If a co-worker gets you down

Strife due to difficult relationships at work, either with a boss or co-workers, can turn the workday into drudgery. It may seem easy to categorize others and justify our indifference to them, but instead there’s a healing, solution-oriented route to take.

Some time ago I was working in close quarters with a producer, editing a television show. We were in a small closet that was stuffy, warm, and uncomfortable, and my temper was hot. Running the tape back and forward, adding music and voice over and over again, was tedious. Trying to agree on what should be left in and what should be taken out led to a grinding conflict. I wanted to throw away the whole project and leave, but I knew that wasn’t going to solve anything. I had to calm my thought and see my fellow worker and boss, as well as myself, as inherently good, a child of God.

I knew from my study of Christian Science, in which I was seeking to know more about God, our Creator, that He is Love. He created all things good and flawless. Nothing can oppose this mighty truth. Mental stress, dislike, irritation, antagonism are mortal thinking. They have nothing to do with our true being, the reflection of Love.

Mary Baker Eddy recognized this when she discovered Christian Science and wrote a textbook for self-instruction titled “Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures.” In it she wrote: “A material world implies a mortal mind and man a creator. The scientific divine creation declares immortal Mind and the universe created by God” (p. 507).

In my situation in the studio, I saw that it was not a person who was the problem, but impatience, self-will, and self-justification that were in the way. Deep down I knew these had no power. God’s all-power is independent of material conditions. I remembered this statement of Mrs. Eddy’s: “When error strives to be heard above Truth, let the ‘still small voice’ produce God’s phenomena” (“The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany,” p. 249).

So I refused to be intimidated by fear, hatred, or inharmony of any kind. I held to the fact that unreasonableness and bad temper do not belong to the sons and daughters of God. Soon the work progressed. We were finished, and we both felt satisfied.

The true sense of work and our relationships with others is found in right thinking. Love lifts us above every limitation. As God, who is divine Principle, is recognized as the only cause, there can be no discord. We can accept and realize the omnipresence of divine Love.