Finding the Good...
Dieter F. Uchtdorf… his talks are inspiring. They are beautiful and wise and understandable for the youth. I always find myself captivated by his words. One of the greatest ways to feel the Spirit is by listening to him.
How true this is
Today I am humble.
Today, I am going to keep my words low. I won’t tell my own stories. I won’t talk about myself. I won’t boast and I won’t brag. Instead…
I’ll ask how someone is doing. I’ll compliment every person I can. I’ll ask questions, and give people opportunity to talk about themselves. I’ll listen to every person who speaks. I’ll pay attention to my teachers. I won’t sass my parents. I’ll say “please” and “thank you”, even to my closest friends and family.
And this will keep me happy.
These words are purely mine… but all those there who struggle with the concept, feeling, or understanding of love, allow me to at least help you to the best of my ability.
LOVE is not LUST. They are similar in feeling and emotion, but different between what is bad and what is good. LOVE:
L is For:
Loyalty…hmm, whenever people say “loyalty”, I personally always just say, “Who cares?” because loyalty is one of those random words that you throw into a description box when somebody asks you what ‘qualities’ you like. But if you think about it… isn’t it a meaningful quality? Having someone who is loyal to you—having someone who respects you, who admires you, who knows you well? It doesn’t sound meaningful, but think of this: imagine your best friend with all of those qualities. Picture situations where loyalty would come into play. Then, picture your friend doing the opposite of that—having a friend or companion who doesn’t support you, who doesn’t respect you and your home, and who doesn’t know you or make any effort to know you. Do you really want that in your daily life? The best way to find loyalty is to BE LOYAL.
Life… when I say this, I mean that you should find someone who has a purpose to life. Life is AMAZING, and I’m not just saying that as a preppy Mormon girl, I’m saying this as someone who loves and enjoys their life. Why? Because I have a purpose, or multiple purposes, to it—I’m looking for someone to love rightly, I want to go to school and get an education, I’d love to be married and someday raise a family. These goals that I have are my purposes. If you don’t have them now, you don’t need to be concerned. I know there’s more things to add to my list, I just haven’t found them yet. Someday I will. But listen to this: when you look for someone to love, look for someone in your life. Someone that has life. Someone that cares about life and doesn’t abuse life by doing things like smoking, drinking, drugs, pornography, the works…you have INCREDIBLE potential in life (this is for boys and girls), why not find someone that looks to thrive off of that potential as well?
Learning… you have to be patient with your love. It will come, but only if you learn as you go. Trial is GOING TO HAPPEN. Trial is going to come at you like a train. The more you have, the stronger your Spirit must grow, and that’s what God has told us. You’re going to make mistakes—I’ve made plenty already—but the point of all this is to learn from them. Here’s what you should do: go write a list about everything you have dealt with before. Write down all of the troubles that you’ve endured and mistakes that you’ve made, and write down the consequences. (i.e. I know someone who was driving with his friends and got caught up drinking and crashed into a nearby accident, killing a police officer. He must now endure the pain of ending someone’s life and many other consequences, like a job, jail, family, or potential education). You should look at this list as a reminder of all the things you’ve learned.
L IS FOR LOYALTY, L IS FOR LIFE, AND L IS FOR LEARNING.
Loyalty: make a list of qualities that you desire in a future spouse. Keep that always, and as you date and meet people, watch as the list grows and changes.
Life: the greatest suggestion I have for you is to discover yourself—pray, search your Scriptures, and think of Christ…but don’t just think of Him, act like Him. I dare you, for just one week, to go through each day, every moment thinking, “What would I do if the Lord were with me right now?” I did it this past week, and I can truly say that although it was EXTREMELY hard, by the end of the week I felt a sense of happiness and satisfaction with myself for pulling through, and I felt extremely spiritually blessed.
Learning: make the list that I told you about, and look and see what you’ve done. Imagine what you could have done differently, and then say a prayer of gratitude. There are no undoable things, everything you’ve done can be forgiven of if you pray and ask the Lord for forgiveness. Learn from what you’ve done in life.
