February Wrap-Up

I've had several conversations with one of my children who complains that she is tired of waking up, going to school, coming home and doing homework, and waking up and starting all over again; she wants to feel more purpose. My initial reaction was, "Welcome to Life!"

It is true that it seems like I'm constantly getting into bed at night. That is my marker to know that my days pass by quickly, but so much happens in a day; there is so much opportunity and purpose in the Average Day. Getting to go to school and learn all sorts of things is a huge opportunity. The question I have asked my kids is, how much do you engage in that opportunity? Education is expanding and often preparatory for things to come. Line upon line we are prepared for the next stages of life. Same with going to work, being a stay-at-home-mom, you name it.

This felt like an educational month. A preparatory month. A month of opportunities. A purposeful month. A month full of very Average Days.

My New Year's goals of meditating and doing more yoga has been life changing. I have been reading related books that have stretched my mind to completely new realms of understanding and perspective. To the outsider my life is pretty uneventful at this moment, but my mind is engaged and expanding in significant ways. That has been February's highlight for me.

I will say that getting into shape has been harder than I would like to admit. Is it age? Am I really this far gone? These are some questions I have been asking myself! And then I read an interview with yoga instructor Seane Corn. I love this quote that changed my perspective on getting older and all that goes with it:

Contrary to societal opinion, I am excited to have made it to this age and do not feel sad or apologetic for the changes that come with it. It’s part of the deal. You live, and if you’re lucky enough, you get old. Getting older is complex, deeply personal, and I won’t dictate to you what your experience with aging can or should be. Aging, like everything else in life, is a process and different for everyone. I look at aging as a privilege, and as I get older I truly appreciate how short our time is in these bodies, and I don’t want to take a second of this journey for granted. I am very grateful. I’m grateful for my health, my resilience, my commitment to growth and change. Grateful for my family, my yoga practice, my community, my amazing body that can do so many interesting things, and all the love I’ve been given and have been able to give in return. In these 50 years, I have lived big, loved deeply, turned my passion into a career, got to explore the world, buried a parent, lost more beloved animals than I care to think about, opened my heart to God, created my own unconventional family, and have had more wonderful, tragic, and weird moments than I could ever possibly describe. Life, for me, has been deep and beautiful, and although terribly heartbreaking at times, I’ve treasured this wild and unpredictable ride. I can’t wait to see what wisdom comes from the (hopefully) many, many days I have left.  

Isn't that awesome?

Adele and Ceci have reengaged in their previous talent agency, and now that they are both older we are investing a bit more into some classes and workshops that will help them (hopefully) get more jobs. This was a big focus this month with all-day classes and evening classes (two a week) and preparing resumes and having meetings with casting directors and getting head shots and little details up the wazoo. But look at these cuties.

  

I got to watch my friend's little cutie one day. We made muffins for her to take home. Oh how I loved spending time with this independent and smart-as-a-whip two-year-old!

My stepmom and I have been writing her personal history for months and finished it up this month. It was so fun learning about my stepmom through this process! One of the last pictures we added was this picture with my dad and brothers at his last conference due to his battle with cancer. What a great day. I miss my dad. 

We had a family gathering to celebrate cousin Bailey's birthday, and this is the only picture I got of that event:

And lastly, we have been getting all of our ducks in a row for our exchange student's arrival next Tuesday! We're so excited! More about her to come.

Depression - Part 3

The time from when Geoff was diagnosed (to be weeks or months from Addison's Disease) until we moved to Salt Lake (a period of five years), we call our "Wilderness Years". We left the comforts of "home" by putting it all in storage and venturing to France for a year of convalescence. From there we moved in with his amazing parents to continue nurturing Geoff's health. I won't go into details about the difficulties of those five years, but I was far more like Laman and Lemuel. I was resisting God's plan for us. I was so ungrateful; God's hand was in all aspects of my life daily and I didn't notice. I complained. I was critical of the people around me and my circumstances. I had zero perspective. I was self-absorbed. I felt a lot of pride. I was in despair. All of this led me to darkness.

Around the time I was reading in 1 Nephi I was going to the temple weekly. I was pondering about what God expects of me. He expects that we have pure and holy thoughts (which lead to pure and holy action). I decide to make a list of all of the pure and holy thoughts or actions I could think of from the scriptures, and along side it I listed their opposites, or impure and unholy thoughts/actions. This was very insightful for me.

PURE & HOLY THOUGHTS/ACTIONS          IMPURE & UNHOLY THOUGHTS/ACTIONS

Gratitude, appreciation                                            Ingratitude
Honest                                                                      Dishonest, deceptive
Virtuous, modest, chaste                                          Immodest, immoral, crude, sexy
Benevolent, kind                                                      Irritable, mean-spirited
Good works, service                                                Seeks only own comforts/welfare
Hope                                                                         Despair, discouragement
Endure                                                                      Quit, complain
Seek praiseworthy in others                                     Criticize, find fault, judge unrighteously
Diligent, focused, disciplined, responsible              Slothful, lazy, distracted, waste time, procrastinate
Love                                                                         Hate
Forgive                                                                     Hold grudge, unforgiving, resentful
Patient, suffereth long                                              Impatient, frustration
Meek, gentle, calm, submissive                               Overbearing, controlling, loud, impulsive
Selfless                                                                      Selfish
Humility, repentant                                                   Pride, self-centered, boastful, show-off, rely on
                                                                                  self, jealousy
Generous, consecrated                                              Greedy, envy, covetous, materialistic, seek riches
Faith, trust in God, optimism                                    Doubtful, disbelieving, wary, untrusting, fearful,
                                                                                  pessimism/negative thinking
Compassion, empathy                                               Disregard for other's needs/wants, unaware
Organized, order                                                       Disorganized, scattered, tardy, chaotic
Careful, thoughtful                                                    Light-minded, light-speech, careless
Self-reliant, provident living, motivated,                  Impulsive, entitled, unmotivated, lack of initiative                                                                     initiative
Steward of physical body                                          Thoughtless about food, sleep, exercise, stress
                                                                                   management
Steward over God's creations                                    Litter, wasteful
Integrity, true
Loyal                                                                         Disloyal

At church one Sunday, during this same period of time, we read a quote that astonished me.

“There is a line of demarcation well defined between the Lord’s territory and the devil’s territory. If you will stay on the Lord’s side of the line you will be under his influence and will have no desire to do wrong; but if you cross to the devil’s side of that line one inch you are in the tempter’s power and if he is successful, you will not be able to think or even reason properly because you will have lost the Spirit of the Lord.” George Albert Smith

I immediately saw the connection between the list of pure and holy practices and impure and unholy practices. If we do not CHOOSE light, we are in Satan's power.

How can you know you are in the Satan's power?  Feeling darkness, despair and discouragement.  Feeling like you are captive, in bondage.  Feeling confused and frustrated in life.  Feeling like it is hard to make right choices, disempowered.  Feeling anxiety.

When we have the companionship of the Holy Ghost we feel hope, love, light and freedom.  We feel power, and a desire to do what is right.  We feel strength from God, even when things are hard in our lives. (Doc. & Cov. 11:12-13; Galatians 5:22-23, 25-26)

So how do we keep the Spirit?  How do we stay on the Lord’s side?  How do we constantly feel light in our lives? We are watchful every hour for the adversary’s attempts to ensnare us (and he IS sneaky).  We meaningfully study our scriptures and sincerely pray and commune with God daily.  We express gratitude and repent of all of our shortcomings daily.  We pray for the Savior’s grace, daily, to make us more than we are.  We go to the temple regularly.  We serve others.  We listen to hymns or conference addresses, or in some way fill our minds constantly with light and truth.  We eat in a way that gives us energy and clarity (the adversary tries to dull us with what we put in our bodies).

It is important for us to realize that unless we “yield to the…Spirit” the natural man in each of us will be our default thought, feeling and action.  Those natural inclinations are against God.  Unless we use our agency to choose God, and invite the Spirit into our lives, and “become a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord", we will be in the adversary’s power.  

Even with all of this effort we will occasionally find ourselves feeling darkness or discouragement. We then will notice we haven't been diligent and we quickly repent and plead for the return of the Spirit, and the Savior's grace to help us. We are empowered by knowing how we got there, and what to do to return to light. Light and darkness cannot exist in the same place. Light can be dim, though. We can invite the amount of light we want in our lives. We have agency to choose it. We are not helpless or victims. We can choose light. The more we do, the more power we gain to choose more light.

Most importantly, God delivers us from bondage. Sometimes it takes years, maybe for some a lifetime, but in the end he will deliver us. All of us.

Depression - Part 2

Let me start off by saying that this was MY answer to depression. And while I do not assume it is everyone's cause and/or solution, I do believe there are true principles in what I will share. I also am speaking from my own personal, spiritual and religious beliefs. I believe much of my religious language can be adapted to another's beliefs. Truth is truth.

I was feeling particularly dark one Sunday, but even inside those darkest days there was a light on inside trying to guide my way.

I was sitting in Relief Society (women's meeting at church), looking through mentally dark lenses, hoping to be invisible. Not much was penetrating my blackness until I heard another sister in the class say that she struggled with depression until someone told her to read 1 Nephi (in the Book of Mormon) and she would find the answers, and she did read and she did find answers. It was as if her little comment in class was highlighted in my mind. It was the only thing I heard. I determined to search 1 Nephi for answers.

I've read 1 Nephi who knows how many times, but this time God opened my eyes to new insights. I was shown that Laman and Lemuel made certain CHOICES, and because of their choices they lost the Spirit of the Lord. Nephi, who was having the same difficult experiences, made CHOICES that helped him to keep the Spirit of the Lord. No doubt their situation was outright hard. I related to Laman and Lemuel, but I wanted to feel like Nephi.

The story of Lehi’s family is full of examples of choices and the subsequent light and darkness.  A few examples from the story of Lehi’s family:

In 1 Nephi 2:11-13 we see that Laman and Lemuel are going through a very difficult trial.  They have left their hometown, their big and comfortable house, friends and status, and their cool stuff to live out of a tent in the wilderness.  They think their dad is a lunatic and they are really struggling with this circumstance.  They feel anger and resentment and they are complaining…a lot.  V. 12 says they complained because “they knew not the dealings of that God who created them”.  They weren’t taking the time to turn to God, or to consider that his hand might be in this difficult trial, and that there might actually be purpose to all that they are struggling with.  There wasn’t humility enough to step back and see the situation from a different lens.  They were really only thinking about themselves and what they wanted, not what God wanted. 

God often asks hard things of us.  The whole purpose of this life is to become like him, and if we are seeking that end we can expect some rough waters.  We can be GRATEFUL for the rough waters.  We can submit in humility, and seek the Savior’s grace to successfully pass through them.

Laman and Lemuel are stuck in their lens.  And their lens is selfish, prideful, and ungrateful, all of which produce lenses that will invite darkness.

Continuing on with the story of Lehi’s family, when Lehi tells Laman and Lemuel the Lord has commanded them to return to Jerusalem to get the plates of Laban complain that it is too hard (1 Nephi 3:5).  In truth it IS too hard for them on their own.  But it is the Lord’s errand.  Nephi sees that and gives us his trusting reply in v.7, “I will go and do…”

Nephi was young in his testimony and shows a tremendous amount of faith and TRUST in the Lord.  He doesn’t know how it will be done, he just knows that the Lord will help him do it.  A few chapters later he testifies of his knowledge that the Lord will provide the way (1 Nephi 17:3), right around the time he is commanded to build a ship.

Trusting that God is all-powerful and all-knowing changes our PERSPECTIVE on hard things.  Trusting gives us strength and comfort, and actually gives us power to do things we couldn’t do on our own. It invites light into our souls.

Unspoken throughout these chapters, but assumed from Nephi maintaining light and the Spirit of the Lord is that he repented, often. He kept himself pure and holy.

Also unspoken is resistance. When we complain and are ungrateful and are not trusting we are resisting What Is. If What Is is God's will for us, then we are resisting God. This resistance invites darkness and gloom into our lives. At this time in my life, I was resisting. I was ungrateful. I was not trusting that God knew what was best for me or else he would change my circumstances!

But my eyes were being opened.