Thanksgiving is tomorrow, which in some respects is hard to believe given how long Thanksgiving decor has garnished many stores. I never liked skipping ahead with holidays nor celebrating them too soon. I never saw that on my mission in Guatemala. Many people there spend their days collecting what they need to survive that day, whether that’s harvesting corn and beans for food, grinding the corn and making tortillas, or collecting firewood for cooking. I’m still touched by memories of impoverished people sharing with me what little they had. They don’t need to share with me. I can go home and enter any number of local grocery stores where I can have whatever I want. Yet they still shared with me. Usually I didn’t really want what they shared. I endured much sickness on my mission, often feeling like something was alive inside of me trying to eat its way out. How was I to know what might make me sick? Still, I was grateful to be around good-hearted people sharing from their scarcity. And they felt grateful to be able to provide. We chose to be grateful. One who choose not Not everyone made that choice, though. I remember meeting a bitter man who always complained that my country didn’t share enough of its wealth. Gratitude was nowhere to be found near this man. He was a pathetic clod of misery. I never said that to him because of his anger management issues. Unfortunately my companion didn’t share my perspective. One day, when he taunted us as we walked past the tienda where he sat drunk, my companion mouthed back to him. In response, he pulled out a pistol and threatened to shoot us. My companion quickly bolted. I was set to follow, but something stopped me. A power I couldn’t see physically held me back, and I felt strongly impressed to walk, not run, away. I complied. The man followed me, waving his pistol and commanding me in drunken slurs to return to my home country. At length, I turned my head and shouted, “Look at me. I am walking away. I’m going home.” He then stopped, turned around, and walked back towards the tienda. I never saw him again. And I’m very grateful for that! The right focus This man never seemed grateful for anything. He chose a constant focus on what he lacked and how unfair and unequal his situation was compared to others. Because your focus becomes your reality, he had a reality of lack, unfairness, and inequity. And that made him miserable. In contrast, many of his countrymen chose to be generous rather than spiteful. They focused on sharing what they had rather than searching for ways to accumulate more for themselves. That focus led to a reality of abundance that inspired gratitude. And that made them happy. Just as you can choose what you focus on, you can choose to be grateful for what you have. Focusing on what you lack leads to a reality of lack, and that reality makes it harder to choose gratitude. Focusing on what you have leads to a reality of abundance, and that reality makes it easier to choose gratitude. You can be grateful and happy, or you can be ungrateful and unhappy. It all depends on the focus you choose. Make sure you choose wisely. The right choice It’s sometimes not enough to focus on what you have. You also need to avoid comparing yourself with others. Including any element of comparison in your focus invites a reality of competition making it harder to be grateful, especially when you don’t win. Typically, we don’t win the comparisons we make with others. Those exercises often provide evidence for not believing in ourselves and our own potential. What’s to make us think we can accomplish anything great if we aren’t as good as somebody else? That line of questioning leads to a focus of lack, which in turn leads to a reality of lack, which in turn makes it harder to be grateful. It all depends on what you choose. You can choose to be grateful when you choose to focus on the positive elements of your life. That will create a reality of positivity that will encourage gratitude. Choosing to be grateful then reinforces that focus on the positive, and the cycle repeats itself, leaving you in a much happier state. And that will bring you more joy in your journey.
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Although Elder Pingree does not confine his remarks to singles, engaging a personal ministry can fill LDS singles with strength to face their challenges. God has given every one of us gifts to help us with the divine assignments that comprise our personal ministry. Great joy awaits those who embrace those gifts to assist God in His work. Discover your gifts It’s OK if you don’t know what your gifts are. Discovering them is part of the process of embracing them. Through the work discovery requires, you’ll become more endeared to your gifts and can more fully appreciate them. I love Elder Pingree’s counsel to “approach decision points in our lives—like what to study, what to do for work, or where to live—in the context of helping others.” Such an outward focus aligns well with the support network LDS singles groups should be. More importantly, this approach follows the Savior’s example. A priesthood holder giving a blessing never places his hands on his own head. Rather he places his hands only on the heads of others. That’s because the priesthood is all about serving others. This is how the Savior fulfilled His personal ministry. And it’s how we can fulfill ours as well. Elder Pingree taught,
Partnering with the Lord can help us discover our gifts and then develop them. Leverage adversity We’ve all heard adversity has positive benefits. One such benefit is help in discovering our gifts. Experiencing our adversity gives us knowledge obtainable only through that experience. That knowledge gives us opportunity to help others who experience similar adversity in their lives. Elder Pingree told the story of a human resources professional who was laid off. This man started his own company aimed at helping others find employment. In this way he used his experience to serve others. And in the process, he found a more meaningful career for himself. That story reflects my own in developing this forum. A woman I asked out brushed me off without really getting to know me. After almost 20 years of that treatment, I decided to start a blog on 12/12/12 that could help others. What started as a simple release valve has grown into so much more. Although the lack of comments to these blog posts suggests otherwise, hundreds of LDS singles have been helped to meet their challenges with faith in the Lord and hope for their future. One such single whom I called Lydia expressed special appreciation for that help. Many more LDS singles will be helped. Next year, Joy in the Journey Radio goes live with a weekly Internet broadcast. Between that and the social media outlets to come, I’m hoping to bless the lives of many more LDS singles throughout the world. Can you see how using a focus on others amidst adversity has helped me to discover my gifts as well as pursue my personal ministry? This is what happens when you partner with the Lord to pursue your own personal ministry. He can show you your gifts and how to develop them. And He can strengthen you as you use those gifts in advancing your own personal ministry, which is really just your individual threads in the great tapestry of His work. Avoid distractions Satan will of course attempt to dissuade us from contributing to that mighty cause. Sin may be his most frequently used tool, but other avenues at his disposal can be equally effective. He can distract us with a preoccupation on worldly things or discourage us with feelings of inadequacy or perceptions that our work is too great for us to accomplish. However, as we walk in faith by keeping our focus on following the Savior, we need not allow Satan to prevent us from fulfilling our personal ministry. We can “be anxiously engaged in a good cause, and do many things of [our] own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness” (D&C 58:27). And it need not end there. I love the quote from President Russell M. Nelson that Elder Pingree shared in his address.
When we partner with the Lord, we can do anything He requires. Our personal ministries can further His work and bless the lives of countless others. And that will bring more joy in our journey.
Yes, Elder Holland hit his usual home run. Elder Bednar taught healing truths about missionary service. We rejoiced to see and hear the Prophet speak in Conference. The list goes on, but something seems more inviting in Elder Choi’s remarks. Perhaps it’s because he declared
So often in our lives as LDS singles, we find ourselves in need of strength, balance, and healing. We can find all of these in the Savior when we look up to Him. Find strength Life is hard for everyone. LDS singles are no exception. Although our challenges are all unique, the solution is very much the same. We must look to the Savior for the strength to soldier on. When facing difficulty, we often wish life would be easier and wonder why the battle before us must be ours. Yet instead of wishing our situations were better, we should wish we were better. Learning how to conquer challenges is a major purpose of mortality. We’ll never do that unless we increase our inner strength and become more than what we now are. No one can increase that strength within us more than Christ. His Atonement manifests His power through which He can transform us into new creatures able to do what before we could not do. Elder Choi pointed us to the Savior when sharing this experience:
We can find the strength we need to conquer our challenges when we look up to the Lord. Find balance Directing our focus to eternity can be challenging, especially when the reality of our mortal existence presses us to place our attention in the temporal world. We ease that difficulty when we balance what we see in our mortality with what we know about our eternity. If we live life based only on what we see around us, we walk by sight. The more we walk by sight, the more reactive our approach to life becomes. Simply reacting to life is living on autopilot playing out previously programmed habits that lead ultimately to the unfulfilled life. The restored gospel of Jesus Christ teaches life can be more wonderful when we walk by faith. We can use the gift of agency to choose consciously an approach to life aligned with gospel standards that responds rather than reacts to life. And we can balance what we see in mortality with what we know about eternity when making those choices. Elder Choi spoke about our need for balance and how we can get it.
Our focus determines our reality. When we focus on the limitations of mortality, our reality will be one of limitation. But when we focus on embracing our own personal ministry of contribution to others, our reality will be a life that contributes back to us. Find healing We can get in our own way of making that contribution to others when we cling to our past. For LDS singles, that past often includes heartache, loneliness, discouragement, and hopelessness. Many of us keep repeating those stories of failure to ourselves. Yet carrying unnecessary baggage from the past does nothing but hold us back from living the full and joyful life we can live today. It’s much easier to move forward when our load is lighter. Still, letting go of the past can be difficult, especially when we hold on out of habit. Elder Choi points us to the only lasting solution — the Savior.
Part of the healing we need comes from the power of Christ through His Atonement. Yet another part comes only as we step outside ourselves and realize our lives are smaller pieces in a much larger puzzle. Partnering with the Lord can help us let go of our past so we can make our full contribution to the plan of happiness God has for all His children. And by faithfully embracing a personal ministry that contributes to the lives of others and alleviates their pain, we can find our own pain alleviated.
The longer we look only around at our own lives, the more we will feel helpless, hopeless, and hurt. By looking up to the Lord, we can begin to receive the strength, balance, and healing we need to live our best life. And that will bring us more joy in our journey.
I love Christmas time! Why wouldn’t anyone? It’s a time of merriment, a time for drawing near to family and dear friends, and a time for rejoicing in the goodness of God. That said, many LDS singles radiate negativity during the holidays. Last week I advocated the perspective that even the worst days can be great days if we recognize every day as a gift from God. Some may find that perspective hard to grasp, especially if they’ve been so focused on the negative aspects of their lives that their reality is overwhelmingly negative. That’s why we all need to spread the cheer of the holiday season. Reaching out to others in that spirit of the season can help them to find a better focus that can lead to a better reality. And helping others to experience joy can bring joy into our own lives. That’s what those who feel overwhelmed with negativity during the holidays really need. They need to feel loved so that they in turn can help others to feel loved. We can kickstart that cycle of joy in their lives as well as ours when we reach out and spread the cheer. Obey the law Yeah, life is hard, and woe to you because you’re single. I get it. Believe me, having been single for more than 20 years, I really do get it. Here’s what I also get — happiness comes from giving your all to the right things. Negativity and a constant vision of what you lack is never one of those right things. It never has been, and it never will be. That’s because the universe obeys natural law, one of which is the Law of the Harvest. You can’t get carrots from planting apple seeds. If you want to reap carrots, plant carrot seed. Likewise, if you want to reap happiness, then plant happiness seed. And what’s happiness seed? It’s giving your all to the right things. Certainly keeping those covenants we have made is among those right things. But it’s more than just checking items off a to-do list. It’s a way of being that defines who we are. That means giving to others can’t be just a project or something nice to do. It has to express a sincere interest in sharing joy we really feel inside. Lend a hand It’s certainly hard to share something you don’t have. Serving others can bring positivity to those overwhelmed with negativity. But negativity doesn’t prompt positive action, which provides an obstacle for those who most need to take such action. That’s why we need to reach out and lend a hand. Natural law still holds true regardless of what anyone chooses. Those who focus on negativity will have a negative reality. If we choose to help them, they might change their focus, which will give them a different reality. If we choose not to help them, they likely won’t change their focus and will reap the same reality they’ve been having. That’s why we need to spread the cheer. A positive reality comes only from a positive focus. Being creatures of habit, we all need some external force to break the bonds of inertia that keeps us keeping on in negative habits. We can provide that external force for others when we spread cheer into their lives. Solomon once said, “A merry heart maketh a cheerful countenance: but by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken” (Proverbs 15:13). We need to fill the tank of others so they then and fill the tanks of still others. If you’ve ever had to run on empty, you know how difficult it can be to continue serving others when you really need someone to serve you.
What a glorious promise! The Lord will lead us to every blessing we lack. How can we believe Him and not rejoice? We have every reason for cheer.
And we have every reason to spread the cheer to others. So what cheer are you spreading? Whose heart will be lifted because of your cheer? When we spread the cheer of the holiday season in any season, we share the love of our Lord such that we cannot help but also be partakers. And that brings more joy into all of our journeys.
We all have those times when we feel the elements of life oppressing us to the point of pure exhaustion. Those experiences are part of mortality. That’s by design. I know this doesn’t really compare with my trials earlier this year, but I really didn’t want to return to work this week. Having all last week off was most welcome. This semester has been a grueling one for us instructors as well as for our students. We were all ready for a break. But it didn’t seem like enough to me. Even midweek, I’m still struggling to return to the typical swing. Whatever their shape or size, hard times come to everyone. Many of the challenges we LDS singles face are tailored to our unique circumstances, but guess what? So are everyone else’s. Again, that’s by design. Such days call for added perspective, renewal of purpose, and a return to our journey along the path to our heavenly home. Add to your perspective No matter how events in your life unfold, some truths remain constant. God still lives. He still loves you and is still aware of the smallest details in your life. The restored gospel is still true. Prophets and apostles are still living on the earth. Priesthood power and authority are still accessible. And the covenants you’ve made with God are still in effect and full of power provided you’re still faithful. You also still have the opportunity to start over. Every day is a gift from God because each one brings a new opportunity to try again. Even your worst day is a great day when viewed that way. I’ve discussed before the importance of recognizing that every trial we endure will eventually pass. I’ve also touched on using our God-given gift of agency to leverage the obstacles before us into opportunities. Looking for how you can grow from your experiences may not make the unpleasant ones less unpleasant, but it will give you added strength to endure them with joy and increased gratitude to God. Those experiences refine you so you become more like your Heavenly Father. And that prepares you by design to live with Him in a state of eternal happiness. Renew your purpose Understanding that design positions you to renew your journey with hope for the future. You weren’t put here to fail. You were put here to succeed, and that gloriously! Knowing opportunity exists amid the obstacles in your path invites you not only to see with new eyes but also to renew your sense of purpose with faith in a loving God Who will provide the tools you need to succeed. I’ve long advocated LDS singles adopt a personal ministry, a personalized approach to bring goodness into the world. Having a personal ministry allows you to focus on the positive aspects of every circumstance because that brings what you can do into higher resolution. Many LDS singles feel unfulfilled because they want to progress towards eternal marriage but for one reason or another don’t. Staying stuck means no progress, and no progress means no fulfillment. Personal ministries can help LDS singles to find fulfillment in advancing an agenda designed to benefit their brothers and sisters in their mortal journeys. Your focus becomes your reality, so when you focus on advancing your personal ministry, your reality finds you an active advocates of positivity rather than a pathetic victim whimpering in a helpless corner of life. Return to your journey By throwing yourself into your unique way to increase goodness in the world, you can access a strength available only as you serve others with all your heart. That strength allows you to renew your purpose along the journey home through mortality. You’re never abandoned because heavenly help is always available. Your journey home in mortality can be divided into the individual days you spend here. Each day is a gift from God bringing the opportunity to begin again. No matter how bad any number of previous days may have been, each morning the sun rises to reveal a clean slate before you. What will we do with that new opportunity? Even the worst days are great days because every day is a gift from God. He has given you the space and the tools you need to grow and become like Him. And He has given you the agency allowing you to choose for yourself. Each day you get another opportunity. What will you do with yours? I hope you’ll add to your perspective, renew your purpose, and then return to your journey to your heavenly home with positive energy and optimism for your future. We all have great reasons to hope. Focusing on those reasons will bring all of us more joy in our journey.
With Thanksgiving just around the corner, it’s no surprise I’m addressing gratitude. Last Thanksgiving I promoted gratitude as a lifestyle, a way of being that defines who we are. I was all set to dive further into that concept. But today I feel prompted to move in a slightly different direction. Maybe it’s something I need or (more probably) something someone else needs. Gratitude is about appreciating what we have, but far too often we LDS singles, influenced by the family-centered culture of the Church, look to escape the singles life we have. It’s hard to appreciate what you have when you’re always looking to run from it. That means if we LDS singles are going to embrace gratitude as a lifestyle and not just an attitude, we need to be grateful to be single. You can see it I can understand singles balking at that prospect, especially if they view singles life as undesirable. And often they’re justified. Who wants to go through life with loneliness, the pain of relationships that were either broken or never took place, and the constant feeling you don’t quite belong at church? No one in their right mind would want any of that. But gratitude doesn’t mean you stop wanting a better situation for yourself. It means you recognize and cherish the good about your situation. And you can do that regardless of your circumstances. No matter how bad you may have it, you’ll always have something good in every situation you encounter in life. That’s the design behind mortality. We often focus on this mortal life as a test with challenges to conquer and assume those challenges are mostly negative. But when we focus too much on overcoming the negative we can miss seeing the positive right there in front of us. Part of the test in mortality is to distinguish between the bitter and the sweet, the good and the bad. That means we need to be presented with the sweet and the good in order to learn that lesson. In His tender mercy to all of us, the Lord gives us good in every single day. That’s something to be grateful for. You can choose it Because there’s good in every day of every life regardless of one’s circumstances, and we have the glorious gift of agency, we can choose to be grateful for that good. True gratitude doesn’t depend on your circumstances. That’s because it’s a way of being. Your focus determines your reality. If you look for goodness in every situation, the opportunity in every obstacle, and the tender mercies around you everywhere, then goodness, opportunity, and tender mercies will fill your reality. If, on the other hand, you constantly see the bad in every situation, the obstacle before you as only an obstacle, and an absence of God’s love even though it’s right there in front of you every single day, then all the negative elements you choose to see will comprise your reality. We choose our reality when we choose our focus. You can be it When who we are naturally chooses that better reality, we’ve positioned ourselves to feel gratitude in every circumstance simply because that’s who we are. But if you’re not that way yet, you may be asking, “What’s so good about being single that we should be grateful?” Speaking for myself, I can come and go as I please. I don’t need to ask for “permission” or tell someone else what I’m doing. There’s been many a weekend when I just got in my car and left. It’s easier for me to change my life. I just decide what I want and then do it. My married friends need to reach an agreement with their spouse. That’s not always easily won. Changing the course of your ship is easier when that ship is small. It’s also easier for me to build my career. Not having someone waiting for me at home means I can spend whatever extra time I need at work whenever I want. That’ll put me in a better position for supporting that family when they are there in my home. If you’re a single parent with kids, none of that probably applies to you. But then you have something I don’t — the constant reminder of God’s love embodied in each and every one of your children. By no means is my list comprehensive or applicable to all singles, but that’s the point. Gratitude is highly personal, so your combination of elements comprising your gratitude will differ from mine. What elements comprise your gratitude? When you embrace those positive aspects of your singles life, you’ll feel much better about yourself, your world, and your future. And you’ll have more joy in your journey.
Heaven indeed hears our cries. This past weekend the Church released a new series of seven videos. I’m excited to see what seems like the Brethren in Salt Lake attempting to change the culture of the Church. Without diminishing the role of the family in the gospel plan, they seem to be encouraging members to replace our current family-centered culture with a Christ-centered culture, one in which all members feel they belong. The speakers in the new videos don’t directly call out the problem of singles not fitting in with the family-centered culture of the Church, although they scream that very message as I watch them. I suspect the Brethren want to speak in more general terms so their message can have broader application. Whatever their reasoning, I support the Brethren. Although not every video addresses the problem many singles have with attending church, most of them do. And they do it without mentioning the words single, married, or family. Here’s the new videos by speaker and title.
Note that all the brethren are apostles and the two sisters serve in general auxiliary presidencies. Although all these videos are outstanding, the comments from Elder Christofferson and Sister McConkie most impressed me. Walking together Since I’m a gentleman, let’s consider the lady first. Sister McConkie does a bang-up job of calling attention to the neglected and ignored among us. Even though she never says the word single, you know she’s talking about singles. Sister McConkie admits she knows “people who come to church every Sunday so they can be inspired and uplifted and who just simply walk away feeling judged and unloved, unneeded, like there is no place for them at church. We need to do this differently.” Can I get an amen? Seriously, if that’s not a call to change the culture, albeit a tongue-in-cheek one, I don’t know what is. She continues, We cannot allow judgement to dictate the way we interact with people. It’s just not right. . . . We just cannot be or even call ourselves a disciple of Christ if we are not helping others along that path. The gospel of Jesus Christ does not marginalize people. People marginalize people. And we have to fix that. We need to be sensitive and love them and allow them the opportunity to grow and to blossom and to be their best selves. They have talents and abilities and personality that is needed in the kingdom of God, and if we’re going to build the kingdom of God on the earth we need everyone to come, to come and do their part. And we need to recognize that. When anyone’s shadow darkens the door of the chapel, they ought to feel immediately embraced and loved and lifted and inspired, that when they walk out that door, to go and be better because they know the Lord loves them and because they have friends in their faith. Wow! That sweet vision would make a wonderful reality for LDS singles everywhere! We need to walk together, singles and marrieds, helping each other along the journey to our eternal home. I love that bit about building the kingdom. If we’re going to be serious — I mean really serious — about building God’s Kingdom on earth, then we have to include every faithful soul. We do play a part, but it’s not about us. It’s about everyone, and that means reaching out to include everyone so everyone can play their part. Coming together Elder Christofferson does no less in maintaining that glorious banner. He directly pursues the question of fitting in with a positive and emphatic yes. Like the speakers in the other videos, he never uses words like single, married, and family. Yet we all know his words apply in that context. He then brings up Paul’s classic analogy that we’re all “many members yet but one body” in Christ (1 Corinthians 12:20). I especially love Paul’s rhetoric questions: "If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling?” (1 Corinthians 12:15–17) In God’s design for His Kingdom, everyone willing to make covenants with Him is needed. The problem comes when many LDS singles don’t feel needed. I love how Elder Christofferson acknowledges the reality of such feelings and then offers a two prong solution: The diversity we find now in the Church may be just the beginning. Frankly, I think we’ll see greater and greater diversity. In the ancient church there was tremendous diversity. And it’s not just diversity for diversity’s sake, but the fact that people can bring different gifts and perspectives and the wide range of experience and backgrounds and challenges that people face will show us what really is essential in the gospel of Christ and that much of the rest that’s been perhaps acquired over time and is more cultural than doctrinal can slip away and we can really learn to be disciples. So on the one hand, we’ve got to be better as a people at receiving and helping and walking together with everybody, and on the other hand, every individual needs to be determined that they’re going to have a place in the kingdom of God. They’re going to have a place in the body of Christ. And others who are thoughtless or careless or worse can’t prohibit that, can’t drive them away, can’t take it away from them” (emphasis added). Yes, LDS singles need to own their life and control their reality by controlling their focus. At the same time, I love Elder Christofferson’s recognition that some of what we do is “more cultural than doctrinal [and] can slip away.” I’ll gladly place our alienating family-centered culture on that list. Of course, changing that culture means coming together and being real disciples of the Master. But isn’t that we should be doing anyway? Rising together A new day is dawning. The time when LDS singles needed to have the mark of belonging to the Church community to get the help they need is dying. Rising is a time when true disciples of the Lord reach out and bring all willing to make covenants with God together in a grand, diverse unity of the faith. Single and married will be situations, not identities. And the culture we embrace and promote will center on the Savior, He Who spilt His precious blood so that all of us could be redeemed. The time has come for us to walk together. The time has come for us to embrace a true unity of the faith. The time has come for us to be true disciples of Christ and start building the Kingdom for real. The time has come for us to change the culture.
blog and program immediately afterwards is challenging. But this time around the choice was clear. From the moment I heard President Russell M Nelson speak, I knew his address was the one. How could it not be? In his address, entitled “Joy and Spiritual Survival,” President Nelson discusses how to feel joy amidst the trials of life. That’s very much in line with Joy in the Journey Radio, a project I developed to spread positive energy into the lives of LDS singles everywhere. President Nelson’s remarks directly promote that purpose. In addition, those remarks provided unanticipated blessings. Although many of the references are simply scriptural citations, quite a few include comments that elucidate his main address. Including them (as I do in parentheses in the portions I’ll quote) provides helpful perspectives. I also found further answers for the questions I posed last week regarding local leaders who fail to support singles. Taking my own medicine Let’s tackle that elephant first. In the middle of his address, President Nelson taught, “Saints can be happy under every circumstance. We can feel joy even while having a bad day, a bad week, or even a bad year! My dear brothers and sisters, the joy we feel has little to do with the circumstances of our lives and everything to do with the focus of our lives” [emphasis added]. I had the answer in front of me the whole time. How long have I been preaching that your focus determines your reality? It’s a bedrock principles of my blog and this program. By focusing on the lack of support and love from my local leaders, I created a reality in which I felt unsupported and unloved. How thankful I am to President Nelson for reminding me to take my own medicine! That doesn’t excuse local leaders who fail to support singles. I’ll never excuse inaction due to ignorance. If you need to learn something in order to move ahead, then please accept one word of free advice — learn! We don’t always have all the answers we need in life, but that’s the way it’s supposed to be. Looking for those answers helps us to grow. And we can’t always do life alone; that’s why we have each other. We’re supposed to help each other as we journey home. Seeking the positive In reality, we all need to balance help we provide ourselves and help from others. Marriage is designed to provide much of the support outside ourselves. Singles by definition aren’t married and so are more out of balance to begin with. That concept seems simple, yet it never ceases to amaze me how many local leaders don’t seem to realize that a greater measure of imbalance means we singles need a greater measure of help to make up the difference. Confronted with that situation, we can very easily focus on the injustice of the inequity. But when we do, we compound the problem by preventing ourselves from being part of the solution. We need to help our local leaders just as much as we need them to help us. Where there is ignorance, we should educate. Where they show lack concern, we should show greater concern. President Nelson hit the nail on the head when he declared,
When we confront the injustices that come naturally from being single in a family-centered culture, we must place our focus on Christ and the positive benefits our challenges can offer. If we see only the obstacles, we’ll never see the opportunities. Every challenge comes with opportunity to bless, to uplift, and to increase goodness in a world starving for it. True disciples of Christ will always seek those opportunities. Rejecting the negative Seeking the positive is only one side of the joy coin. We also need to reject the negative. President Nelson declared, “Anything that opposes Christ or His doctrine will interrupt our joy. That includes the philosophies of men, so abundant online and in the blogosphere.” President Nelson also taught that the unrighteous can never feel joy “not in this world nor in the world to come” because “joy is a gift for the faithful. (Righteous Saints ‘who have endured the crosses of the world … shall inherit the kingdom of God, … and their joy shall be full forever’ (2 Nephi 9:18).) It is the gift that comes from intentionally trying to live a righteous life, as taught by Jesus Christ. (For examples, see 2 Nephi 27:30; Alma 27:16–18.)” Christ is the great prototype. Following His example can help us to feel joy even in the midst of great trial. President Nelson declared,
Yes, our local leaders won’t always get it when it comes to ministering to singles. And injustice will often result. But we can better endure those moments by focusing on the Savior and our covenants to follow Him. Doing that places us in a better position to be heard by our local leaders. And doing that can open us to the joy of Christ, a joy that can swallow all of our sufferings and that can be ours every day.
We’ve all fallen short at times. No one’s perfect. We’re all works in progress. Yet too often we focus on our imperfections. We wonder how we could ever obtain eternal blessings when we just aren’t good enough. We’re not tall enough or thin enough or funny enough or beautiful enough or strong enough or whatever enough. We can go insane focusing on what we lack. Because your focus becomes your reality, focusing on what you lack produces a reality of lack. It’s impossible to feel competent when you always focus on how you fail to achieve. It’s impossible to feel optimistic when you always focus on pessimism. But the reverse is also true. It’s impossible to feel incompetent when you always focus on what you’ve achieved and what you can do. It’s impossible to feel pessimistic when you always focus on optimism and reasons to believe in a bright and glorious future. We each have a choice every single day regarding the perspective we’ll embrace. I choose to say “Enough with enough!” It’s half full and half empty We’ve all heard how perspective in life is like a partially filled glass of water. Is the glass half full or half empty? Seeing the glass as half empty brings pessimism. Seeing the glass as half full brings optimism. I agree our focus determines our reality. That’s why I say the glass is both half full and half empty. Yes, we want to be positive. But ignoring our problems just isn’t smart. Nature teaches that weeds will infest your garden unless you act appropriately. Likewise, ignoring the problems in the garden of your life allows those weeds to grow and fester. Yes, look to the positive. Then take the energy and optimism that perspective gives you to tackle the negative. See the opportunities in your obstacles. Believe in possibility, and make changes in yourself so you increase your probability of success. You’re already enough Of course, you should see the glass as half full before you see it as half empty. That approach fortifies you to overcome your challenges. We can all easily answer what’s wrong with our lives. But what good is in your life? When you follow the advice of the hymn and count your blessings, you’ll start to see how much good you really do have in your life. As wrong as you may feel your life is going, there’s always something going right. Last summer I faced the loss of a very special relationship. Yet in the midst of that experience, the Spirit directed my attention to how much I loved my job and how much it allowed me to contribute to improving the lives of others. While it felt like one part of my life was going very wrong, another was going very right. Focusing on that right part helped me to feel how blessed I really am. Amplifying positive perspectives and experiences in your life grants strength to confront and overcome your challenges. Of no perspective is that more true than of the Atonement. That consummating act of the Lord’s pure love proves you’re already enough. Would He have suffered and died as He did if you weren’t? Of course not. Additionally, the Atonement means He’ll never abandon you. He provides you with many tender mercies every single day. He’ll always be there to help you know your next step and have the strength to take it. You are a conqueror With that strength, you can conquer any challenge before you. You can transform any setback into an advantage. You can find opportunities in any obstacle. Rather than ignoring the “half empty” aspects of your life, you can confront them with confidence and come off conqueror. What obstacle keeps you from your eternal blessings? Are you not funny enough? Say “Enough with enough!” and partner with the Lord to know how to work on improving that skill while searching for that someone who thinks your skill level is enough. Are you not beautiful enough? Say “Enough with enough!” and partner with the Lord to know how to work on improving yourself while searching for that someone who thinks you are enough. And so it goes with any area in which you think you aren’t enough. Say “Enough with enough!” Then partner with the Lord to know what changes you need to make in yourself and get to work. You weren’t sent here to fail. You were sent here to succeed, and that gloriously. Stop focusing on how you aren’t good enough. Say “Enough with enough!” And then get to work on changing you. When you do, you can change your life and have more joy in your journey. When I was a boy, I loved riding my red bicycle. Then one day my father suggested we take the training wheels off my bike. I was really confused. How could my dad want me to fall flat on my face? Despite my staunch resistance, my dad more staunchly and patiently persisted in moving me forward. He offered to hold the bike while I rode. My little kid brain couldn’t understand how that solved anything. I could pedal faster than he could run, so how would he keep up to balance the bike? Surely facial scars were in my near future. But my dad simply waited and did the deed while I watched Saturday morning cartoons. When I realized he was outside with my bike, I rushed to find him fastening the last nut after removing the training wheels. My dad tried to curtail my obvious angst by suggesting I now give riding my bike a try with his help. Reluctantly I mounted the bike. Because deep down I trusted that my dad really didn’t want to hurt me, I began riding down the street. I soon realized my dad wasn’t holding the bike, and I wasn’t falling on my face! I couldn’t understand it, but it was incredible. I was happier riding that bike than I had ever been, and since then I’ve never even so much as thought of using training wheels again. Keep pedaling This experience applies directly to LDS singles trying to navigate life. Although my kid brain couldn’t understand it, I later learned that forward motion balances a bike without training wheels. Moving the bike forward supplies the forces needed to keep the bike in balance. To prevent myself from falling on my face, I just need to keep pedaling. Very often we LDS singles feel we’ve fallen flat on our face. We see others getting married and wonder where our blessings are. Or we experience a very painful loss of a marriage we thought would last forever. We wonder how our lives won’t end up with us falling flat on our face forever. The way to prevent that is the same in life as it is on the bike without training wheels. We need to keep moving forward. It’s the forward motion that keeps the bike and our lives in balance. Leverage success Bad situations are part of mortality. Dwelling on the negativity of your bad situation will perpetuate imbalance. Your focus always becomes your reality. So look ahead to better times and move forward towards them. That may be challenging if you feel like you’ve never been successful. I used to think I’d never succeed at dating because I didn’t look like a movie star and wasn’t otherwise “good enough.” But that focus on my failures brought me a life filled with failure because your focus always becomes your reality. How do you improve your focus? Everyone has experienced success somewhere. Use that success to leverage success at small wins in new areas. Those small wins can help propel you to greater success with bigger wins. Don't go it alone Sometimes you simply won’t have the strength to go it alone. That’s OK because you’re not supposed to do life alone. Reach out to the Lord and partner with Him. Just as my dad initially held my bike so I could take the leap of faith I needed to ride without training wheels, so the Lord will hold you so you can take your leap of faith. That’s what partners do, and the Lord loves you more than any other partner you could ever have. You’re not here in this world by chance. You’re here as part of a noble plan designed to promote your growth into something so amazingly incredible you can’t really imagine it. And guess Who designed that plan? A Heavenly Father who loves you so immensely that anything less than your growth into an exalted, celestial being would never be His ultimate objective. You’re not here to fail. You’re here to succeed, and that gloriously! The way to succeed is to keep moving forward. The obstacles in your path may seem huge, but the power of the Lord’s Atonement is greater than any power any other opposition may offer. Partner with Him and keep moving forward. Just as I learned to balance my bike without training wheels by continuing to move forward, so LDS singles can balance their lives without a spouse by continuing to move forward. Partnering with the Lord can help you to know what you need to do to move forward and provide the strength you need to do it. So what are you waiting for? Partner with the Lord today, and enjoy the serenity of a life in balance.
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Howdy! I'm Lance, host of Joy in the Journey Radio. I've been blogging about LDS singles life since 2012, and since 2018 I've been producing a weekly Internet radio show and podcast to help LDS singles have more joy in their journey and bring all Latter-day Saints together. Let's engage a conversation that will increase the faith of LDS singles and bring singles and marrieds together in a true unity of the faith.
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