I remember a difficult case I had taken on in the early days of my practice of Christian Science with all the wonderful courage and inspiration that so often characterize those first thrilling days in the healing work, the spirit of which we should never lose.
I had worked long and earnestly on this case, yet it didn't respond as I had expected. One day, feeling the need for greater enlightenment, I called my mother, who was an experienced Christian Science practitioner, and told her impersonally about the case. Her instant reply was, "Have you handled animal magnetism in relation to it?" I said I hadn't thought of doing so, specifically. "Well," she said, "stop handling the claim and its symptoms for tonight. Instead, thoroughly handle animal magnetism with all its bearing on the case."
I pondered what she said. "Surely," I thought, "I have spent days endeavoring to handle the outcome of this material belief of animal magnetism. What more should I be doing?" Then it sharply occurred to me, "Yes, that is exactly what I have been doing—handling the effect of something but not handling the something itself."
