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Making good choices and decisions

A Christian Science perspective: Spiritual intuition can guide all of our decisions.

  • By Barbara Vining

Every day, by every person, choices and decisions must be made – all the way from what to wear in the morning, to major family or business decisions, to whom to vote for on election day (or what to do if there are no voting privileges where you live).

Considering all the options (or lack of options), how can we know what to do that will move things forward toward an outcome that will be good for everyone? How do we begin tackling daunting decisions? The prophet Joel called on God to help him decide how to rally Israelites out of bondage: “Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision” (Joel 3:14).

As in Joel’s day, God is still right here with us in every decision, small or great. Not that God will tell us in so many words exactly what human course we should take, but He has given us an inherent tool – spiritual intuition – that enables us to listen for His guidance, reason more clearly about the options at hand, and make decisions we can trust.

Spiritual intuition is a primary quality of spiritual sense as defined in “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” by Mary Baker Eddy, Discoverer and Founder of Christian Science: “Spiritual sense, contradicting the material senses, involves intuition, hope, faith, understanding, fruition, reality” (p. 298). To utilize this tool we need to turn our mental attention away from material observations, opinions, and fears to a spiritual sense of God as the one divine Mind of everyone.

Through spiritual intuition we inherently know that unlimited goodness, justice, purity, integrity, and health not only should be the norm for everyone, but actually are the norm. That is because these qualities are the only reality in the divine Mind, in which we all truly exist as Mind’s perfect spiritual reflection. So even if an important decision has to be made right now – giving us little or no time to ponder spiritual ideas or consider the options – we can pause and mentally acknowledge that God, as all-good, has given us the ability to know right from wrong, to see beneath the outward appearance of things, to be a discerning and unbiased judge of character, and to have a clear intuition about which course to take.

I have often been surprised, when pausing to subordinate my muddled thoughts to God’s direction, at what has emerged in my thought as the right choice. At times it has been a possibility that had never occurred to me before. Every one of us can be directed by Mind – through prayer and spiritual intuition – to make right decisions and good choices that we can be confident about and that bring us peace.

Should we ever encounter a tough decision, we know that our deliberation is divinely inspired when we quiet the physical senses and use our spiritual sense. After all, each new day affords us new opportunities to turn to God, the divine Mind, as the source of intelligence and discernment, and we find guidance that we can trust.

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