Clear your head

"When you clear your head of faulty assumptions, you can more easily meet with your success.  Embracing all experience opens the door of possibility, increases your probability of success, and helps you to find much more than you ever imagined you could"

If you’re struggling with LDS singles life, and particularly with dating, then you need to examine your attitude and your approach.  Your results in life always come from what you do.  And what you do inside yourself (your attitude) and outside yourself (your approach) comes from your choices.  We’re all choosing the life we want.

Many LDS singles without the life they want need to adjust both attitude and approach.  We touched on some aspects of a more effective approach two weeks ago when we discussed the proper role of revelation in dating.  Then last week we addressed aspects of a more effective attitude.  Neither of these discussions was comprehensive, but they do contain good starting points for positive change.

Here’s another aspect of both attitude and approach: Many LDS singles make assumptions about their world which their habits then use as the basis for action.  But it’s like the old saying goes — garbage in, garbage out.  A more effective attitude and approach begins with more effective assumptions.

Everything goes back to the way you think.  That’s why a periodic reformat and reboot is good; you need to step back, examine your assumptions, and clear your head of anything faulty or less effective.

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Question your assumptions

Sometimes what we think is significant really isn’t.  Many LDS singles reject opportunities for success because their assumptions about what was important or even essential guided them along a different path.  Their assumptions blinded them into thinking what really was an opportunity wasn’t an opportunity.

For example, most singles think the age of their special someone is within 5-6 years of their own.  Why?  Because they assume that’s what they should want.  But often it’s not experience guiding them to adopt that assumption; they’re just being good “sheeple” in following the herd.

Thankfully, President Hinckley’s parents didn’t follow that assumption.  They were separated by 13 years of age.  And their union produced a prophet!

Life will never fully unfold for you until you start questioning your assumptions.  When you let go of what you think you need but really don’t, you open yourself to more possibility.  And that increases your probability of achieving success.

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Don’t discount the good

Many LDS singles interact with other singles only insofar as it serves their agenda.  Once someone no longer serves their agenda, they cease all interactions with that someone.

This faulty approach is itself based on faulty assumptions: Spending time and money on people who won’t progress with you towards marriage is a waste.  That assumes people matter only insomuch as they help you achieve what you want.  In the end, all that really matters is getting the goal.

When you spell it out, it’s not hard to see how ridiculous those assumptions are.  People have inherent worth as children of God.  Everyone matters.  Yet many of us don’t have the self-awareness necessary to realize how ridiculous our own assumptions are.

Yes, lovers should be friends first.  But friendship alone has intrinsic value.  Who couldn’t use more support in facing the challenges of LDS singles life?

Every relationship you have, romantic and otherwise, offers knowledge and experience that can help you have a better relationship with that special someone when that person comes into your life.  By discounting the good many potential friends have to offer, you make life harder than it needs to be.  And you might be staying single longer than needed as well.

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Look for the flecks

Elder M Russell Ballard once told the story of a young man who went to California during the Gold Rush to seek his fortune.  He eagerly panned for gold nuggets like the ones he had heard about before coming west.  But after weeks of effort, he had found nothing.

Then one day he met an older gentleman who had spent many days prospecting and found enough gold to fill a small bag.  The young man was discouraged to learn that gold was not the nuggets for which he searched but rather many tiny flecks.  After hearing his discouragement, the older gentleman responded that those flecks had made him a wealthy man.

If we assume the eternal companion we seek is a gold nugget, then we may be joining that young man in disappointment.  Most people aren’t gold nuggets; they have imperfections aplenty.  Yet they also have flecks of gold mingled among those imperfections.  Choosing to give those gold flecks more weight than the imperfections can make us wealthy indeed.

When you clear your head of faulty assumptions, you can more easily meet with your success.  Embracing all experience opens the door of possibility, increases your probability of success, and helps you to find much more than you ever imagined you could.  And that will bring you more joy in your journey.

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You can listen to the monologue from today's episode of Joy In The Journey Radio here.  Please also feel free to continue the conversation by leaving a comment below.  Want to hear more?  Listen to the whole show by going to the show page for this episode!