It was clear to me that a healing of grief would have to include our whole family, and particularly my husband, who was having a very hard time of it. I prayed daily that divine Life, Mind, God, would make itself known to him, would tell him what he needed to know — that he, too, might experience The Allness.
Heather and I had talked about the significance of “daughter” in the Bible —“shake thyself from the dust, o daughter of Zion”; Jesus’ blessing at the healing of a woman: “daughter, go in peace, thy faith hath made thee whole; “thy daughters shall be as corner stones” … She had even started to prepare readings on the subject.
One night, as I was praying for my husband some months after Heather’s passing, I had an image of what an important thing a daughter is to a dad’s concept of himself — that it represented his ability to protect and nurture something precious and beautiful, that it was, indeed, a very cornerstone to his sense of himself. I felt how much, to human sense, the loss of a daughter was shattering to his sense of identity and self worth. I also perceived that this sense of daughter was something that couldn’t be taken away from him. A verse in Psalms reads, “the king’s daughter is all glorious within”. For the first time, I saw an additional meaning to the verse — not only is the king’s daughter glorious within herself, but she is glorious within the king. His internal daughter is intact, glorious, safe.
I was telling this to a new and dear friend, with whom I was staying for my Christian Science Students’ Association, and I said I’ve been praying to see that he can know this wholeness of his daughter within. She said, “he does know it, because he is a compound idea in Mind.” These words struck me as deeply true. Further insights at the Association meeting brought out the idea that human personality has nothing to do with what we are. If God is All, and we are the reflection of God, then God, Mind, is the only Mind we can have, the only source of thought, the only holder of conclusions. I saw that there is no small “m” mind that can hold a false view of its identity, that can feel that some part of its being is shattered.
This has become an important focus for my prayers: no human personality, no small “m” mind. No repository for wrong ideas about being. Instead, I am here to bear witness to man as a compound idea in Mind, including all right ideas, as Science and Health points out (see page 475). So in my prayers I am affirming that man (and that includes me and my husband) includes the full and whole idea of daughter, and of son, and of father and mother, and also many other right ideas such as home, livelihood, joy, friendship, companionship, fulfilling activity, brilliance, skill…
I told my friend what I was beginning to see: Heather showed us daughter, but she was never our daughter. She always has been, and always will be, God’s daughter. We can love her and be so grateful for what she showed us, both of her own wonderful identity and the wonderful daughter within that is part of each of us, which can support us like a cornerstone and insure that we protect and bring forth beauty in our lives. And we can expect to learn new things from her, and share new things with her, as we grow in our perception of Spirit.
I won’t say that this healing is complete at this point, but I do see continuing progress in my witnessing of man as the compound idea of God.
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