Article March 12, 1932 Issue

Thinking versus "Thinking About"

JANET H. ROBJOHNS

Right thinking is active, positive, constructive; whereas "thinking about" may be mere daydreaming, indicative of the apathy or inertia of mortal mind. And are we not often apt to confuse what we actually think with what we think about? Do we waste time in the contemplation of future achievement, instead of starting out on the road towards that achievement by constructive and definite utilization of true thoughts?

Simple examples in human experience will serve to illustrate these two conditions of thought. In the accomplishment of an art, for instance, can anything be achieved by merely thinking about the beauties of that art? Must there not be a striving to understand and assimilate the fundamentals of that which we are trying to accomplish, and, having made these fundamentals our own, to put into active practice what we know?

True thinking is reflecting what the divine Mind knows. Our thoughts are expressed in our activity, in our attitude towards our fellow men, in our conduct. We give to our church services, our lectures, our homes, our work the fruit of our thoughts. Our true thinking, our spiritual understanding, is all there is about us that has reality. How very important, therefore, to watch that our thinking is true thinking, the thinking which is the utilization of the divine Mind's knowing! How necessary that we should be alert to the subtle influence that would sometimes lead us into that condition of merely "thinking about" how we ought to think—gazing at a beautiful idea without making it our own and using it! The temptation to indulge the apathy of mortal mind would make us "hearers" instead of "doers of the word," and leave us versed in the letter, but lacking in the spirit.

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