One weekend when we were visiting our daughter and son-in-law, our small grandson awakened from his nap crying almost hysterically. He obviously had experienced a bad dream, and even though he was awake, the effect of the dream was still very real to him. My daughter gathered him up in her arms and said gently but firmly: "Now, Jake, let's get a reality check! Mommy's here, Daddy's here, and even Grandma and Grandpa are here. See, you're in your very own house, and you are surrounded with all the things you know and love." As she continued to remind him of what was really going on, the dream picture faded and he became more aware of the familiar—the people he loved, the things he knew, and the environment he felt at home in. He gradually stopped crying and soon was his normal, sweet self.
This small incident has impelled me to see the importance of a "reality check." This is a popular expression that means someone needs a more realistic view of what is going on outside his own little world. But in a deeper sense we might think of a reality check as something that transcends a shift in human perspective. We could think of it as distinguishing between the real—the absolute, spiritual truth of God and man—and the unreal, the false, materialistic concept of life, embracing evil as well as good.
This perceptiveness is not an exercise in human will or in merely thinking more positively. Christian Science, revealing the absolute reality of spiritual existence, makes radical demands on thought and living. It shows us that human belief must yield to spiritual understanding, or we continue to remain at a standstill, not making genuine progress. Referring to the belief that mind is in matter, Science and Health by Mary Baker Eddy affirms: "This human belief, alternating between a sense of pleasure and pain, hope and fear, life and death, never reaches beyond the boundary of the mortal or the unreal. When the real is attained, which is announced by Science, joy is no longer a trembler, nor is hope a cheat." Science and Health, p. 298.
