How to Let God Help You

(Quite often Myrtle Fillmore wrote to parents who sought her thoughts and prayers concerning the health of their children. This chapter is made up of two letters that Mrs. Fillmore wrote, one to a parent of a little girl and the other to a parent of a little boy.)

1. No MATTER what took place at her birth, or before, or after, your little girl is still God’s perfect child, and the pattern of her body temple has not been altered. The divine intelligence and power and life and substance and love of God are ever within her, giving her all that is necessary to her perfect expression.

2. The anxiety of those near and dear to her at the time of her birth—and possibly the methods employed in helping her into the world, which no doubt resulted in the injury—shocked her nervous system and put fear into her subconsciousness (which is the department of the mind directing and managing the circulation, muscular activities, digestion, and elimination). This subconscious fear and shock is no doubt responsible for her hesitancy in trying to walk and to use other members of the body, and for the spasmodic clutching at things. But whatever is responsible, the Truth of Being will clear out anything and everything which hindered her growth and perfect unfoldment and expression.

3. Tell her, quietly and simply, that when she was a tiny baby, coming to live with Mother, something occurred which hurt her and frightened her. Explain to her that her little baby mind couldn’t then reason out just what had happened, and that the body, in its effort to protect her from further possible hurt, kept telegraphing to the various parts the message: “Be careful. Fight for your life. Cling with all your strength to this beautiful body. Don’t take any chances by getting out of the sheltering love of Mother’s arms.” Now she is a big girl and wise, and has the knowledge that God’s life and love are within and all about her and that there is nothing to fear. She must tell that beautiful body the truth, as you do, and release it, and let it do the splendid things it has been built to do. She must teach her spine and her throat and her tongue and her lips and her arms and hands and her legs to do the wonderful things her mind wants them to do. She must direct them patiently in doing whatever she wishes done, until they learn to do it without her attention.

4. You, then, will have to learn a new way of dealing with her. You have formed the habit of doing everything for her. Now you will have to deliberately avoid responding to some of her wishes, and doing things for her. Call her attention to a thing, help her to get started, and then leave her to deal with her muscles and nerves in her own way. Remember, dear, the Spirit of God is in her little body temple; and it is the Spirit of God which is prompting her to grow and to unfold what He has placed within her.

5. Because souls adapt themselves to conditions under which they find themselves embodying, those who have some sort of handicap are likely to give way to it. In this case, your child may be hiding away, as it were, from the very things which remind her, subconsciously, of the sense of fear and harm. In this way she may be avoiding the learning of the very things she needs to know in order to accomplish.

6. On the other hand, the intense desire of the soul for full, free expression will make her tense and nervous until she learns to free herself in some systematic efforts at expression and use of all her members.

7. Your little boy is God’s child. God is both father and mother to him. The divine Father-Mother has created him and given him a perfect pattern for his life and placed in him intelligence with which to build a perfect body. God is also the unfailing and abundant supply of everything that is needed by the child for his spirit, soul, and body. God has not only created him but is ever abiding in him as his very mind, life, wisdom, and substance. Isn’t that a glorious thought?

8. Remember, now, there is nothing in that little boy’s body but God—God substance, God life, God intelligence, and God love. There has been some failure to know how to rest and grow in the great love of God; some failure to obtain or to assimilate properly some of the body-building elements of food and air and sunshine; some failure to understand how to live by faith in the good. All these things are the mistakes of God’s children. First of all, let us tell you that it makes no difference what the doctors have done or said. It makes no difference what the examination and the X-ray have shown. It makes no difference how the child may have been neglected through lack of understanding or lack of proper food supplies or right environment. The life of God is in your son, and about him; everything that is needed to make him comfortable, whole, strong, happy, and free is flowing into him and through him now and will continue to come.

9. Have you placed your faith in the doctors and the hospital for a sufficiently long period now? If so, forget them and turn your attention to God; study to understand His way and how to receive His help.

10. Don’t worry because of what appears to be wrong with your boy. Just be glad and thankful that you can give him what no one else can give. You can care for him, for God has given him into your care and keeping. God is expressing through you as mother love, and as the wisdom which enables you to care for and help this little one.

11. In order that you may understand better how to deal with the little fellow, and help him, it is important to remember that children should have the right kinds of food, very early; and that they should take these foods regularly, in the atmosphere of peace and happiness and quiet and love that is natural to them. There are many mothers who do not know how to supply the foods their children need. There are some who do not have the freedom to choose the foods they instinctively would take to supply what is needed. There are some who do not know how to provide the things best suited to their needs. Sometimes financial difficulties cause parents to fail to provide what is needed.

12. This is the physical side of the cause of the trouble. Then there is the mental side: fear, which in some way gets a hold on the minds and emotions of little children. Fear keeps the stomach from properly receiving and handling foods taken, and causes a sort of poison in the system which in turn prevents some part of the body from getting its share of nourishing food elements. Fear hinders circulation, so that some undesirable materials or waste materials are not properly eliminated. Fear causes a gnawing hunger which makes the child or the grown-up eat fitfully—sometimes craving 136 How to Let God Help You things not needed, sometimes refusing foods that are needed.

13. But thoughts of peace and real understanding love on the part of those near and dear, and careful study to determine just what is best in all ways, will do away with fear and all of its undesirable results.

14. Just let your whole mind and heart fill with love and peace. Take up this little fellow and tell him how much you love him and what a wonderful little man he is and how much better he is today. Tell him how his “little body helpers” are working to make him strong and well and how they will love to get the good things to eat which you are preparing for him. Most little folk readily get the idea of helping themselves when it is explained to them that their bodies are like lovely houses in which there are hundreds of little body helpers who are trained to take care of everything and are always busy doing the work God has made them to do. Tell him that these little helpers have had to hurt him at times, so that those who are taking care of him would know that something wasn’t being done just right. Assure him that the little helpers don’t want to hurt him, ever, and that just as soon as he begins to help them, they will stop making the hurts.