From the Chaplaincy
Progress
Finding signs of progress in the news can often seem difficult. But when we look for it, we find our world is full of examples of hope, resilience, joy, gratitude, compassion, persistence, and courage.
For the students there is always much to celebrate whether they receive a high score, an award or not. There is a more important prize.
The teachers and students are of the same Mind. Teachers are not here to trick or trap students with unfair tests but are working for them. They are expressing the same Divine Mind as their students.
With persistence and grit, students will progress to their own reward, and will see the following as more important than the result or the score:
- A sense of pride in their efforts,
- Satisfaction of having persisted, showing courage and determination,
- Freedom from the fear of failure,
- A sense of family at school, a home where they belong,
- A sense of connectedness with fellow students and teachers,
- Gratitude for the time spent together working and studying.
These are worth striving for.
'There is nothing difficult or toilsome in this task, when the way is pointed out; but self-denial, sincerity, Christianity, and persistence alone win the prize, as they usually do in every department of life.’ Mary Baker Eddy, Science and Health.
I love this story of the 80-question test.
A girl is sitting an English Literature test of 80 questions. After the first five questions she knew she was failing.
“It hit me in that moment, right after question five: I’ve been approaching this the wrong way. I realised that all this stress was coming from thinking that doing well was up to me. Whether I was smart enough, had worked hard enough.”
“That’s when I had a complete switch in the way I was approaching the test. I knew that there is only one Mind, which means there is only one intelligence. My teachers, the ones setting the test, and I are all unlimited expressions of the one Mind. We are part of the same family.”
“I actually paused right there in the middle of taking the test, closed my eyes, and really trusted —trusted in that one Mind and that one intelligence. I immediately felt calm, the stress kind of lifted off me, and I went back to working on the test. When I finished the test, I felt like it had been hard, but I also felt pretty good about it.
“A week later, we got the results back— not just a grade, but a slip of paper that told us exactly which questions we got right and which we got wrong. Questions one through five I got all wrong. Questions six through eighty I got all right. I was blown away, because that change in performance happened right at the place where I stopped making everything about me and trusted in an unlimited intelligence, one Mind or God.
“The intercommunication is always from God to his idea, man.” Mary Baker Eddy, Science & Health.
The Chaplaincy Team