Steam of consciousness - follow the prophet

following the prophet doesn't mean I blindly give my allegiance to him and do everything he asks without question.

It simply is a disposition. I am disposed to give the prophet the benefit of the doubt. Upon my own searching and prayer, I will then take action.

What we are taught as Church members is that, if you search and pray, you will find the same answers that the prophet has given.

What happens when you don't get those same answers?

Implication is you need to wait for a time. you need to trust in the Lord. Perhaps there is something in your life that is not in line with the commandments? This is where the difficulty arises.

If I am not living the commandments, the Church says my understanding of God's word to me may be influenced by my unrighteous thinking or actions. Like looking through a dirty lens.

On the other hand, if I feel that my actions are not sinful, then I may question the validity of the prophet. I think this is where many people are at today. They do not see how their actions are sins. They think their ideas are good, they are right, and it is the prophet and apostles who are living in a false tradition that has passed out of fashion.

What about me? I believe that God speaks to me. There are many habits and attitudes that I believe would be healthy for me to live, that I do not live. I then question my ability to judge the rightness or wrongness of what the prophet says is a good way to live. Until I can live in the way my conscience tells me I should live, I feel unqualified to make a judgment on anyone else's life or ideas.

But I give the prophet the benefit of the doubt. I lean towards the side of believing the prophet.

Saying how you feel is different than saying what you think.

That's what I'm learning lately.

Until recently, I've always told people about my thoughts. I experience a feeling. Then I examine my thoughts. Then I talk about how my thoughts are connected to the feeling. But I'm not really talking about the feeling itself.

I've lived a lot of my life with the idea that feelings are caused by what happens to me. If someone does something I don't like, then I feel uncomfortable or angry or frustrated.

So then I tell someone that what they did was wrong because it resulted in me feeling badly. And that doesn't usually go over well with people. So. When I tell people just a simple emotion that I'm feeling, the outcome is different.

For example, if I open with, "You did 'x' and I'm angry about that," then people get defensive. It's not the words that I use. It's an attitude: the attitude of "you were wrong to do 'x'."

If I say, "I'm angry," then I'm not starting the conversation with a judgment. And then people around me can respond sympathetically, which allows me to focus on my feelings, instead of on what the other person did.

Mystified Gratitude

Adara broke her arm on Halloween day. Today I called to find the latest total for the three appointments she had. I was surprised to learn my balance was zero, as I had not submitted it to my healthcare ministry.

Medicaid paid the bill in full. I don't know why. We used a Medicaid from October 2015 to April 2016 because a jon had been fired from his job. I don't know why, 6 months after our eligibility ended, they paid the bill. I am happy they did.

Adding to the mystery is that the same child saw a doctor in June for a ruptured eardrum. We paid out of pocket for that (our insurance at that time was mostly catastrophic insurance). Why would Medicaid pay the broken arm but not the burst eardrum? Again, I don't really care about the reason.

2017 Goals

1. Diet
Feeling: Feed my body like it was a newborn baby body.
***Practice: Find one new vegetable, or a new method or recipe that maximizes nutrition, tastes pretty good, is on the easy-ish side to prepare and keep on-hand, and is sustainable over several months of eating.
****Easy, one-time goal -- get a good multivitamin routine started
(Also - supplements that support healthy hair)
***Deadline: April 30, 2017


2. Exercise
****Feeling: My mind and body are healthy when I'm happy with what I'm doing
****Practice: Find fun ways to move my body with my kids. YouTube videos on dance, martial arts, balance balls, yoga. Swimming, biking, gymnastics, roller blading. Hiking, rock climbing, weight lifting, pilates ...
(Also - look for how to tone abdominal muscles)
****Deadline -- Do activity with kids at least 2 times each week, before Saturday


3. Relationships
****See the world with mindful energy (that light in your eyes when you're doing something you love) in day-to-day tasks, including and especially, in my interactions with children and husband, and also with people in general.
ALSO -- the more energy you put into life, the more energy you have.

****Practice: Read with kids. Play puzzles. Singing / playing piano. Pattern games, math games coloring together as a family. Sewing. Drawing. Art time. Science games. strategy games .... find ways to enjoy one another that everyone is happy with, and doesn't involve just "watching t.v."

****Deadline -- Do at least ONE of this type of activity every week. Perhaps on Sunday morings. Or Monday evening?

Equality and Relativism. Mormonism and Atheism

Rough Draft -- thoughts after reading this article:

http://happiness-seekers.com/2017/01/02/the-alarming-truth-behind-anti-mormonism/


The question of equality is one that particularly has concerned me. This issue first came to my awareness when I was studying the Civil Rights movement. I'm still exploring the ideas of equality, but one thing you said was helpful. "Simply put, society will be governed completely by what individuals think they want and need—as opposed to a sense of duty and obligation to some higher truth about good and evil or directives from Heaven."

I've heard this basic idea from my atheist friends. "Social rules are the result of human evolution" is how I understand it. That, of course, means that social rules are subjective. And that means the rules can change. So, for example, with the abolition of slavery, we changed the rules. That's a good thing. Women having more equal treatment. Also good. Disabled people, LGBT, different religions -- all are alike. This is an idea from scripture that we believe is true. Only in scripture the idea is that all are alike unto God. Which means there is a standard. God is the standard. If people decide what the standard is ... I'm pretty sure I don't trust any one person, or any group of people, to create a better standard than the one God has made. If they try to reinvent God's standard, well, okay, except for people tend to get distracted, especially over long periods of time. I just don't trust people. I guess I don't understand why atheists do?

I do believe people can improve, they can grow and become more gentle, patient, just and merciful at once. And I believe they become such by following the standard of conduct decreed by the Supreme Ruler of the Universe. I guess I don't see how humankind, as a whole, will ever agree to a common standard of conduct that will bring people to ever greater fulfillment .

New Eyes

I have just returned from a 10 day meditation retreat where I basically lived like a Buddhist nun for 10 days, including a vow of silence, vegetarian meals, and seated, immobile meditation for 10 hours a day.

I find my emotions more subdued than is normal for me. Perhaps it is partly due to the cold I avoided acquiring for the entire time I was in the Vipassana retreat, but finally caught up to me the day after I returned home. Time will tell if my former energetic mind will return. Though I have to say, I think I could get used to this calmer mind.

Before writing this post, I scanned through the most recent ones. It has not been a good year (or two!) for ponderings. I feel I could just delete them all and start over. (I initially wrote "start again", but that phrase now brings a bit of a raw feeling to my emotions after hearing it repeatedly during the retreat).

That's all that I find to say that is real for now.

Midnight Musings

Do you ever have a feeling come over you like, everything around you is quiet and the thoughts in your head feel more real than anything has for months?

Here is the fruit of tonight's quiet ponder session. My ideas about God have been conglomerating over the years, a bit here and a piece there. This is my first attempt, really, to write anything down.

Believing in God is an inner search and an outward sharing. When I look for God, as I pray or ponder His words, I am looking within myself. I consider myself to be more than a physical construct. There is an essence to being human that is not simply a combination of the different aspects of flesh, bone, electric impulses, and other chemicals. The whole is more than the sum of its parts. I don’t know when that idea first originated, but I believe I understand what it means, as applied to a human being. That essence is what I call the Divine. God is Divine. I am His child, and just like I inherited my hair color from my mother, I have inherited divine personality traits from my Father in Heaven. When I seek to know God, I begin by seeking to know myself.

If seeking for God is inward, then the success at finding Him is measured outwardly. I feel either a sense of connection, or a sense of distance, as I interact with others. I define the connection to be the divine in others. When my ideas don't connect with others' ideas, I re-examine my ideas. The Divine is in the connection. So I ask, what is most important -- the ideas I've come to in the past, or finding harmony with those around me? 

I believe that truth is big enough to allow endless variations on a simple idea. I often see my ideas as variations of what other people believe, even if those other people don't believe as I do. I can see the picture as a coherent whole, where others see discordant ideas.

And, in spite of all the ideas, it is how these others and I behave that determines the most real connection. If there is kindness, mutual respect of the other, and a bit of grace in letting slide the rough spots, then this is real. This is divine. This is God.