Shyness can be healed—and should be. People often assume that shyness in a child will soon be outgrown or overcome by the ebullience of youth. But sometimes as a shy child grows older, the trait develops. In the mature person shyness often fosters a dread of challenges that prevents him from mixing with others in business and social activities. Fear, not shyness, then best describes the emotion.
Christian Science teaches that such human emotions as shyness and fear exist only in a finite, material consciousness. But this consciousness is not real. It is a counterfeit of the one Mind, God. Mrs. Eddy says: "All consciousness is Mind; and Mind is God,—an infinite, and not a finite consciousness. This consciousness is reflected in individual consciousness, or man, whose source is infinite Mind. There is no really finite mind, no finite consciousness." Unity of Good, p. 24;
Shyness and fear, not being qualities of Mind—not proceeding from God—are unreal. We can destroy our belief in them by denying their reality and by becoming actively aware of the truth that God is All, is good. In this way we can overcome timidity and fear.
