentioned in his parable. As human thought is brought closer to God, it lets go of the mortal and improves, until it totally yields to the divine Mind, the one Mind over all.
Beautiful, peaceful, timely ☺
Thank you
Thanks, Evan! Very helpful!
thank you
Good reminder, as for moment, Love thy neighbor.
Late yesterday I got an email from somebody I work with that really angered me. But instead of allowing that reaction to continue, I decided to “impersonalize” the beliefs that were angering me and pray to see the truth about each one.
The term “impersonalize” as used in Christian Science has puzzled me for many years. But I finally got it. Woo Hoo! For example, I felt that the person sending this email was expressing “arrogance”, “selfishness”, and was being “obstinate”. So I “detached” each of those errors from this person and prayed about each one of these beliefs. In other words, I used what I have learned in Christian Science to:
– understand why each of these beliefs could not have been created by a loving God (that’s why I’m calling them “beliefs” instead of “ideas”).
– And to realize the opposite of each of these beliefs -or- to realize the truth, the counterfact, of each of these beliefs until I was certain each belief was unreal.
This only took about 30 minutes and afterward I felt sooooo much better. I no longer felt any anger towards the person that sent the email. I realized that all of the beliefs I had associated with this individual were not real and therefore I could not suffer from them. At this point I just knew that somehow the situation would be resolved harmoniously and felt no reason to respond to the email.
This morning I got another email from this same person proposing a resolution to the issue that he had sent the email about yesterday that angered me. I’m completely happy with the proposed resolution so I was able to respond that I accepted his proposal. Issue resolved!!!
Thank you so much Evan for your daily reminders via SpiritView such as this one about not letting others get us upset. I attribute my ability to handle this email situation I just described in large part to your wonderful SpiritView postings that instruct and remind us how to see through the errors that try to present themselves to our thinking.