Don't be afraid to receive

Here it is another Sunday night, where does the time go? Sometimes I feel like I am in a headlong sprint, but I'm not sure where it is I am running to. Sometimes we can be so caught up in the busyness of each day that we can forget where it is we hope to go.



Tonight I received a priesthood blessing, I can't say that I was aware of a distinct need for one, I just sort of felt like I should ask for one. In doing so I received a blessing that caught me completely unawares, the Lord mentioned things that I hadn't even realized were on my mind and brought up things that sort of felt were from left field. What I did feel most deeply is that Heavenly Father has the long view, even if I feel so stuck in what is happening today.

I think the thing I had reinforced the most to me this week is that the adversary can use anything to stir up opposition and that consistency is really our best defense. Bare in mind this consistency will then most likely stir up more opposition, but it is really the thing that gives you sanity.

This week Christopher and I embraced the new and unexpected and we bought a car, an amazing car that will get us beautifully from point A to point B and has more bells and whistles than I ever expected in a vehicle. It is amazingly fantastic. And it has stirred up more doubt, fear, worry and freak outs than I ever thought possible. It's not as if we did this completely on the spur of the moment. I have been planning and preparing for a new car for months, I had been figuring out budgets and needs, the things I wanted/needed in a car and fighting my own self doubts about allowing myself to have nice things and not just hand me downs. The moment this week when we got this car was one of six months and more of planning. Yet somehow every morning since has been filled with doubts, worries, fears, regrets, and freak outs. I could still feel in my heart that the initial choice was a good one, yet there was so much noise in my head I often wondered if it was really worth it and wondering if I really could have nice things.  It took full concentrate to forcefully encourage those voices and doubts to leave and to focus on what I felt when I first started the process.


Now some might say I am reading way more into this situation than is warranted, but I think there can be much to learn from any situation in this life, especially the new things we have never done before. For me this happened to be a new car. This week I have learned that Satan doesn't want us to find joy, he wants to discourage us and he wants us to doubt. The more we learn and grow and expand ourselves the more he shouts and rages. But we do have a choice, we can choose to tell him to leave, we can choose to hold onto the direction we received and we can choose to consistently do the good things even when Satan tells us it isn't worth it.

Why do you think Satan tries to discourage us so much from being consistent? I came to the understanding this week that he fights against our consistency so much because he knows consistency leads to perfection. We become what we repeatedly do. If he can stop us from doing the good things consistently then he can stop us from becoming and growing. If he can stop us from positive thinking, if he weighs us down so fully in doubts and fears, then we give up, never realizing that we are so close to all that Heavenly Father has for us. That gift our Father has for us will look different to each of us, but believing He does have great things for us allows Him to do wonders in our lives. He wants to surprise us with the extra special. I didn't set out to buy a car with extras, I just needed a car to go from point A to B, but sometimes we can have the good and the great and we shouldn't feel bad about it, we should be thankful for the gift and be willing to share the good and the great. Heavenly Father has a way of blessing those He knows will extend that blessing to others. Don't be afraid to receive and always find joy in the giving.



Joy D Jones also talked about growing through enticement, her remarks when a long way in helping understand what was happening this week and to be grateful for the opportunity to grow, though unexpected. You can find her remarks here.

Tomorrow is something new entirely

I think weekends are my time for learning, probably because all through the week I am simply rushing around to keep up and on weekends I have some time to breathe. And can I just say how important it is to take that time to breathe.

Can I just say that temple withdrawals are real. A lot of the craziness and struggles of the last weeks have all occurred while the temple was closed and I was feeling it. I hadn't realized how much until my temple shift yesterday. I had sort of been hoping that just walking into the temple would help me find the peace I had been seeking for weeks and it wasn't as forthcoming as I had hoped.

After prayer meeting (for the ordinance workers) I found myself in a training meeting for assisting with own endowments. In a moment of self awareness I noticed that I was leaning back in my chair, with my arms and legs crossed, with a bit of a feeling of "okay impress me, or teach me something" as I realized what I was doing I heard the Spirit whisper something to the effect of "I'm not here to impress you, are you here to learn?' I realized that my attitude of sitting back waiting to receive wasn't going to get me what I wanted, I needed to wake up, sit forward and open my heart to what was already being offered and what could be offered.

With that improved attitude my experience in the temple also improved. As I went to officiate in initiatory I was struck by the promise given to Aaron and to all of us (found in Exodus). That when we go to the temple we are washed, anointed, and we are sanctified. As I extended those promises to those who I assisted I realized that clean-ness isn't just a gift we receive on Sundays as we partake of the sacrament or at our baptism. It is a gift we can access everyday. Because of the Atonement of Jesus Christ each new day we wake up is a fresh start. Each day we can choose to grow, learn, try new things and become something different than the day before.

This doesn't mean that we won't make mistakes, we most likely will, as L.M. Montgomery said in Anne of Avalon "each new day is clean with no mistakes in it...yet". Each new day can be a fresh start. We don't have to stay stuck in old programs and dialogues, we don't have to be forever stuck in who we were yesterday, last week, last month or last year. Our Savior knows that we will make mistakes, it is the reason He walked into the Garden of Gethsemane and suffered for us, it is why He hung on a cross, He wanted us to be able to move forward. The inability to move forward, to let go of what was and embrace what was very literally dams our progress. Our Savior didn't want us to be dammed, so He bled and died for us, He gave us the blessings and covenants of the temple so that we could freely move forward.

As I offered the promises and blessings of the initiatory to those there I felt those same promises given to me. I felt my Savior saying to me that I could let go of the last month, I didn't need to hold onto the bitterness of the past month, I could heal the black hole inside me, I could choose the light and let the darkness become a long ago memory. I felt Him say to me that I can be clean, I can be clean of my sins of omission, I could be clean of the sadness, frustration and pain. I could become something new.

Having felt that for myself, I can promise you, He offers that to you too. It doesn't matter what you felt you have done wrong, it doesn't matter how many times you mess up, Christ's atonement doesn't just kick in as you stand at the bar of judgement, it is available to you each day as you wake up each day with a fresh start to try to do and become something new.

Forgive yourself for what was and embrace what can be, Christ is already there encouraging you to be more than you think you can be in this moment. He sees the big picture and He has great dreams for you. No matter where you are today, tomorrow is something new entirely.

He is in it for the long haul

Hello Everybody!!! It is wonderful to be with you tonight. I find myself rather excited to write tonight. Part of that is because I am very excited for what I am hoping to share and also because I think I have found me again. For a long time I have felt cut off, isolated and voiceless, this weekend I think I found my voice again.

I'd like to start with a quote by William Blake, he said "I sought myself and myself I could not see, I sought my God and He alluded me. I sought my brother and I found all three." I went to a training* this weekend and as I learned how to reopen my heart and embrace others I found myself again and I finally felt God's love in a way that I really needed. At this training we were challenged to give 10 hugs to people during the break. If you had asked me to do this even last week I would have turned you down flat, asking why I had to go out of my way to do it, when no one else was (as far as I can tell I was one of the few going up to complete strangers and giving them hugs, and I mean real hugs, not the touch arms then jump apart kind). I would have asked inside my mind why I should put myself out. But instead I took this as an opportunity to try to lift another, so I asked the Spirit for help and looked for those in need of a hug. As I tapped people on the shoulder and asked if I could give them a hug I had a wonderful opportunity to share love with them, to hold on longer than is the norm and take a moment to feel their spirit, to understand their need to feel loved and to feel the love of my Savior for them. How precious it was to hold these complete strangers in my arms and feel a love for them and for myself that I didn't even realize existed.

At this training we were encouraged to assume the best of others, that as we encountered someone and saw a look on their faces that past experience would tell us is negative, to instead see the positive. "To choose to love them no matter what, we don't have to move in with them, unless we want to, but to simply choose to see the best in them and love them." (Kim Duncan). We will run into so many people in this life, some will treat us kindly, some will treat us poorly. Instead of assuming they are out to get us or assume that they are failing at life, we need to have in our minds that they are doing the best that they can. We don't know what is going on in their lives, we don't know what life experiences have colored their view, we don't know how the muscles in their face rest. If we set in our minds that they are giving their 100% and we give our 100% then we come away feeling we have done our best in a good thing.

I think another thing that I was forcefully reminded of is that I can ask other people for help. One of the things that I have struggled with the most is the fear of other people's pity, of telling other too much and leaving me alone because what is going on in my life is too scary to bare and share. Satan has been working overtime on this fear, he had me so convinced that people wouldn't understand me, that if they did care they would show it in all the wrong ways and that they probably wouldn't care. The more I talk with other people the more I realize we all have trials, we all have things that cause our lives to feel hard, overwhelming and painful...who am I to share my pain around? Is my life really so hard that I have a right to share it?  The thing is our experiences aren't on some gradient scale, "oh you only got a B on a test you studied really hard for, boohoo for you" vs "your child just died of cancer, that actually is sad". Yes one may look much more serious than the other, but to each person in the middle of that moment they deserve compassion, they deserve kindness because they are a mortal struggling with the frailties of mortality and disappointment. Perhaps a key of this life is to not grade trial or to make comparisons at all. Satan would tell us that our struggle is such that no one would understand, so he cuts us off from those who we need the most.

Case in point, having slowly cut myself off from quite a few people the last few months (not hermit style, just selective discussion style) I realized last night that I need to start rebuilding. I began with my dear sweet mother in law. As I asked a simply question I came to understand that Satan had messed with my thinking so much he had cut me off from one of my greatest allies, kept me from someone who has a unique understanding of where I am coming from and my joys and disappointments. She also has a benefit of the long view that I don't have. In finally opening up to her I was able to find perspective that I had lost, hope that had been missing, and joy of not feeling so alone. These new perspectives don't change circumstances, but they make all the difference in the world because our heart can change and with a changed heart everything changes.

If Satan has told you lies, has told you you are alone or misunderstood, or that someone is out to get you or is just being so rude. I would encourage you to evaluate your perspective on your relationships and see what assumptions you've made. For just one day, assume that everyone is doing their best, that they love you, and we're all trying, you will see amazing results. I can already feel some of my desire wearing down to be as open as I can, I struggle with self doubt. But we can all start from somewhere and try to do just a little better the next day.

One last thing, a dear friend that I met at the training said something to me that has helped me so much in my thinking. I had begun asking myself what is the point to do what I do each day, I just have to redo it again the next. She shared with me what the Spirit shared with her "work is endless because progression is endless". If we want to gain all that progression has to offer, which is endless, then we must be willing to pay the price endlessly. We will be blessed in this effort. As she said, if progression means doing dishes every day, then I am going to be the best darn dish washer I can be. If sometimes we face disappointment or frustration, that is simply another step in endless progression.

The Lord has an amazing destiny for us and that destiny is reached through making and strengthening relationships and to find the joy in the little things that bring us closer to Him. He is in it for the long haul, are we?

Christ has already fought our battles, and He won.


*Queen of the Kingdom through 3keyelements.com

Who was there all along

 A year or two ago I wrote a post called The Voice that Lies* in that post I talked about the three voices in our minds, The Spirit, our own personal voice (the essence of who we are) and the adversary's voice, that which lies and manipulates our emotions. If you'd like to read that post you can find the URL at the bottom of the page. The summary was that we need to be conscious of the voices and to invite the Spirit to help us to discern truth so that in those split second moments when we have the choice whether to believe the lies and choose to feel negatively about something or to recognize the lie we choose to reject the lie and trust the good. I've been thinking a lot about this moment of decision and reminding myself that I have the choice to control my emotions, they don't have to control me.

But what happens when we are under attack and we don't see the moment of choice for what it is, what do we do when the voices in our mind get so loud, so persistent, so persuasive, so overwhelming and so powerful that we don't see the moment when we make a choice to feel lonely, to feel exhausted, to feel attacked, to feel alone, to feel picked on, to feel that life is unfair? What do we do when we feel like we just can't take it anymore, when we begin to believe that life isn't fair (as a reminder mortal life was not created to be fair, it was created for us to learn through injustice, to fight against pain and disappointment to see the good when it seems darkness and unfairness is prevailing), that no one cares about us, that we are doomed to an endless cycle of drudgery, chores, and upheaval in our minds, that we will always feel cut off from others and separate because our life experience seems so different from their's?

I wish that these were rhetorical questions, that they were generalizations with no grounding in fact or real life. Yet when one seeks for Christ in a world growing in darkness Satan plays a game of no holds barred. He is seeking our souls brothers and sisters, he knows he can't win, he knows and has known that he couldn't win, from the very moment that he chose contrary to our Father's plan he knew he would lose. His only consolation is to try to take as many of our Father's children with him when he loses. This means he doesn't attack us in our strength (though he'll always send a temptation or two just to see if we've grown complacent) this means he'll kick us while we are down and see how many spiritual ribs he can break. This means that he will attack us in our sorrow and confusion and see how long he can keep us wallowing in sadness and fear. This means that he won't give us a breather, he sees this as a fight to the death and we need to realize this is serious. Our very souls are at stake and we need to be willing to put all we have into the fight.
   
   I am quite certain that I am not the first to feel overwhelmed and under armed nor will I be the last. We all have felt our moments of despair, we have all felt at the end of our rope, unsupported, facing the darkness alone and unaided. The key is to realize that this is the voice that lies who is telling you those things. He knows he has more power when you feel you have no power to call upon.

   So in moments of darkness and drowning when you feel you have no hope to reach out to, I hope that you will call upon our Savior, He has all power against that darkness, He can pierce it and cast it out, which is why Satan speaks so loudly that Christ won't, because he knows it isn't a matter of can't. When you feel the distance between you and your Savior widening remember that He walked into a garden and knelt by a rock and prayed for you, He was raised on a cross for you, He walked from a tomb for you. He is the Savior of the World and He is the Captain of your salvation. Your Savior and mine will give you the space you need to take a breath, He will clear the mists from your eyes so that you can see the lies you've been told. Now this doesn't mean the darkness will automatically leave, as much as Christ fights for us, Satan fights against us, he is seeking our souls and he doesn't give up easily, but he must leave when we tell him to. So we seek our Savior to give us the strength to tell our adversary to leave. We seek our loving Savior to reach out to us and pull us from our chasm and we keep seeking the light until we find it.



  I testify that the light will come. All our problems won't be solved, we wouldn't learn the lessons of mortality if they did, but we will gain clearer vision, we will find hope, we will see that there is reason to continue, to keep trying. Whatever holds we can face it because as we learn in the Old Testament, there are more that be with us than they that be with them (Satan and his followers). We are watched over. If there comes a moment of chaos, darkness, doubt, fear and pain call upon our Savior and in His name cast out Satan and those who follow him, Satan will leave and with his leaving we will feel our Savior who was there all along, we just needed the space to feel Him again. This is a fight, but we aren't in it alone.
 






*http://ofchoicesandconsequences.blogspot.com/2016/08/the-voice-that-lies.html