“I was never really your friend. I just pretended to be your friend!”

That’s what a former friend told me a couple of years ago. That experience taught me that when I’ve felt the need to surround myself with lots of friends, I haven’t always found what makes me happy. (more…)

Someone once told me they thought the hardest challenges to heal involved relationships. I disagreed with this person at the time. I didn’t understand how a mere conflict between people could cause too much of a problem. “God is good. We all live in Him. It’s easy,” I said to myself. While those spiritual ideas are true, I now understand more what that person was trying to say. I’ve also gained some perspective on how relationship problems can be healed through prayer. (more…)

I recently came across this passage in the Book of John in the Bible where Jesus said, “Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you.”

It made me think how God is our Father and He loves us. That’s why we have the Christ, because God wants us to know Him. He doesn’t want to be a mystery. The Christ is our friend because it’s God’s voice speaking to us and it is “ever present in the human consciousness” (Science and Health, p. xi). So the Christ is always with us and never leaves us–it’s better than your very best friend! (more…)

One of my favorite things about the Christ is that it helps me understand who I am. It’s funny, but the best way for someone to find out what he or she really is like is to learn what God is like. People aren’t God, of course, but they do express God’s nature. The quality of God is the same quality of God’s spiritual creation—and spiritual creation is the true you and me. (more…)

I used to struggle with making friends and trying to fit in. So I’d always find comfort in talking to adults, especially teachers. In elementary school, that meant I was called the "teacher’s pet." At first, I thought it was cool to be a teacher’s pet, until I found out that I was being teased for it. People described me as bossy, and sometimes I even used to yell at others to do things.

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What I remember about seventh grade is finding myself in a new school about five times as big as I’d ever known—I was stumped by algebra, and the girl who wanted to help me get through that class was my only friend. Neither of us were cool, and she didn’t care, but I longed to be accepted by the in-crowd. But every attempt to connect with them ended up in some awful embarrassment. It was a painful time of learning how to make friends and how to be a friend.

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Malvika – Christian Science Sentinel, April 6, 2009

I started going to the Sunday School of the Christian Science Society in my city two years ago, after being raised in a different religion.

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by Kate Warner

I recently became an intern at The Mother Church. I’m going to be here in Boston all summer, and getting here was a little hectic. Since I didn’t know when I was going to be leaving until the day before I left, I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to most of my friends and even to some of my family. Now, I dearly love my friends and am very close with my family. And I felt I had finally learned how to truly express love to those I’d always been close to. To be ripped so abruptly away—well, it hurt.

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Emily – Christian Science Sentinel, Oct. 20, 2008

My sister and I started out together like two peas in a pod—peanut butter and jelly . . . milk and cereal. We shared a lot of the same friends, and often did a lot of activities together growing up. And it really is the same way today. But there was a time when all the camaraderie seemed to be missing.

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At summer camp where I was a counselor, at least one night a week I would lie on the tennis courts and stare up into the limitless Maine sky to search for shooting stars—and just reflect.

I clearly remember coming back to camp late one night a few years ago, still wide awake after a rewarding day off. I ran back to my “cubie” (dressing room) to put my stuff down and grab my headlamp. My co-counselor was still up, so I grabbed her, and we walked to the tennis courts. As we lay on our backs gazing into the star-filled night, we began a conversation about companionship, my overwhelming fear about post-college life, and the shaky feelings I had about who I was trying to be. (more…)