SEVERAL YEARS AGO I had the opportunity to study abroad in a developing country. While there, both of my eyes became quite red and inflamed. I wore contacts and had to remove them because it was too painful to leave them in. I thought that the pollutants in the air caused the irritation and that once I got back to the United States my eyes would be fine. So I didn't give much prayerful thought to healing the condition.
However, when I returned to the United States about three months later the condition had not changed. Shortly after, I graduated and moved back to my parents' home while I contemplated what my next steps in my career would be. At the same time, I began to pray more deeply about my eyes and what my eyes represented in a spiritual sense. In the Glossary to Science and Health, Mary Baker Eddy gave this explanation of eyes: "Spiritual discernment,—not material but mental" (p. 586). One dictionary defines discernment as "understanding," so I started to think about how I understood and identified myself. For most of my life I had been a student—now who was I?
This became a time of deep searching for me, and I prayerfully listened for God's direction. Yet questions swirled all around me, the same questions that bombard many new college graduates: What am I going to do with my life? Where am I going to work? How much will I get paid? I became overwhelmed with these questions. I looked around my parents' home thinking, How will I ever be able to afford a nice home like this? I mentally made a list of all the things I wanted in my life and became absorbed in thinking about how I would actually get them. And the red-eye condition persisted.
