A quote that has stuck out to me for a while now is "she realized none of it was real and set herself free." Confession: I have no idea who said this. But it has still resonated with me. When I was in the depths of sorrow because of failing out of BYU, I just couldn't seem to get it together. I couldn't take control of my own life somehow. And I finally decided to read a book my grandma recommended to me called, Excuses Begone. I probably would have been super reluctant to read this book based on the title alone since it seemed really cheesy to me, but I'm really glad that I did.
The premise of the book is basically that we have these problems in our life and then we have a huge list of reasons why we solve them, or excuses if you will. Things like, "my family would think less of me," "I don't have the money," "I don't have the time," etc. And I just realized (over a process of time of course) that when I sat down and looked at reality, there wasn't anything real that was holding me back from succeeding and taking back control of my life. The only thing that was stopping me, was me.
The book is really good because it goes through all of the excuses and basically debunks them and shows you that most of the time, it is really just all in your head of why you can or can't do something. And that if you are truly passionate about something, you find a way to do it no matter what. And that is something that I wanted in my life. I didn't want to be held back. I wanted to face the world, full of passion, and not let anything stop me from doing so.
The main one that I think a lot of us deal with is worrying about what other people are going to think if we make a change in our lives. And this can be anything from a small change to a big change. But why are we letting that stop us? Why are we letting other people control our lives when we should be the one in charge? And most of the time, the people aren't really thinking what we are so afraid they will think.
The other one is being afraid of hard work. I limit myself on so many things in life because "Oh that would just be too hard." But why do we do this to ourselves? Aren't we all capable of doing hard things? We tell ourselves that we can't do things. But guess what? We can! I have learned this over and over and over. I'm faced with a situation where I just don't think I can do it. But then I'm forced to do it anyway and somehow pull through. We are capable of so much more than we give ourselves credit for. I never thought I'd be doing a lot of the stuff that I'm doing now, but somehow it has worked out. And I need to remember that as I go into the future. Hard work always pays off. Especially if it's something worth working for.
Becoming self aware and aware of reality is a hard, but important thing to do. It will help you get rid of those excuses in your head. It will help you take control of your life, and most importantly it will set you free!
Sunday, May 27, 2018
Sunday, May 20, 2018
Lessons from Rahab
You'll have to excuse my constant blog posts about the Old Testament. As I've said before, I teach gospel doctrine at church every Sunday, so needless to say, it's on my mind. Plus the Old Testament is so rich and full of good, amazing stuff! Going through it this time around has been such an amazing experience. Especially since I have been to so many of the places it talks about in there. Truly amazing.
My lesson today was on the book of Joshua and wow there is a lot of good stuff in there! One particular point, that stuck out to me this time around, is in the story of Rahab. Joshua needed to defeat the city of Jericho, which was walled up, so he sent over two spies to check everything out. They were sought after by the people of Jericho and Rahab, a harlot, helped them by hiding them in her home. In exchange for helping them, she asked that when Jericho was destroyed, the Israelites would save her and her family. The two spies complied and swore an oath to her. Jericho was destroyed and her family was saved.
There's a lot more to the story of Joshua and Jericho, but I particularly wanted to focus on Rahab and what we can learn from her since a) she's a woman in the Bible with a story (those are hard to come by) and b) there's a great lesson to be learned from her.
Rahab was a harlot, and therefore was probably not living the most faithful life. The Lord, however, still saw fit to use her. He took an imperfect person and he used her in his plan for the Israelites to conquer Jericho. She was able to be an instrument in his hands, despite her "life of sin." And the spies could have looked at her and said, "Yeah she's not someone we want to interact with." But they didn't. They accepted her help and were able to conquer Jericho because of it.
So sometimes we may feel inadequate because we are imperfect. We may feel that we are not worthy of being an instrument in the Lord's hands. But that simply isn't true. And Rahab teaches us that. The Lord knows our true potential. He knows that we are imperfect and have flaws. And yet he still needs us. He still wants us to come unto Him and be perfected through Him. And what a blessing right? If he only used perfect people, he wouldn't have anyone to use! Anyone, and I mean anyone can be an instrument in the Lord's hands. If we seek him and submit to His will, we can do all things through Christ.
Rahab was imperfect. Pretty much everyone in the Bible was imperfect (except Christ of course!). I am imperfect and you are imperfect. And sometimes we really mess up. And get to a point where it feels impossible to come back. But it's never too late to come back. And there's no such thing as being too deep in to resurface. The Lord can and will use you, if you just let him. And he can perfect you and make you whole. Through the power of the atonement, we can become stronger and be used by the Lord for good.
Thank goodness for the Lord and his infinite mercy. And thank goodness for Rahab and her story. She plays a seemingly small part in the Old Testament, but yet there are big lessons to learn from her.
My lesson today was on the book of Joshua and wow there is a lot of good stuff in there! One particular point, that stuck out to me this time around, is in the story of Rahab. Joshua needed to defeat the city of Jericho, which was walled up, so he sent over two spies to check everything out. They were sought after by the people of Jericho and Rahab, a harlot, helped them by hiding them in her home. In exchange for helping them, she asked that when Jericho was destroyed, the Israelites would save her and her family. The two spies complied and swore an oath to her. Jericho was destroyed and her family was saved.
There's a lot more to the story of Joshua and Jericho, but I particularly wanted to focus on Rahab and what we can learn from her since a) she's a woman in the Bible with a story (those are hard to come by) and b) there's a great lesson to be learned from her.
Rahab was a harlot, and therefore was probably not living the most faithful life. The Lord, however, still saw fit to use her. He took an imperfect person and he used her in his plan for the Israelites to conquer Jericho. She was able to be an instrument in his hands, despite her "life of sin." And the spies could have looked at her and said, "Yeah she's not someone we want to interact with." But they didn't. They accepted her help and were able to conquer Jericho because of it.
So sometimes we may feel inadequate because we are imperfect. We may feel that we are not worthy of being an instrument in the Lord's hands. But that simply isn't true. And Rahab teaches us that. The Lord knows our true potential. He knows that we are imperfect and have flaws. And yet he still needs us. He still wants us to come unto Him and be perfected through Him. And what a blessing right? If he only used perfect people, he wouldn't have anyone to use! Anyone, and I mean anyone can be an instrument in the Lord's hands. If we seek him and submit to His will, we can do all things through Christ.
Rahab was imperfect. Pretty much everyone in the Bible was imperfect (except Christ of course!). I am imperfect and you are imperfect. And sometimes we really mess up. And get to a point where it feels impossible to come back. But it's never too late to come back. And there's no such thing as being too deep in to resurface. The Lord can and will use you, if you just let him. And he can perfect you and make you whole. Through the power of the atonement, we can become stronger and be used by the Lord for good.
Thank goodness for the Lord and his infinite mercy. And thank goodness for Rahab and her story. She plays a seemingly small part in the Old Testament, but yet there are big lessons to learn from her.
Monday, May 14, 2018
Imperfection
I'm a perfectionist. And I'm sure you can relate. I make a goal, let's say to eat healthy, for a week. And then I do really well for a few days. And then Wednesday comes and opportunities for something delicious like cookies comes my way. So I indulge and then basically say to myself, "welp, I guess the week is shot" and then eat lots of cookies the rest of the week. Flawed thinking, right?
But don't we all do this all of the time? Where we are confronted with failure, hardship, etc and then just give up? Learning to overcome those failures and keep trying is what is going to get us to where we want to be.
Something I always think of watching Flint learn how to walk. He could take a few steps for such a long time. He would take a few steps and then fall over. And once he fell over, he would just crawl to wherever he was trying to get. We kept trying to teach him to no fall back on crawling, but it still took him a few months to get it. The true breakthrough, however, came when he learned to get up. When he learned how to stand back up after falling down. And I realized that I need to do this too. Or else I will never learn to "walk."
There are all of those cheesy quotes out there like "You don't really fail until you give up trying" but dang it, it's true!
So I guess what I'm saying is that I missed writing in my blog last week. And I have been tempted all day to just not write anymore and be done with this. But I'm not going to! I made a goal to write every week this year. And maybe I missed a week by one day, but that's ok. Gotta keep going.
But don't we all do this all of the time? Where we are confronted with failure, hardship, etc and then just give up? Learning to overcome those failures and keep trying is what is going to get us to where we want to be.
Something I always think of watching Flint learn how to walk. He could take a few steps for such a long time. He would take a few steps and then fall over. And once he fell over, he would just crawl to wherever he was trying to get. We kept trying to teach him to no fall back on crawling, but it still took him a few months to get it. The true breakthrough, however, came when he learned to get up. When he learned how to stand back up after falling down. And I realized that I need to do this too. Or else I will never learn to "walk."
There are all of those cheesy quotes out there like "You don't really fail until you give up trying" but dang it, it's true!
So I guess what I'm saying is that I missed writing in my blog last week. And I have been tempted all day to just not write anymore and be done with this. But I'm not going to! I made a goal to write every week this year. And maybe I missed a week by one day, but that's ok. Gotta keep going.
Sunday, May 6, 2018
Be Still My Soul
Life is good. I've just been overwhelmed today with love and gratitude for a Heavenly Father that has blessed me in abundance. It just kind of all hit me at once this weekend. I have an amazing husband with a solid surgeon job (which was his dream) for the next 5 years. A husband that stayed awake for 36 hours straight to install our new dishwasher. And then stayed up again until 1 am last night putting the kitchen back together again while I slept. I have a new home that is slowly but surely coming together that I just absolutely love. Being here just makes me happy. Going out into our peaceful yard and watching Flint jump on the trampoline or play in the sand just makes my day. The weather has finally decided to warm up and I've got the sunburn to prove it. But I'm grateful for that sunburn because I'm grateful for the sun. I have a beautiful baby girl who brings me joy and is loved by her family fiercely. Basically, I really do feel like I have it all.
And it's crazy to think that all of that frustration and anxiety I felt over the last 3 years has just melted away. God really did have it all planned out from the beginning and here I am, experiencing the blessings that he had in store for me all along. His hand was in the minute details of my life. Of my family's life. I know other hard times will come, they always do. But for now, I just want to thank God for everything. The lows, the highs, and the in-betweens. I want to remember what this feels like- which is why I'm writing it down. God has always had my back and He always will.
I remember when I first felt "converted" to God. I was 14, attending my grandmama's funeral. For the first time in my life, I really needed to know if this whole claim that I would see my grandmama again was legit. I prayed like I had never prayed before. During the service, a missionary sang "Be Still My Soul." His voice wasn't spectacular, but the spirit that was brought into that room was undeniable. Those lyrics burned within me. And I knew it was all true. I knew.
I feel like that day was a keystone to my faith. I look back on that day, and rehearse those lyrics in my mind constantly. They bring me peace like nothing else can. And the more time that passes, the more significant that day has become to me. I will forever be grateful for that song. And different lyrics bring me peace at different times in my life. During the last 3 years, the lyrics, "to guide the future as he has the past" have been particularly significant. God has always guided my past. And time and hindsight have allowed me to see that. So I must have faith that he will always, always guide my future. And now that I'm sitting on the other side of the "match day trial," I see once again that that promise has held true.
God is good and he wants to bless us with more than we can fathom. I have learned this lesson so many times and yet it still astonishes me how much the Lord is truly on my side. Be still my soul, the Lord is on thy side. With patience bear thy cross of grief or pain. Leave to thy God to order and provide. In every change, He faithful will remain. Be Still, my soul. They best, thy heavenly friend. Through thorny ways, leads to a joyful end.
And it's crazy to think that all of that frustration and anxiety I felt over the last 3 years has just melted away. God really did have it all planned out from the beginning and here I am, experiencing the blessings that he had in store for me all along. His hand was in the minute details of my life. Of my family's life. I know other hard times will come, they always do. But for now, I just want to thank God for everything. The lows, the highs, and the in-betweens. I want to remember what this feels like- which is why I'm writing it down. God has always had my back and He always will.
I remember when I first felt "converted" to God. I was 14, attending my grandmama's funeral. For the first time in my life, I really needed to know if this whole claim that I would see my grandmama again was legit. I prayed like I had never prayed before. During the service, a missionary sang "Be Still My Soul." His voice wasn't spectacular, but the spirit that was brought into that room was undeniable. Those lyrics burned within me. And I knew it was all true. I knew.
I feel like that day was a keystone to my faith. I look back on that day, and rehearse those lyrics in my mind constantly. They bring me peace like nothing else can. And the more time that passes, the more significant that day has become to me. I will forever be grateful for that song. And different lyrics bring me peace at different times in my life. During the last 3 years, the lyrics, "to guide the future as he has the past" have been particularly significant. God has always guided my past. And time and hindsight have allowed me to see that. So I must have faith that he will always, always guide my future. And now that I'm sitting on the other side of the "match day trial," I see once again that that promise has held true.
God is good and he wants to bless us with more than we can fathom. I have learned this lesson so many times and yet it still astonishes me how much the Lord is truly on my side. Be still my soul, the Lord is on thy side. With patience bear thy cross of grief or pain. Leave to thy God to order and provide. In every change, He faithful will remain. Be Still, my soul. They best, thy heavenly friend. Through thorny ways, leads to a joyful end.
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