Article March 16, 1981 Issue

Unselfing performance and competition

LIANA F. ZAMBRESKY

People involved in performance and competition can find Christian Science indispensable for preparing their mental resources. Spiritually based thinking invariably leads to freedom of action. In athletics, music, acting, dancing, or any field, the performer can unself the performance and attain a degree of the dominion belonging to spiritual man.

Frequently a person anticipating the focused attention of an audience has doubts as to whether his performance will be good enough. This stage fright is eased through prayer. We come to understand that in truth God is the source of all talent or performance. The Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science, Mary Baker Eddy, writes, "Science reveals the possibility of achieving all good, and sets mortals at work to discover what God has already done; but distrust of one's ability to gain the goodness desired and to bring out better and higher results, often hampers the trial of one's wings and ensures failure at the outset."^{Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 260.}

I have had the opportunity to play professional golf. As Christian Science comes first in my life, with all other things following, I have striven to resolve any conflict through prayer. It seems to me that the most aggressive claim material thinking presents is that one's performance is exclusively one's own! This suggestion comes in various guises. Sometimes, feeling pride and confidence, consciousness says: "I performed beautifully. Didn't I really shine today?" Other times the suggestion comes in a negative way, in the form of mourning self-condemnation: "I blew it. I failed. Will I ever be a success at this?"

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