Good

There are days when for some reason we just wake up feeling out of it. It isn't that we feel bad, we just are in some foggy state of not feeling anything at all. On days like that I've found that the mood can be quickly changed by simply repeating in you mind the word good.

This works on other occasions also. When negative feelings plague you, push them away by repeating, "Good!" and watch what happens. Or when you want to remember something from the past that is good, but you can't quite think of it, say, "Good" and all sorts of past memories that are good will spring to mind. Hopefully one of them will be the one you want.

But you have to say the word with meaning. There are ways to say good and really mean bad. This only works if you mean what you say!

Make it a good day!

Be a Poet

In George MacDonald’s book On the Back of the North Wind, the North Wind explains to the boy Diamond that a poet is someone who sees something good in the world and then helps other people to see it also. I love that definition of a poet, but I also love the implication that anyone who helps others to see the good in the world is a poet.

I love to read poetry. I love to write poetry. I love language. But a lot of modern poetry is not about seeing the good or helping others see the good. Somehow the literary world has lost its avocation of good and has become an advocate of reality as if reality is a given that can't be disputed—but reality is something we all create. We each have our own reality that we create for ourselves.

So I’m proposing that we all be poets using George MacDonald’s definition. As you walk through your day, see the good, and be a poet--share the good in whatever words you have. Then watch the magic happen as your own reality grows more beautiful.

More on Yesterday's Post

source here

I loved the comments on yesterday’s post. If you didn’t read them Julie started it out by sharing that her niece added to the phrase, “And it came to pass” this, “It didn’t come to stay.” I loved that! Jen shared that she’s waiting for a trial to pass that has lasted six years but in the comment you sense her hope, faith and patience. Wendy liked the reminder, and Rebecca shared how her mother often encouraged her with the words, “And it came to pass. . .” and that remembering those words help her now as she deals with a difficult stage in a child’s life. 

All of these comments brought new thoughts to my mind. I have a student this semester who was born without one arm. She has a couple of fingers that grow out of her shoulder and the other arm goes only to the elbow and she has three fingers there. She is a delightful young woman and has not let her handicap hinder her or make her bitter. This trial won’t “come to pass” for her during this lifetime, but she knows it will eventually come to pass and her optimism is fueled by that knowledge. When you have an eternal perspective you know that because of Jesus Christ all trials will eventually pass.

I also thought about how some people would dismiss this “and it came to pass” statement by saying it is too simplistic or too naive, but I sensed from all of you who commented that trusting in those simple words really does make a difference in how you cope with challenges. 

Thanks to all of you who shared your thoughts. We all learn more by sharing!

Savor the Good

The Savior performed many miracles on the Sabbath day which healed people—made them whole. As I’ve studied these miracles, I’ve come to realize that one of the major purposes of the Sabbath is to heal. It is a day for us to reach out and help heal others—heal their loneliness, their discouragement, their disbelief and other such things. It is also a day for us to do the things that heal us. Obviously things like scripture study and pray and taking the Sacrament all do that, but one we might not think about is counting the good.

The mistakes we make and the sins we commit tend to stick in our minds as if glued there with gorilla glue. They haunt us and drag us down and depress us, but if we’ve repented and desire to do better we need to drop the very thought of those things so they don’t weigh us down. Thinking about anything for too long generates more of that thing whether it’s positive or negative. So filling our minds with positive things not only pushes away the negative, it heals us and motivates us to more good.

Therefore, one of the best things to do on a Sunday to help us heal is to take a few minutes to think back through the past week and identify every good thing we did that week. Savor those things like you’d savor the taste of a good chocolate. Feel the good all over again, and let that good define who you are and where you are going. Good begets more good and centering our thoughts on the good energizes us to do more good.

Get in the habit of doing that every Sunday and watch what happens to your week!

Good Things Are Coming

It’s almost here—Thanksgiving Day! It’s my favorite holiday. I love visiting with family even when my brother lectures me on why I shouldn’t have pierced ears, I love eating delicious food even though I’m a vegetarian and the main part of the meal is turkey, I love watching the children play together even though they are loud and obnoxious, and I love working in the kitchen with people I love even though there are too many chiefs giving orders.  And I’m not being sarcastic here. I really love Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving is the perfect time to stop and evaluate whether you are a glass-half-full or glass-half-empty kind of person. It would be easy to hate Thanksgiving because of any of those negative things (I know people who do!) But it is just as easy to love Thanksgiving because of all the wonderful things that occur. 

This year I’m going to capture every good moment and save it up in my memory bank. Then when life gets a little tough I’m going to make a withdrawal from my memory savings account and enjoy the good moments all over again. Besides being good for the future, I think watching for the wonderful moments will make more of them happen. 

Thank goodness for Thanksgiving!

Think on Good Things

Many of you learned the following way back in your Primary days: “If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things.” (Articles of Faith 13). This is very much like Paul’s admonition to the Philippians: “Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things” (Phil. 4:8).

This advice to seek after and think on what is good is wonderful, and as Isaiah advised one way to do this is by shutting our eyes from seeing evil (Isaiah 33:16). This means to avoid evil and to keep it far from us. But there is something we need to beware of. Sometimes in our effort to avoid evil, we search it out so we can label it and then avoid it. We spend time making sure we know all the hidden meanings in words of songs so we can avoid that song. We make sure we know who the evil people are so we can avoid them and any person they have any contact with. In other words we get so obsessed with avoiding evil that all we are thinking about is evil.

But there is another way to shut our eyes to evil and avoid it. Obviously we avoid the blatantly evil things in life, but the things that are evil by association or because someone says there is a hidden meaning in the words or because there is some distant connection with evil can be avoided by us simply assigning good to it so that when we see or hear that thing we think of good. 

This was brought home to me one day when some Jehovah Witnesses knocked on my door and were teaching me about the evils of Halloween. I knew Halloween had pagan beginnings. But in my own heart Halloween is about children, fun, giving treats, and love—none of which are pagan. In other words, we could all go through life making everything pagan and evil through some association. Or we can go through life making everything as righteous and good as possible and that is the best way to shut our eyes to evil. 

As Elder Bruce R. McConkie said in  General Conference of October 1973, “We must not center our attention on evil and wickedness. We must cease to find fault and look for good in government and in the world. We must take an affirmative, wholesome approach to all things.” That is one way we can seek after and think on good things.

Holding Fast to the Iron Rod

In my Book of Mormon class a few weeks ago we were talking about the dream of the Tree of Life and while discussing the Rod of Iron I mentioned that it is possible to fall off the straight and narrow path on the left or on the right meaning that it isn’t just liberal ideas that can lead us astray, but also ultra conservative ideas. The truth is in the middle.

At that point one of my students asked for examples of falling off the path on the right. I gave him several but just a few days later heard of an amazing example of this. A woman who was concerned with the words to some of the songs her children were listening to started to research on the Internet the singers and their music. Her concern was, of course, to protect her children. But the pursuit began to consume her. She spent hours and hours on-line digging up dirt about how evil the singers were and the hidden messages in the words to their songs. She had evil connotations and meanings most of the songs ever written. Her intent was good, but in so doing all this research, she was drowning herself and filling her mind with all the dirt.

Yes, it is important that we identify evil enough to avoid it. But to spend hours researching it only submerges us in the evil. It reminded me of my growing up during the John Birch era when people were finding evil everywhere and in everything. I once overheard a friend of my mother’s telling her about the evil connotations hidden in the nursery rhyme, “Humpty Dumpty.” Well, to me there were no evil connotations until she put them there. Her intent to help my mother avoid evil only created evil.

This takes us back to the concept that we create our own reality. We can center our minds on the simple fun contained in the rhythm and rhyme of a nursery rhyme and enjoy it every time we hear it, or we can research and assign all kinds of evil connotations to the poem so that every time we hear it we are filled with evil thoughts. As President Monson advised us this last weekend, I’d rather look for, remember, and enjoy the good. That's one of the ways we hold firm to the Iron Rod.

It's Going To Be A Good Day

Carpet outside!It looks better outside than in!

Today is going to be a good day! We have been working VERY hard to paint and get the basement ready for new carpet and today the first installment of the carpet is going to be laid. I am excited. This is long overdue! We should have carpeted years ago, but with Grizelda hanging around in my head I’m afraid it was one of the many things that had to wait until I had my health back.

I am very blessed that Mr J is an expert painter. He worked his way through college in the employ of a contractor and he did a lot of painting in those days which prepared him well to paint our houses! He does a better job than the professionals. Much better! He is amazing. (He's also tired!) The walls look so nice—a pale (off-white) yellow with all the wood trim painted white. It looks so crisp and clean. I love it. And the old carpet, a Berber, was not only dirty, but frayed and worn, and unraveling. (I told you we are way, way past due for new!) I can’t wait until tonight when I can run my bare feet over the soft new carpet and enjoy the results of our two weeks of stressful, tiring painting and hard work.

I’m trying to memorize every moment of this enjoyment so that when the bad days come I can replay this in my head and enjoy it all over again. That’s one of the nice things about good days. They are relivable and when I relive it I can forget about the two weeks of hard work and just relive this one day of pure satisfaction!

I hope you have a good day, too!