It was an awkward moment. A couple of family members were teasing me about a past tendency toward certain behavior. They clearly wanted me to join in the laughter, and while I'm usually pretty good at poking fun at myself, this time I just couldn't.
The behavior in question had actually dropped away several years earlier as a result of a profound insight I'd had about myself. That realization about my spiritual identity had led me to so disassociate myself from this particular characteristic, I honestly felt as if they were making fun of someone else. And it seemed rude to be laughing about her behind her back.
Afterwards, worried that I hadn't been a good sport, I asked my husband about it. He responded with a wave of the hand, saying, "That wasn't you."
It was just a small incident, but it gave me an idea of what it means to make such spiritual progress that you don't even feel like you participated in some aspect of your personal history. This is the topic of our cover feature this month, "Break free from the past"—in which several contributors discuss how learning more about their identity as children of God freed them from the scars of heredity, abuse, and other traumas of the past.
It was Mary Baker Eddy who wrote, "The true theory of the universe, including man, is not in material history but in spiritual development." Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 547. She then encouraged readers to relinquish a material conception of themselves and to adopt a spiritual view. It's our hope that this issue inspires you in those efforts, that it helps you to see yourself as intact, beloved, and whole. The way God sees you.
, Managing Editor
