Article October 13, 1980 Issue

Free of self-consciousness

Jane-Ellyn Ames

A teen-ager boarded the bus she took to commute to high school. As she stopped to pay the driver, she tripped over her umbrella, dropped her schoolbag, and almost fell into the arms of the passenger in the first seat.

"How embarrassing," she thought. Such a small event. And yet she was thoroughly dejected during the whole trip. She decided to talk it over with her Sunday School teacher, the next Sunday.

One leading dictionary defines "self-conscious" as "unduly conscious that one is observed by others; ill at ease...manifesting embarrassment." Another defines this mental millstone as "conscious of one's own acts or states as belonging to or originating in oneself...uncomfortably conscious of oneself as an object of the observation of others." This mental burden afflicts adults as well as teen-agers. The light of Christian Science exposes it as a delusion rooted in personal sense—the conviction one is a material person with a mixture of good and bad features. Self-consciousness would try to limit and confuse—rob one of freedom and joy, his unbounded ability to express divine Mind.

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