Countless people are struggling with attention issues these days, so it helps to get a spiritual understanding of the concept to demonstrate it more successfully.
The place to begin is with the source of attention—God, the one divine Mind.
Each of us is a child of God, formed and shaped in the Mind of God long before human parents knew anything about us. We are eternal spiritual ideas in the divine Mind that are fully bestowed with all the faculties of Mind, including the faculty of attention.
God’s children are not born with deficient attention. They are created with perfect attention.
Each of us, as a child of God, can focus, comprehend, understand and communicate intelligently and appropriately with others around us. That is the way God made us. It might not seem that way at times, but when this is the case, it’s an opportunity to prove likewise, that we are not deficient mortals struggling with lack, but whole and complete immortals blessed abundantly by God with all the faculties of Mind.
Attention is not material, or of the human mind. It is spiritual, of the divine Mind.
Attention is not housed in the brain. It is not organic, chemically or electrically based. It is a faculty of the divine Mind that is built into our being as a spiritual creation of God. We have attention because God gave it to us. It’s the way we were made.
Everyone has perfect attention to express and demonstrate.
The place to find attention is not in matter, not in the body, not in the brain, not in drugs, but in Truth.
Jesus showed us how when he taught, “Know the truth, and the truth will set you free” John 8:32, NLT. To understand that attention comes from God and is built into the mental makeup of every child is to set the human mind free from the erroneous belief that attention is finite and lost. That which comes from God is never lost. It might appear lost to material sense, but when material sense is replaced with spiritual sense, that which appeared absent becomes apparent.
Mary Baker Eddy wrote, “God is the creator of man, and, the divine Principle of man remaining perfect, the divine idea or reflection, man, remains perfect. Man is the expression of God’s being” Science and Health, p. 470. Man is the whole expression of God’s being. There are no deficiencies in God’s child. There is no lack, no shortcoming, no missing link. There is only the wholeness, integrity and completeness of the one Mind to manifest and bear witness too.
You have God-given attention to demonstrate and prove. Your children have focused attention to express. Your co-worker was created with clear attention.
See the truth in yourself and others and stay away from any evil labels mortal mind might slap on that suggest lack. God’s child does not lack. Everyone is fully supplied by the Mind of Love to be everything God created them to be.
Calm, poised, collected and focused attention is yours to express today and to see in everyone around you. It’s what God put there to see.
This is just beautiful Evan. Thank you so much. A wonderful way to start my day.
I agree with Linda- this is beautiful and so helpful on many levels! Very appreciative of the wonderful inspiration here!
In praying for the world’s children (of any age 🙂 we can cling to these truths about the divine design of God’s child to manifest all the faculties of his/her Maker, including focus, attention, and alert intelligence. This is so helpful, Evan.
This is very helpful thank you Evan
I hope you are shaping a form of this beautiful helpful piece for the periodicals! I am substituting whatever thought quality that seems lacking or out of balance for the term attention… what a wonderful aid to uplifted and uplifting treatments.
Thank you.
A wonderful quality of attention may be stated thusly:
Wherever one places their attention,
that area of their life will grow
Thanks for these wonderful, powerful truths about our true being. They also directly apply to and heal the belief of Alzheimer’s and memory loss. Thanks again.
Amen, Mike, it any hint of a belief in losing our attention. Impossible.
I meant to say, ‘at’ error correction; Amen, Mike at any hint of a belief in losing our attention of spiritual sense. Impossible.
Perfect, Thank you, Evan.
I would like to echo the gratitude expressed above. Fear would argue so strongly and wrongly for the belief that our individuality and identity as the perfect, beloved child of God can somehow be diminished or lost by some “disease” process. The only true process of man’s knowing is the uninterrupted, undiminished, clear flow of Mind’s knowing to Its beloved reflection.
Thank you for addressing this issue. As a young parent, I saw so many parents frantic about this, medicating 5 year olds. It is just another form of mortal mind. When I was growing up it was polio, special shoes, retardation. I try to calm my children ,who are parents, by reminding them that whatever is scaring their generationsof parents, it’s just the new ‘thing’ , the new version, and not much more.
Agree with others here. Excellent stream of thought and so necessary. I do hope you develop an article for the periodicals. As a former teacher, I dealt with this each day when praying about student issues. And doesn’t this also address concerns about texting while driving? Right on, Evan.
thanks a lot again for this precious SpiritView, dear Evan. It is very helpful and freeing that attention is not material but its spiritual of divine Mind and therefore effortless, because we naturally express this divine Mind!
I remember on Wednesday meetings decades ago, I was unhappy, because I could not really follow the reading of the reader. It seemed that I was was not able to pay attention enough to get the spiritual content of the reading. Today I have learned to listen more with spiritual sense in order to get the Truth and understand it. But anyhow we are still learning and will never stop to learn to understand the Truth more and more. Am grateful for that 🙂
This subject is so important! I once had a piano student who had been labeled as ADD. The mother wanted to sit in the room while I taught her daughter, I assume to see if I had the patience to teach her. It made me a little nervous at first, but I claimed in my thought that this little girl and I both reflected the one Mind and we did fine One day the mother noticed my books on C.S. on my desk. It turned out that she had attended church sometimes with a neighbor when she lived in Texas. (We were in Hawaii.) I then offered to take her two daughters to Sunday School with me. She was happy to do that! I then could teach my student, reminding her of the truths she was learning in Sunday School. We made great progress. A few years ago her mom told me she had gone on to college, majored in music, and eventually received a Masters Degree in Ethnomusicology. Her mom also told me I was the only piano teacher she ever had which made me feel very humble and thankful to God for his direction.
WOW what wonderful comments today! And thanks, Evan, for the message that inspired them. I was especially attracted to the idea of being able to “communicate appropriately.”
Dear Evan and All – I am so grateful for all of the good here in this blog. Thank you and blessing to each and every one of you.
Thank you Evan…your blog today is Wonderful!
When I was in college I was a member of a small C.S. church and I taught Sunday School. One day some of the other members of the church saw a mother and her two boys arrive to attend church/Sunday school. The two boys were at an age that they would be in my class, so some of the other church members warned me about how unruly the boys were the last time they had attended (they didn’t attend regularly) and expressed concern that I would have a hard time with them. Thankfully I was alert and didn’t buy into that idea about these boys. I just held to the idea that these boys expressed God and His idea and therefore I would be guided with how best to interact with them. During Sunday school the boys listened and contributed in a nice way. After Sunday school the same church members that warned me about them asked me how I was able to keep them from mis-behaving. I told them it had come to me to bet the two boys a dollar at the start of Sunday school that they couldn’t sit still for the entire class. lol That sounds terrible, but since I was led to do that I obeyed and it worked. And at the end of class the boys never asked for their dollar…it was like they understood that was just my way of asking them to sit still through the class.
The points of this story are a) if we don’t buy in to negative ideas about others and listen for God’s guidance, we will be led what to do in each situation to bring about harmony, b) it’s important to stay alert to false suggestions…even when interacting with other Christian Scientists (ourselves included), and c) I too think your blog today would make for a good article for the C.S. periodicals since, as my experience shows, many people are not alert to the falsity of so-called “attention disorder”.
This is such an important subject to work with. For me, particularly with the people I work with in a high-paced tech environment. Phones, laptops, screens, and distractions are everywhere such that focus (and therefore commitment to the task at hand) seem to be increasingly lacking. Thank you for the reminder of how we need to work in this area.
Wonderful blog and comments. I agree with those who hope you will submit this for a periodicals article.
Thank you!
This is an answer to my prayer. I have just been asked to teach Maths to a group of 16 yr old pupils which have been labeled with learning difficulties and behavioral problems . I will also know God is their only Mother and Father and their Teacher. Thank you for the wonderful inspirations you impart with Spiritview.
Thank you! thank you! thankyou!! This is exactly what I have needed to read and understand properly for a long time now as I daily deal with someone who seems to often misunderstand what is being said or is happening around him.
It will also help me to focus more on what I need to. Every sentence of this article is just perfect and so applicable. Thankyou so much for your constancy of inspiration and work in continuing this blog Evan.
Many of my friends send it to each other with the subject heading “Another goodie from Evan”
🙂
Just wonderful–so appreciated!
In my daily prayers I focus with concentration on a specific issue to enhance my understanding on my spiritual focus and I find I need to keep on tract on spiritual things and not on material accomplishments.