They who do not live up to their ideals soon find that they have lost them.
~ Unknown
Treasure your ideals. Value them. Honor them. Live them!
A life lived with integrity is a life filled with health, strength, and happiness.
Live true to your ideals
May 17, 2022 | 12 comments
An Ideal is a principle or value that one pursues as a goal and holds above other concerns. Also defined as a standard or model of perfection. What standards or models do we live by?
This quote from Mrs. Eddy is very helpful to me, “Do you not hear from all mankind of the imperfect model? The world is holding it before your gaze continually. The result is that you are liable to follow those lower patterns, limit your life-work, and adopt into your experience the angular outline and deformity of matter models. We must form perfect models in thought and look at them continually, or we shall never carve them out in grand and noble lives. Let unselfishness, goodness, mercy, justice, health, holiness, love—the kingdom of heaven—reign within us, and sin, disease, and death will diminish until they finally disappear.” (p. 248 S&H)
This makes me think of the first commandment to put God first and have no other gods (mortal models) before Him. God is our ideal and the truth of our being.
When our motives are principled, our ideals are in accord with divine law.
Philippians 4:8
“Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any praise, think on these things.”
“Be true and list the voice within, be true into thy high ideal” a hymn from last Sunday (416). I’m also hearing:’ To thine own self, be true…..’ And ‘as thyself, love thy neighbor’ It resonates to me: ‘”The Christ in you, the hope of glory’: an honoring of God ‘s perfect reflection. What a grounding & strengthening treatment.!!
Live true to Gods ideals
S&H Pg. 483:8-12
I have found I need to pray to not be ignorant of God. And, it is easy to be ignorant when, as Rose has mentioned above, we are constantly bombarded with the imperfect models and misleading messages.
We are constantly told that there is disease in many forms and that we should fear it. We are told sinning is fun or is how you win in the world/in life or leads to one being powerful. And we must detect that they are lies and understand why they are not true. We must do the work to disprove these mortal mind theories.
When the work is accomplished, sin is destroyed and disease in all it’s invented forms is understood to be invented mortal mind theories.
I love that Mary Baker Eddy is so ahead of her time. That she understood so clearly life is spiritual. That put her on a true foundation. Even now Material medica struggles to find its footing because everything is based on life being material. She discovered this in the 1800s! Wow! It is exciting reading her writings because they are unlike anything else out there.
One of the great experience that has impacted my life being introduced to Christian Science is the Love expressed by those who were true to its principles. It was warm, encompassing and reassuring. If there is one ideal that I find vastly important in my life, it is that expression. If I only accomplish that in my experience here, I will have change the world, my world and those others who recognize Loves value within the truth of being an expression of God’s creating.
Thank you for sharing this (and all of your comments). The heart of Christian Science really is Love.
Thank you all for the interesting comments today. I too like the quote from S&H that Rose shared and I’ve given a lot of thought to how I can avoid identifying with “imperfect models”. One technique would be to reject each suggestion of an imperfect model that comes to thought similar to how a tennis player swats back a ball hit to them. But that would be exhausting. Then one day I realized that, even though I see commercials on TV or hear commercials on radio or am in the company of people conversing about imperfect models that only effect women, I am never even slightly tempted to accept the suggestion as applying to me because I’m male. In other words, because I identify myself as male, I am never tempted to accept discordant health suggestions that only apply to women. I concluded from that realization that the key to rejecting suggestions of imperfect models is to maintain a clear “ideal” of my identity as a Son (manifestation) of God (i.e. “form perfect models in thought and look at them continually”),. Holding that true ideal of myself as spiritual and as the perfect idea of God results in me “automatically” and “effortlessly” ignoring the “imperfect model” suggestions that we are constantly bombarded with. :-).
That is good thinking RH. It’s about how we identify ourselves. As we get clearer and clearer about our identity as children of God, it’s easier to reject suggestions that don’t apply to us (and don’t apply to anyone, as we are all the child of God). I like the idea of it becoming automatic and effortless. Thanks!
But if we are on autopilot, we might think a mortal is an immortal or that everyone, regardless of their behavior, is a child of God. And then are we really standing porter at the door of thought? If we are ignorant of sin, we are abused by it until we identify it for what it is and handle it. I guess I think it is key to identify it as a false suggestion or counterfeit and know the reason why and bruise the head of the serpent. Jesus said to be “as wise as serpents…” and also to feed the sheep. To assume the sheep are as wise as serpents could fatten them for the slaughter – could be like telling them they do not have to stand porter. That is just my take on it though. Through Science or suffering everyone learns.
‘The Ideal is attainable’:
https://sentinel.christianscience.com/shared/view/9vjnh5yow6?s=e
Excellent article – thank you for sharing it Angie!
Thank you all for for these wonderful ideas! Great food for thought! Love and blessings to you.