"Locus of control — I think I understand it, but tell the others what you told me."

"It's about where you see control in your life coming from. Psychotherapists keep it in mind dealing with their patients. Does this person feel he's the one in control or does he feel controlled by others? Of course if it's others, we've got the set up for a victim."

"If he's in total control of his life, don't you have the makings of a megalomaniac?"

"Could be — but locus of control is a scale. No one — or very few—would be one of the extremes."

"I'd see someone proclaiming his 'in-controlness' as operating on a reaction formation covering extreme feelings of weakness and dependency."

"There you go with your Freud!"

"Look — an ego being in control or not in control is influenced by lots of conscious and unconscious drives that need evaluation."

"Like what?"

"Am I being driven by childhood trauma...?"

"If it isn't one thing it's your mother."

"Right. Or sheer instinct, or an overdeveloped superego pounding me..."

"Cutting through all that, can't we designate it beliefs—dualistic belief — and handle it in Science?"

"I see a way in Science to jump right to the absolute. If I'm confronted by a megalomaniac, well, this is just language for God's total control. I'd extinguish the belief as being present as the person by surrendering to the understanding of God's total vibrant control as I, Us."

"That's a wonderful way to do it but there is a slower, more psychologically oriented way. I could clarify the drives and feelings around the issue and then pray to find the countervailing fact."

"Here's an experience I had at yoga last week. We had a substitute teacher. He offered to help me get into bow pose but I didn't want to take up the time of the class — maybe 20 seconds — for one-on-one instruction — so I quickly said 'I'll do it later'. Then in savasana I took the standard position even though for months I'd been doing it in a modified form to prevent pain. My reasoning: he might rush over, disrupting the class, to demand I get into the regular way. So in spite of agony I stuck it out for seven minutes."

"Aren't you supposed to breathe into those difficult moments?"

"I tried everything except getting into my very comfortable alternative. It was only later talking about it with a friend that I saw how I operate on automatic in situations like that. Underneath is a package of persecutory fantasies — based on neglectful, rage-illed parents plus some archetypal figures."

"Did you work it through in Science?"

"Doesn't Mrs. Eddy say something about an error seen is mostly destroyed? There's more to do in the absolute to dissolve the fantasies, but to be aware of them and to see the value of not just drifting along on automatic — I feel great! I can even entertain a new fantasy of taking 20 seconds from a class for something important or speaking calmly to an authority figure about something non-standard I might be doing."

"You know Eckhart Tolle in 'A New Earth' comes up with a term 'pain body' for the whole load of memories and emotions we carry around with us. You got in touch with some really painful stuff that was controlling you."

"Yes — and it was basically unconscious — I didn't realize I was controlled by such deleterious influences until I stopped and took a good look. When I talked to a practitioner about the situation she helped me see that my parents were by no means still locked in the images that erupted from my unconscious. They too were progressing, or more properly, are divine ideas incapable of error.""Do you all remember the story about Mrs. Eddy and control of the weather?"

"I know she wanted us to work on it in Science."

"Didn't she dissolve a tornado heading right for her digs in Pleasant View?"

"Yes she did and she expected members of her household to work on the weather. At one point something went very wrong, so she assembled them all in the front hall and went down the line asking each one' Do you control the weather?' and each dutifully answered ' Yes, Mother.' After the last response, she virtually shouted ' No, God controls the weather!'."

"Perfect! The locus of control is in God, not in ego thought manipulation and control."

"She calls that kind of stuff semi-metaphysics which avail nothing."

"Didn't you all go to the Red Book event at the Rubin Museum ?"

"Yes, last Wednesday. It contains the underpinnings of Jung's whole approach. He was in an extended psychotic break when he wrote it and painted the dream figures included in it."

"The paintings are spectacular. They're mainly mandalas which he came to see as symbols of the Self, the central controlling principle of the psyche. It's not only center but it's circumference."

"Well that certainly resonates with Science. Isn't the Self more or less Christ?"

"Not exactly — at least for Jung. He was still dualistic, so the Self includes negativity. I think he was projecting his own unacknowledged shadow material unto the Self. Let's face it, a wrathful God needing sacrifices and cajoling is very much a cultural icon that none of us is immune to, unless we work at it with something like Science."

"Still with all that said, I find his schema of the mind excellent to work with. Persona, ego, shadow, anima/animus and Self are transferable concepts."

"Back to Tolle, He has the most amazing paragraph on pages 127 and 128 of ' New Earth' showing how the Life that's God gets conceptualized and divided up by man into personal beliefs like 'my life', 'my love' and so on. We're then relating to beliefs about ourselves and others, and of course swinging back and forth between good and evil.""So, what's the remedy for living as a belief rather than a fact? I'd suppose we should surrender to the divine energy — letting it be us and all."

"Kind of like light — are we particles or waves?"

"We're both. The evidence appearing would depend on the point of view."

"Do you realize the energy that's locked in just one human body? Einstein put it in his formula E=MC^2. Its energy is equal to the body's weight times the speed of light squared. It's a huge number. One scientist I heard said the energy contained in one raisin could light a city for a day."

"We haven't been tracking our discussion with quotes from Science and Health, but I've been thinking of many of them as we've gone along. Let me just read one: 'Let us feel the divine energy of Spirit, bringing us into newness of life and recognizing no mortal nor material power as able to destroy (S&H 249: 6-8).'"

"Before we close tell us how things are going with the choir you joined."

"I love it! I had such a demonstration on Sunday. The director had rehearsed us for the service and we had the music to practice on our own. When I got there Sunday he suddenly asked us to do another piece which old-timers knew well but I hadn't the slightest! The director told me to just move my lips, but I prayed in Science to receive direct inspiration from God. I remembered how the choir described its mission. It is to minister to the congregation — to help us all feel the presence of God. With that my voice suddenly boomed out with just the right notes and word placements. Divine energy and intelligence were in control."

"Thank you! It's time to close. There won't be a meeting next week, October 22nd, because of the Emergence Conference but we'll be back and in business the following Thursday, October 29th."

"Don't we need a topic?"

"I'd like a no topic session. We can concentrate on whatever we're led to and bring in some ideas."

"Sounds good to me. Is everyone else okay with no topic?"

"Sure. Just watch — one'll emerge anyway!"