Mind of My Mind

When Mary forms the Pattern with other telepaths, she sees it visually manifest as an actual pattern. The Pattern connects her with other minds, placing her in the middle. As she looks at the Pattern and the people connected to it, its visual appearance begins to represent the significance the Pattern will have in their lives. The Pattern is a motif for the theme of The Development of Identity Within Community. As the actives struggle against the Pattern and Mary, they also become more familiar with each other: “Then they were long strands of fire, stretching away from me, but somehow never quite stretching quite far enough to escape. They were writhing, shapeless things, merging into each other, breaking apart, rolling together again as a tidal wave of light, as a single clawing hand” (59). The Pattern irrevocably connects the telepaths together, and their struggles against it signify their own resistance to others, each so accustomed to being on their own and independent. And yet as the struggle, they interact with each other, never able to break away completely and always drawn back together. This view of the Pattern foreshadows the First Family’s experiences.