Article October 12, 2015 Issue

Your true self is never lost

Karyn Mandan

“Be yourself,” my mom would say to me when I was growing up. She knew that in my early teenage years I was tempted to try to be what others wanted me to be. But I wondered, What did it mean to “be yourself”? I wasn’t sure who “myself” really was!

While I struggled to find answers, I was beginning to glimpse a few spiritual ideas about my identity from reading the Bible and Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy, which I did at home and in the Christian Science Sunday School. Many of the Bible figures, including young Samuel and Joseph, were good, honest, intelligent, and loving. And as they understood God to be a constant, loving presence, they were guided through difficulties and demonstrated something of their true, Godlike nature. I realized I could ask, “What does God know me to be?”

I really began to find an answer to that question as a college student living 3,000 miles away from home. I felt out of my element at this school, where the other students seemed more intellectually sophisticated and socially confident than I. I became doubtful about measuring up academically and wasn’t comfortable enough to make new friends.

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