CMP Review 2023-05-02

May 2, 2023

“Are you cross? Change your thoughts. Are you tired of trying? Change your thoughts. Are you craving for things you are not to have? Change your thoughts; there is a power within you, your own will, which will enable you to turn your attention from thoughts that make you unhappy and wrong, to thoughts that make you happy and right.”

So wrote Charlotte Mason in Home Education, previewing Principle 17 of her Twenty Principles: “the way to will effectively is to turn our thoughts from that which we desire but do not will.” Deceptively simple, it seems too simple for some. Could this really be the key to the will? And does this “way of the will” really deserve a place in the Short Synopsis of Charlotte Mason’s method?

As if anticipating these questions from modern readers, Charlotte Mason called up her physician friend to write about the topic in more detail. Drawing upon a vast range of knowledge and expertise, the “beloved physician” accepted the challenge.

At a PNEU gathering in 1912, the Lady Campbell announced to her audience: “One word as to formation of habit. Read Miss Mason on this subject in the Home Education Series, and get Miss Webb’s admirably helpful pamphlet on Thought-turning as a factor in the training of Character.” Perhaps you’ve read the first source. Isn’t it about time that you read the second? Now you can read or hear it here.

@artmiddlekauff