In search of an explanation of present difficulties, some people try delving into their past by means of a psychological technique called regression therapy. The assumption is that this is necessary to the successful establishment of a healthy, balanced outlook on life. The claim is also made that certain shortcomings or failures in an individual can be directly attributed to an abusive past. It's assumed that one who has been abused, physically or mentally, may find it difficult to cope with recurring, sometimes jarring memories.
A friend of the writer, at the age of three years, bore the brunt of severe parental domestic violence. Then he was abandoned on a street corner, along with his sister, who was one and a half years old. Their mother had put them out, and they never saw her again. They were placed in various other homes, sometimes with strangers who were even more abusive. Later in life, this friend reexamined many times what had happened in those earlier years in an attempt to sort out his concept of the world, searching for meaningful answers, but he faced what seemed a stone wall. It was a wall of frustration based on his belief that his history as a battered child had been allowed by a punishing God. The acceptance of this belief about God and His relation to him thwarted all his efforts to come out of the mire.
When, however, he was given a copy of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures by Mary Baker Eddy and began to read it, the Scriptures became illuminated for him. Through consecrated study of this book in conjunction with the Bible and through daily prayer, he experienced permanent freedom from the belief that past injustices had power over him. The initial breakthrough came when he read with fresh insight Paul's statement "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." II Cor. 5:17 He realized he must see this more clearly and stop returning to the past, endeavoring to blame present failings on someone else.
