Celebrating 96 Years

As Science of Mind magazine celebrates 96 years in continuous publication this month, we offer these excerpts from the October 2022 issue for your inspiration and guidance. Thank you, dear readers, for continuing to support this essential part of CSL’s worldwide ministry.

Flexible and Teachable:

Daily Guide for October 8

by Dr. Ernest Holmes and Rev. Dr. Jesse Jennings

I do not think we should make such a claim to divinity that we forget we are human. The human proclaims the divine; and here we are, a lot of little human beings doing the best we can —laughing and crying, singing and dancing, praying and exalting, then sometimes falling into the depths of despair.

Everyone does this, and the person who says they don't — still does. And so what? Let us accept it, non-resistantly; otherwise we shall be so inflexible fighting life that we will get no fun out of it.

You know, if the tree didn't bend a little before the wind, it would break off just like an icicle. Nature has provided a flexibility, and “He has tempered the wind to the shorn lamb.”

— “Ideas of Power,” pages 44-45

This reading focuses on the advice to remain flexible and teachable. True, we are each divine beings — and we have incarnated here into a realm of apparently finite space and elapsing time. We set our intentions, and when most of them don't materialize instantly, we can drop into gloom over our prospects, thereby stalling the process by which new good was invisibly hurtling toward us.

Flexibility entails resilience. If what we seek isn't found through this door, it's behind another. Teachableness means learning as we go what to subtract as well as what to add. Sometimes we overcomplicate our inner envisioning, when the good we desire is right in front of us. Then there's patience. Something wonderful is happening behind the scenes. Be sure of it.

Affirmation: Today, my whole being is animated by the divine Spirit.

Prayer: Safe in God's Presence

By Jessica Tabachnik, RScP

We take a deep breath and become still, knowing that the only one present here is God, the almighty power and presence. It's Pure Love that breathes each and every one of us, that created us in the image and likeness of Itself. I know that this Divine Presence brought us to this moment. It created the whole universe — the stars, the moon, the mountains. As we see the perfection of life, we see in the perfection of ourselves as the likeness of God in every way.

As I know this for myself, I proclaim that God is in every human being, that the light and beautiful essence of who we are is shining brightly for ourselves and humanity. Our lives are a beautiful magnet, attracting everything that's in our hearts, manifesting with ease and grace. I know that life is manifesting miracles in every moment and that we get to experience all the good of God in our lives.

For this and so much more, my heart is overflowing with gratitude. I release this word into the right action of the Law, knowing that it is always done with ease and grace. I let go and let God. And so it is. Amen.

Prosperity: You Are Worth It

By Rev. Dr. David Alexander

We've heard the axiom that we live in an abundant universe, and it is most certainly true. Yet for as long as we've been around helping people understand this truth — and for as long as the eternal principles have been around, long before anything called “New Thought” — there are still many who go without.

Ernest Holmes, as well as many mystics before him, sought to help us understand the laws of consciousness that govern our experience. Holmes declares in “The Science of Mind” that while the law is simple, it's not always easy. It's perhaps easy for most of us to consider this is a prosperous universe, filled with innumerable grains of sand on a single beach or uncountable stars, galaxies and planets in space. These insights are a matter of simple reasoning. But it is not always easy to either work the law in our own life or understand that despite great effort and care, some of us never seem to get ahead.

Holmes reminds us that our teaching is not a get-rich-quick scheme — the accumulation of more and more is never the goal. The real key to prosperity is about how worthy you feel. This is the gateway to true wholeness at every level. Money is merely a mirror of our relationship with the Eternal; in other words, an expression of our worthiness. Now this does not mean those who suffer or lack do so purely due to some individual “poor” or unworthy consciousness. Systemic issues are born of collective consciousness and require collective or systemic solutions, not merely our individual response.

Either way, worthiness is still at the heart of the matter. Our own capacity to demonstrate any good in our life is directly related to the level of worthiness we feel toward such good. Meanwhile, at the core of every system of oppression, discrimination or prejudice of any kind that stands as a hindrance for some is the issue of worthiness — not of those who are the targets, but rather the worthiness of those who uphold, support and create or perpetuate such systems. Because when you know your worth, you easily and effortlessly extend it to others. That is true prosperity.

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