Article June 28, 1982 Issue

You can deal with aging

ELEANOR OWERS SMITH

How old are you? Let us face this question dauntlessly. The answer is not the number of years since we were born.

Aging is a mental phenomenon. It is not essentially a physical process nor the result of the passing of time. Christian Science explains that every thought or belief held in mind, consciously or unconsciously, is externalized on the body, just as a picture is projected on a screen. Speaking of the mental origin of disease, Mrs. Eddy writes: "But the fact remains, in metaphysics, that the mind of the individual only can produce a result upon his body. The belief that produces this result may be wholly unknown to the individual, because it is lying back in the unconscious thought, a latent cause producing the effect we see."^{Christian Healing, p. 6.} How vital to our happiness and well-being that we be cognizant of what is in consciousness, allowing to remain only that which we wish to see externalized! No error is so deeply rooted that it cannot be destroyed by Truth.

The basic cause of aging is the universal belief that there is life in matter, that man is a physical structure composed of material elements subject to change and decay. This belief, which seems to dominate mankind, is animal magnetism. It is essential that we handle this mental presupposition and destroy it. We are able to accomplish this by Christlike thinking—for instance, by knowing that there is no mesmeric belief so deeply entrenched in human thinking that it cannot be uprooted by the truth that matter has no power, no presence, and no reality.

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