Do other people’s actions and topics of conversation ever bother you? Should they? Or is a perspective adjustment needed?
A common complaint I’ve heard over the years from residents in care facilities who try hard to keep their thought spiritually inspired, is, that other residents talk non-stop about their ailments, the medicines they take and what their doctor diagnosed.
At dinner, multi-colored medicines are placed delicately on the table for consumption. Conversation is filled with queries about what medicine is for what sickness, what to avoid, what to try next, symptoms to expect, and so on until it seems like there is nothing else to talk about.
When considering how to find freedom from such imposition, other than walk away from the table, it suddenly occurred to me that the first place one must work for improvement is with one’s own perspective.
For instance, tongue in cheek here, everyone walks around with physical bodies. I mean really, what an imposition! Unbelievable. When I invite guests to my house, they bring along a physical body. They plunk it on my living sofa for me to gaze at and be impressed by. When I visit with them, there’s this unavoidable physical symbol sitting on my couch screaming, “I am physical. I am physical.” I can’t get away from physical bodies. Everywhere I go, there are physical bodies walking down the street, coming into my office, telling me what to do, directing me where to go. Here I am trying to see man as totally spiritual, as God’s idea, as divine Love’s image, and all my friends and neighbors, and strangers too, are constantly parading physical bodies before my eyes. I can’t get away from physical bodies. It’s everyone’s fault out there. If they would only get rid of those physical bodies, I could think more spiritual and see God’s perfect man!”
Right?
Wrong.
It’s all perspective.
There is no physical body in spiritual fact. If we hold to a physical point of view, we see the physical error and get troubled by it. The problem is never “out there.” It’s a wrong point of view that gives us grief.
The same rule applies to sitting around the dinner table and being presented with medical talk, pills lined-out on the linen, and the latest medical decrees voiced. If our thinking is up in Truth where it should be, we will not be bothered. In fact, the stronger we hold to Truth and radiate spiritual inspiration, the sooner the topic of conversation is likely to improve and move in a much healthier direction.
So, don’t sit around and complain about the other person’s “physical body!” Improve your point of view. Hold your gaze to God’s idea, and what you thought bothered you in the past, will no longer bother you. You have much more inspired things to think about.
Dear Evan,
I LOVE that! It gave me a good laugh and much to think about!
I love all your posts and am so glad to have found your blog!
Thank you for all you give and do!
What great analogy! 🙂
I actually have thought that way about physical bodies on occasion. This is too fun. Great way to reason this out. Can’t wait to try it!
Perfect!
It’s a very good analogy, Evan.
It helps one realize why the Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, kept insist that the only way to stay close to things of the Spirit is to remove thought from corporeality, from personality, from physicality — one’s own and another’s. She said this is more important than getting rid of diseased thoughts.
This means, of course, that maintaining yourself at the same weight you carried around in high school is NOT about the physical body. It’s an indication that your thought is free of the interference of excessive thought about food, free of fear and worry connected with ingesting too much food, free of the supposed pleasures of overeating, etc.
There are so many good opportunities, aren’t there, to practice having only one God. 🙂
Somewhere I read about a woman who said that when she goes anywhere, she also brings along her body.
In other words, she gave her body no authority over her, but vice versa.
Similarly, your point is that pills and “sickly after-dinner talk” (S&H somewhere) have NO power to influence our thoughts or our happiness.
I accept your challenge. I’m going to put my body to bed in a couple of hours (been up since noon yesterday). No tiredness, though. Body can’t talk!
This is a great reminder about minding our own thinking and letting that influence the atmosphere around us, rather than minding the thoughts of others and letting that influence our own mental atmosphere. Thank you.
Have you considered how Mrs. Eddy uses the word ‘physical’ in her writings? She uses it as it relates to the material but also as it relates to the metaphysical! For example, in her book Science and Health, she writes about exchanging the objects of sense for the ideas of Soul. You don’t do away with the object, but you exchange it. The ‘phyiscal’ is like a dollar bill, it can be redeemed for a counterfeit (the material) or redeemed for its orginal ‘gold’ standard–the spiritual! Jesus was physical –he had a body–but he was not material! That body was ‘redeemed’ because he understood his spiritual (or metaphysical) relationship to God. This has been a very helpful insight in praying about the body.
Hi Jeane,
I’m not sure if I follow your logic entirely. Yes, I do understand what you say about translating objects into their original ideas. That is very helpful! But the metaphysical means above the physical. Meta means above. So, the physical is not the spiritual. The spiritual is above the physical, and to discern the spiritual we need to drop the physical concept and replace it with the spiritual idea.
Maybe this is what you mean, but it helps me to say it so its clear to me.
Thanks for sharing.
I am so grateful to you for this most practical message. You shed brilliant light on such critical issues.
I also thank Diane for her remarks which I have written down and will put on my refrigerator:
(paraphrasing)
Mind your own thinking and let that influence the atmosphere around you, rather than minding the thoughts of others and letting that influence your mental atmosphere.
Jeane is on the right track.
There are facilities for Christian Scientists, with a spirit of mutual support, and no pests.
Even the usual retirement village presents about 10 minutes of good conversation, followed by the ailments du jour.
The Christian Scientist is alone with God and the reality of things, according to MBE.
I cannot believe that the author of this blog would spend very long in such an atmosphere without rising in rebellion against being deprived of his dominion and joy, and God given freedoms.
The bottom line in these situations seems to be the bottom line. Shortage of funds to live independently of such daily impositions. There are other arrangements.
My experience with this happened with some of the ladies from my quilt guild. A couple are retired RN’s and a couple others are home-health caregivers. They constantly talked about ailments and even ventured an occasional diagnosis as well as whether outcomes looked favorable. I called a Christian Science Practitioner to help me pray about the situation as I was just about ready to quit attending the meetings. The Practitioner reminded me that none of this was going on in Divine Mind–well, as we talked, and I thought about it later, I could see that it REALLY wasn’t going on–not with them or me and I couldn’t be influenced by these wrong notions, but rather the truth I know influenced in the right way. Well, the next meeting, there was much less talk about ailments. One person came in with a sprained ankle and hobbled about but there wasn’t to much made of it. I didn’t treat her but I knew that I needed to clear my own thought–and did. This lady showed much love helping others in any way she could as we sewed our ‘charity’ quilts. Soon she exclaimed–my ankle is ok–it doesn’t hurt and I can walk on it. A couple people said–God healed you! They (and I) were so joyful! Since then, there has been much less ‘medical’ talk. So we don’t need to be intimidated by wrong thoughts but know that our right thought is the only influence-and a good one!
Great story! Thanks for sharing.
What Jeane is saying reminds me of a talk that Ralph Wagers gave to nurses at the Chestnut Hill Benevolent Association years ago. I have a transcript and will email it to you when I find it, Evan. He raises many interesting insights worth pondering.