When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you're trudging seems all uphill,
When funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest if you must, but don't you quit.
Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about,
When he might have won if he'd stuck it out.
Don't give up, though the pace seems slow -
You may succeed with another blow.
Often the goal is nearer than
It seems to a faint and faltering man;
Often the struggler has given up
When he might have captured the victor's cup,
And he learned too late, when the night slipped down,
How close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out -
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are -
It may be near when it seems afar;
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit -
It's when things seem worst that you mustn't quit.
Author Unknown
White Envelopes
It's just a small, white envelope stuck among the branches of our Christmas tree. No name, no identification, no inscription. It has peeked through the branches of our tree for the past 10 years or so.
It all began because my husband Mike hated Christmas. Oh, not the true meaning of Christmas, but the commercial aspects of it, overspending, the frantic running around at the last minute to get a tie for Uncle Harry and the dusting powder for Grandma, the gifts given in desperation because you couldn't think of anything else.
Knowing he felt this way, I decided one year to bypass the usual shirts, sweaters, ties and so forth. I reached for something special just for Mike. The inspiration came in an unusual way. Our son, Kevin, who was 12 that year was wrestling at the junior level at the school he attended, and shortly before Christmas, there was a non-league match against a team sponsored by an inner-city church.
These youngsters, dressed in sneakers so ragged that shoestrings seemed to be the only thing holding them together, presented a sharp contrast to our boys in the spiffy blue and gold uniforms and sparkling new wrestling shoes. As the match began I was alarmed to see that the other team was wrestling without headgear, a kind of light helmet designed to protect a wrestler's ears. It was a luxury the ragtag team obviously could not afford. Well, we ended up walloping them. We took every weight class. And as each of their boys got up from the mat, he swaggered around in his tatters with false bravado, a kind of street pride that couldn't acknowledge defeat. Mike, seated beside me, shook his head sadly, "I wish one of them could have won," he said. "They have a lot of potential, but losing like this could take the heart right out of them." Mike loved kids, all kids, and he knew them, having coached little league football, baseball and lacrosse.
That's when the idea of his present came. That afternoon, I went to a local sporting goods store and bought an assortment of wrestling headgear and shoes and sent them anonymously to the inner-city church. On Christmas Eve, I placed the envelope on the tree, the note inside telling Mike what I had done and that this was his gift from me. His smile was the brightest thing about Christmas that year and in succeeding years. For each Christmas, I followed the tradition, one year sending a group of mentally handicapped youngsters to a hockey game, another year a check to a pair of elderly brothers whose home had burned to the ground the week before Christmas, and on and on. The envelope became the highlight of our Christmas. It was always the last thing opened on Christmas morning and our children, ignoring their new toys, would stand with wide-eyed anticipation as their dad lifted the envelope from the tree to reveal its contents. As the children grew, the toys gave way to more practical presents, but the envelope never lost its allure. The story doesn't end there.
You see we lost Mike last year due to dreaded cancer. When Christmas rolled around, I was still so wrapped in grief that I barely got the tree up. But Christmas Eve found me placing an envelope on the tree, and in the morning, it was joined by three more.
Each of our children, unbeknownst to the others, had placed an envelope on the tree for their dad. The tradition has grown and someday will expand even further with our grandchildren standing around the tree with wide-eyed anticipation watching as their fathers take down the envelope. Mike's spirit, like the Christmas spirit, will always be with us.
Nancy W. Gavin
This story is a true story and inspired four siblings from Atlanta, GA to start The White Envelope Project, a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting this tradition and charitable giving. The White Envelope Project founders are regularly in touch with the family in the article and are thrilled to have their support. The Gavin family and now thousands of others continue to celebrate the "white envelope" tradition each year. For more information about The White Envelope Project or to honor a loved one through a "white envelope" gift this year, please visit their website: www.WhiteEnvelopeProject.org
1. Happiness is a Plan - Designed by God
Joseph Smith said: "Happiness is the object and design of our existence and will be the end thereof."
2. Happiness is a gift - Given to us by God
The gift of happiness was given to us by Heavenly Father and it is an eternal principle - with conditions of course. Our Heavenly Father loves us so much that he wanted us to have a wonderful time together, to experience joy, love, and to bask in his spirit which is the spark of happiness upon this earth. So He gave us this plan which helps prepare us for greater trips in the future. We have a treasure greater than all the kingdoms of the world. Isn't this wonderful! Let me add here that this gift does hold us accountable in the sense that by receiving this gift, we are now designated stewards over our minds. Aren't we a most blessed people to have this plan and gift and stewardship?
3. Happiness is a set of Laws: Lord's part of promise - Law of Harvest- We reap what we sow."
Gal. 6:7-8 "...for whatever a man soweth that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting."
This is an eternal law. The Lord says also in Hebrew 8:10 that “I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts..." The Scriptures tell us that we have "spiritual organs" - known as the heart and the mind and that is where the Lord has implanted the laws of happiness which are there to direct our divine natures. For instance we hear: "Spirit enlightens the mind" and "..I will tell you in your mind."
Brigham Young said: "The greatest mystery a man ever learned, is to know how to control the human mind, and bring every faculty and power of the same in subjection to Jesus Christ; this is the greatest mystery we have to learn while in these tabernacles of clay."
4. Stewardship - Our life's work - Covenant With Lord - To Live Our Divine Nature
In the LDS lexicon, 'Stewardship' is based on the understanding that all things ultimately belong to the Lord, whether it is our property, time, talents, families, capacity for service or our minds and hearts, and even our very breath.
We are "trustees" of the Lord's plan of happiness. To be trustees we know from managing our earthly assets that we have to have some awareness, accountability, we have to believe in our financial managers, that takes faith, and we have to choose. If we make errors we are quick to repair the choices and reestablish equilibrium.
DIVINE NATURE - Our goal as stewards over our happiness is to live our divine nature, know who we are, and act out of that spiritual nature. When we do that - there is unity, harmony, love and beauty and of course happiness.
Elder Boyd K. Packer has informed us that stewardship over the mind is difficult and it takes a certain amount of awareness to do it.
"The mind is like a stage. Except when we are asleep the curtain is always up. There is always some act being performed on that stage. It may be a comedy a tragedy, interesting or dull, good or bad, but always there is some act playing on the stage of the mind. Have you noticed that without any real intent on your part in the middle of almost any performance, a shady little thought may creep in from the wings and attract your attention?”
“These delinquent thoughts will try to upstage everybody. If you permit them to go on, all thoughts of virtue will leave the stage. You will be left, because you consented to it, to the influence of unrighteous thoughts." (Conference Report Oct. 73: p.24)
STAYING CONNECTED----Our stewardship must consist of staying connected to our "real self" and that means to that part of us that lived in the pre-existence and is now housed in this body. This Spirit requires our care and love, protection and devotion. It is in our keeping. We are like a type of parent to our spirit, AND BECAUSE IT IS INVISIBLE, AND INSIDE OF US, WE TEND TO FORGET IT IS THERE, AND NEGLECT IT, all the while it cries out for our attention as it is encompassed by the darkness.
So if we stay connected to our inner self, we will have access to the great store house of knowledge that is within, and we will discover that we know more than we know. That means that our head and our heart must communicate with each other in a unified way. A partnership is not only required between us and Heavenly Father and our Savior Jesus Christ, but we are commanded to partner with our selves. The Commandment to "love thy neighbor as thy self" cannot be fulfilled unless we have sacred love for our divine nature...that part of us that is unified in harmony for the purpose of happiness. Our head needs our heart. And we need to the spirit to keep them together. They head tends to wander...and we have to pull it back away from the worldly temporal thoughts and back to spiritual perspective on everything. Why:
ENDOWMENTS MOSES 6:61
Because Our Spirit has these capabilities as endowments (there are 8) spoken of in Moses 6:61: I have condensed some.
1. It knows everything. It has an eternal perspective on everything and I mean everything. It knows the record of heaven. Knows the truth when heard.
2. Possesses spiritual sensitivity, understands immortal glory and can spirit talk. Quickens the spirit. Enlivens other spirits.
3. Great awareness, sees logic, and knows when things are not right-makes all things alive.
4. Has all power for wisdom mercy, truth, justice, and judgment. Possesses Deep empathy, understanding, and love..."
5. Has the Holy Comforter - which dwells there
HAPPY PEOPLE -The celestial kingdom will only accommodate happy people, so it is our job to make sure we meet that criteria.
These are all our attributes - aspects of our divine DNA, and WE must use these aspects as part of our living process.
5. It Is A Living Process - (Stewardship makes us Gardeners)
(Alma's ABC's)
We are progressing in our growth and becoming more aware, more accountable, ready to sacrifice some old worn out ideas, and we really need to bump up our discipline of AGENCY so that we can better utilize the teachings that Alma gave to his son Helaman. He gave him a formula for happiness that I call the ABC's. I give these to my clients as an emergency preparedness formula for the care of the mind and heart. It can be used daily, and many times daily throughout our lives to help us get back on track whenever we notice a negative emotional reaction to circumstances in our lives.
Alma teaches us about our inner self. He calls it the 'inner vessel', the place where our minds and hearts dwell, and he says: "Do ye suppose that God will look upon you as guiltless while ye sit still and behold these things? Nay, Now I would that ye should remember that God has said that the INWARD VESSEL SHALL BE CLEANSED FIRST, and then shall the outer vessel be cleansed also." (Alma 60:23) He says also: "Let all thy thoughts be directed unto the Lord; yea let thy affection of thy heart be placed upon the Lord forever." (Alma 37:36) Alma explains, like the great prophet and psychologist that he was, that: "We are spirits living in a temporal body residing in a mortal world, and our work here is to purify our inner spiritual nature to prepare for our return to Heavenly Father. Do not concern yourselves so much with trying to clean up or change the external world. Concentrate on learning how to clean your inner self."
ABC'S - So for simplicity - let's say that we need to follow the ABC'S of the law of our minds and hearts in order to be good stewards and engaged in righteousness to the best of our ability. We can do that! We can be aware and accountable. We can challenge our beliefs and weed out the false ones. It gets easier and easier to do the more we are willing to sacrifice our false beliefs. Most false beliefs concern themselves with these subjects: PAIN AVOIDANCE, POSITION, and POWER. Pain avoidance is the number one false belief that I see. "I shouldn't be hurting, if only...". Our part of the atonement principle is to allow mortal pain to wash over us without becoming angry. That way, the Lord's atonement will still be force for us. But, if we take our pain back from Him, and try to manage it ourselves, feel like a victim, engage in self comfortering - we lose the precious umbrella of the atonement's power over our personal pain. So let's wake up...watch carefully how our carnal nature will try to take control of our mind and let's stop it with this formula.
A= Awareness, accountability,
B = Beliefs false, willingness to sacrifice a position or idea.
C = Change or consequence. Our progress and proficiency can be easily measured by how much we begin to notice change in our nature, or how much we are suffering negative consequences.
That is the simple formula that Alma gave us to use daily for stress reduction, happiness enhancement. If we can practice doing it, Alma gives us another promise:
"And then shall it come to pass, that the spirits of those who are righteous are received into a STATE OF HAPPINESS which is called paradise, a state of rest, a state of peace, where they shall rest from all care and sorrow." (Alma 40:12)
6. STATE OF MIND - Result of our Stewardship
(Mechanics of the Mind Handout)
Pres. David O. McKay said, "Man is the creator of his own happiness. It is the aroma of life lived in harmony with high ideals." (Conference Report Oct 1955. p.8)
Ephesians 3:16-19 - "That he would grant you according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the INNER MAN, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, May be able to comprehend with All Saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with the fulness of God."
Heavenly Father and his Son have such a great love for us, “The Lord searcheth all hearts and understandeth all the imaginations of the thoughts.” (1 Chron. 28:9) “He looketh down upon all the children of men, and he knows all the thoughts and intents of the hearts.” (Alma 18:32) The Lord said, “I know the things that come into your mind, every one of them.” (Ezekiel 11:5)
If our hearts and minds are aligned with the mind and will of God, then we are happy. Alma 40:12 says: "And then shall it come to pass, that the spirits of those who are righteous are received into a STATE OF HAPPINESS which is called paradise, a state of rest, a state of peace, where they shall rest from all care and sorrow."
The whole intent of the gospel plan is to provide an opportunity for us to reach our fullest potential, to learn good stewardship over our thoughts, and to achieve happiness - that state wherein we are filled with the spirit of the Lord and find peace of mind in the companionship of the Holy Ghost.
...Carolyn Webb 2007
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