There is more treasure in books than in all the pirates’ loot on Treasure Island and best of all, you can enjoy these riches every day of your life
walt disney
I love books. I always have. I remember my mom taking me to the library as a young child and checking out as many books as I could. And then going back the next week and doing the same. And the next … and on and on.
There is rarely a day gone by that I haven’t read something.
I love the feeling of being whisked away to a new place or time. I laugh and cry and yell out in anger or delight as the characters move through life.
Their lives become a part of mine and in doing so I am able to experience far more than I could have on my own.
So why should we read?
Books can help us learn new and exciting things, can calm us during times of stress, and give us hours of enjoyment.
Whether we read for fun, to be uplifted, or to gain knowledge, books can stretch the bounds of our intellect and imagination and give us so much more than just the words written on the pages. They can give us hope, love, a sense of being, and triumph.
The beauty in nature is not because everything is the same but happens because everything is different.
And these differences work together to create harmony, unity, and beauty.
Each plant, no matter how small or large helps to create the whole picture.
Each tree whether full of leaves, or misshapen, or even decayed on the ground add life and beauty and interest to what we see and enjoy.
In nature nothing is perfect and everything is perfect. Trees can be contorted, bent in weird ways, and they are still beautiful.
Alice walker
With people, think how boring it would be if we were all the same—same thoughts, same perspective, same color, size, or shape, or same talents. That wouldn’t make a very exciting world to live in.
It is our differences that make us better as a whole. It is sharing our talents, celebrating our heritage, and working together no matter our differences that creates unity, cohesion, and beauty in life.
Look around you and enjoy the beauty of nature…and of your fellow human beings!
In a conversation with others, how often are we only half listening?
If most of you are like me, many times I am already thinking about the next thing I’m going to say, or a rebuttal for the argument, or something else entirely.
By doing so did we miss something important or even the real underlying message of the person we are talking with?
Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.
Stephen R. Covey
Today in church we had a short lesson that incorporated 5 things good listeners do.
Give them time – Give people time to respond and don’t be afraid of silence. People are still thinking when it is silent, and maybe that thinking time gets them to where they need to be.
Pay Attention – We think faster than others speak. We should be paying attention to their words rather than already formulating what we are going to say next.
Clarify – Ask questions to make sure you are understanding what they are really saying.
Reflect – Paraphrase what you heard and how you understand things. This will help them know that you are listening and make sure there is no misunderstanding.
Find Common Ground – We won’t always agree on everything. But we can usually find something that we agree on, even if it is a basic problem. In the end it may just be agreeing to disagree in order to not cause any undue contention.
These skills can be used to listen to anyone—at work, school, neighbors, church, and family. Think about them next time you have a conversation and you may find out a lot more about the person you are talking to than you thought.
From a spiritual or gospel sense the most important thing is to listen to God and Christ through the Holy Spirit. If we give spiritual things time, pay attention to what we feel, clarify and reflect through prayers or by discussing with someone else knowledgeable, and then find something that You and God can work on together to help better yourself, we can become not only a better listener, but a better follower of Jesus Christ.
Listen to the words of Christ, your Redeemer, your Lord and your God…
Moroni 8:8 (book of Mormon)
As we become better listeners we become better friends, are able to help and support others, and become closer to our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
Let’s all try to hear and truly understand what others are trying to say to us before we answer.
Let’s listen more often and become better listeners.
Today in church we discussed a recent talk in our General Conference entitled “God Among us”.
Many of us shared things, especially over this past year, where our faith may have been strengthened or wavered.
This past year has been difficult for people who have dealt with loneliness, bad health, loss of jobs, or even worse loss of loved ones. Many have questioned where God is through all of this.
But God lives and he is still here!
He knows us and knows what we are going through.
“When we feel insignificant, cast off, and forgotten, we learn that we may be assured that God has not forgotten us—in fact, that He offers to all His children something unimaginable…”
Dieter F. Uchtdorf april 2021
I think that having faith in God helps us to get through our trials. It gives us hope in something bigger than ourselves. An eternal perspective over a mortal one.
Personally I try and look for the good things around me when I am in the midst of troubles.
I see God in his beautiful creations as I hike, in the faces of my small grandchildren, in the service of a member of my church to another in need, and in being given peace internally even though there may be turmoil all around.
The best way to see God among us is to serve, help, and lift others. As we do so we become more aware of our own blessings that we’ve been given. And can see his majesty in our own lives.
If you want to see God in your life, sit down and start writing out a list of all the good you have in your life, no matter how small or big. Think of people, places, health, conveniences, inventions, food, faith, knowledge, church, etc. We live in a marvelous time.
As you do so, you might be surprised in how much God has blessed your life.
He has always been there…and will always be among us!
In a talk at church today one of the speakers told about Nelson Mandela. His forgiveness of those who had imprisoned him earlier amazed many people and he received much praise. However in response to the accolades he would say.
I’m no saint—that is, unless you think a saint is a sinner who keeps on trying.
Nelson Mandela
What an interesting concept. So which one are we? Saints or Sinners.
How about both?
None, save Jesus Christ is perfect, and so all the rest of us have committed various sins. Sins of commission and sins of omission. Much of the time our actions do not live up to the level of our knowledge or what we know we should be doing. And so we could be considered sinners.
Yet we try.
And in that trying we become saints.
The church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints
AbigaiL Van Buren
So by attending church, trying to be like Jesus Christ, helping our fellow men and women, and trying to follow God’s commandments we may slip and fall, but in that falling we can still be saved.
God and Jesus Christ love us all and only want what is best for us—not just in this life—but eternally with them. Because of our Saviors Atonement they forgive us each time we repent and crawl back to them. It is during these times of struggles that we grow and become more like them and more aligned with their will for us.
We are refined by our sins and trials. And in that refinement we also become saints.
So if you get down on yourself sometimes for not being perfect—join the club. None of us are.
Yes, we are all sinners. And yet, if we keep trying to do better we are also saints.
Next time you make a mistake think about the type of saint that you are becoming, pick yourself up, and try again.
All of us have struggles or difficulties in life but what we do with those struggles defines us more than the struggle itself. What are we learning and how are we growing through our darker times?
It is not so much about what we are going through in life but what we are becoming.
Edward Dube
No matter what stage in life we are in we can become something better. Each day gives us an opportunity to be more than we were the day before. Each day we can turn aside a bad habit and start developing a new one.
We become what we want to be by consistently being what we want to become each day.
Richard G. Scott
What can each of us do today to begin to become something more?
just think about it and do something…anything. In doing so we are taking the first step to becoming a better person.
Do you ever feel that you are too tired, old, or worn out to help others?
Every time I go hiking I am enthralled by nurse logs. A nurse log is one in which a tree has died, fallen over, or been damaged—but other plants, trees, and bushes grow out of it.
A nurse log keeps giving even when things have been difficult and not gone their way.
A downed or damaged tree can give nutrients to a new seedling, helping it to grow for years.
I love seeing ferns, moss, small plants, and even full size trees growing from one of these nurse logs.
It reminds me that we should never feel too worn out to help others around us.
There is always something more to give.
God does watch over us and does notice us, but it usually through someone else that he meets our needs.
Spencer W. Kimball
Who might be struggling and praying for help that we might be the answer to?
What if we feel too tired to help? Where will the help come from?
Each of us no matter our age, circumstance, or own personal trials has opportunities to help, lift, strengthen, and serve others.
Let’s remember the nurse log and all it keeps on giving, even after we might think its useful life is complete
(below are some pictures of nurse logs that I have taken this past year)
The word itself sometimes makes us tense up or shudder.
We tend to think of change as something that is negative. But we all need to change. If it wasn’t for change we would all still be wearing diapers and laying on the floor. But even as a young child something inside us told us to get up and do something different—to change!
Oftentimes we think we need to change ourselves, when in reality what we really need to do is to change an action instead.
We are who we are—a child of God. We do not need to change that.
What we need to change is things that are keeping us from reaching our full potential as a child of God.
If I am out hiking and get really thirsty, no amount of “changing” who I am or hoping that I can “change” will bring me relief from that thirst. I must act to change that situation. In this case I need to find water. That action of finding water will then change my situation.
From a gospel of Jesus Christ sense part of change is repentance.
Russell M. Nelson, President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints said, “The word for repentance in the Greek New Testament is metanoeo. The prefix meta-means “change.” The suffice-noeo related to Greek words that mean mind, knowledge, spirit, and breath. Thus, when Jesus asks you and me to “repent”, He is inviting us to change our mind, our knowledge, our spirit–even the way we breathe.” (April 2019)
So repentance is really changing an action that we had been doing that we shouldn’t (or should be doing that we weren’t) into a better action.
Change is good. Making changes to our habits and actions gives us the opportunity to do better, achieve more, grow, develop, and eventually reach our full potential.
In Mosiah 5:7 (in the Book of Mormon) it says “And now, because of the covenant which ye have made ye shall be called the children of Christ, his sons, and his daughters; for behold, this day he hath spiritually begotten you; for ye say that your hearts are changed through faith on his name; therefore, ye are born of him and have become his sons and his daughters.
President Nelson said, “When we choose to repent we choose to change.”
Change is a choice we all have to make.
What can we change today that will help us be a better person tomorrow, a better child of God, a better servant to others around us, a better husband, wife, daughter, or son?
Don’t change who you are, but change something you are doing to become more than you now are.
And make God and Jesus Christ part of that change.
The Lord works from the inside out. The world works from the outside in. The world would take people out of the slums. Christ would take the slums out of people, and then they would take themselves out of the slums. The world would mold men by changing their environment. Christ changes men, who then change their environment. The world would shape human behavior, but Christ can change human nature.
We all fail at things in our life. Some are big and some are small. Some are our own doing, while others are just part of life.
But that’s the way life was designed to be. It’s hard to learn what we need to learn and to become what we are supposed to be without set-backs in life.
The goal then is to learn from our mistakes and continue to try and do better. We can look at failures as just one step closer to getting it right.
Our failures do not have to define us. They can refine us.
Dieter F. Uchtdorf
There have been times in my life where I have failed at something or made a mistake—and these times can feel overwhelming, debilitating, and depressing.
As I partook of the Sacrament today in church I thought about how thankful I am for the hope that the gospel of Jesus Christ brings me. And that I can be renewed through the atonement of Jesus Christ and do better.
He has commanded us to “Be ye therefore perfect…” (Matt 5:48)
How can we be perfect if we have failed and made mistakes? It is only through Him.
Because of who He is and what He has done we can learn from our mistakes, and still return back to Him and our Father in Heaven better, stronger, and with greater knowledge.
Don’t let failures get you down. Look at them as a way to move forward and be better.
Failure is not the end of the road, it is only the beginning of the process that will lead to the next success in our life.
Does it seem like the world spins around you changing all the time?
It’s hard to keep up.
I know in the workplace many times the mantra is the only thing constant is change.
In a recent General Conference talk in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints S. Gifford Nielson uses his experience as a football play to talk about challenges and change.
We can’t always choose the outcome of our actions, but we can choose to be ready to act.
S. Gifford Nielson, April 2021
We are always changing through the experiences we have in life. Some changes are forced upon us while others we choose to change ourselves.
But either way we can choose how we react to the change.
Look around your life. If you feel a little out of control because things are changing too fast, try to focus on the ones you can control. Don’t worry so much about the others.
How will you choose to react to changes in your life? Will you take advantage of what you can learn and how you might grow, or will you shrink back and become negative and angry and isolated?
Inspirational Musings of Mike Shelton 