"That they might have joy."

I've been thinking a lot about the idea of "forced joy," or (much like Elder Uchtdorf's talk in fall 2017) the idea that we can be joyful in spite of circumstances.

It's something I'm really struggling with. I can pretend to be happy. It's not hard. I can spare everyone around me the struggles that I'm facing. But the more I try to pretend I'm not facing them, the more they weigh on me. The more "joyful" (read "of positive affect") I become, the more sorrowful I truly am.

When I accept that it's okay to have a hard time, that the things I'm going through really do suck, and really are hard, and really do hurt, the more I can separate them from me and find joy in spite of the hardships. But other people often don't see the joy I feel, especially since few of them are around me to see it.

Living by Power—A Woman of God

My last post got twice as many readers as a typical post of mine. It is not hard to imagine why. In that post, I say things that everyone else is saying, about how it is hard to be a woman in the Church. That refrain is echoed across the blogs, though often with a different tone. People read it because it said what they wanted to hear. That isn't true of this post. It is easy to identify problems. And problems get to people’s emotions, especially when they’re struggling with the same problem. But solutions are hard. They are uncomfortable. They often seem to cause problems. No one wants that.

But, while I know that far fewer people will read and like this post, I want to follow up my last with what lies beyond the pain of being a woman in the Church. There is another side of that valley of sorrow. On the other side lies a chance to build a great, tall mountain of discipleship that completely swamps all the things that make membership hard in the Church. It doesn't make them go away, of course. I still mourn sometimes. But it takes that pain and frustration and makes something great of it.

This session of Conference, the last of 1971, was a symphony. The talks all addressed slightly different things, but together they wove a great tapestry of discipleship. I couldn't pick just one without robbing some of the harmony. Obviously, going and reading them yourself is the best thing, but I'm going to play you only a small sample.

Having No Joy

I hate the word "trials." We talk about getting through our trials, enduring our trials, or suffering trials, as if they are something that stop. Our tolerance for helping other people "get through their trials" fades over time when those trials just don't go away. And for those of us whose "trials" are permanent, at some point we begin to wonder what we are doing wrong that we cannot find the peace and happiness promised in scripture if we follow the commandments.

When I was 17, I planned to focus on a career and eventually get married if the right man came along. I'd have few kids, no more than two, because I knew that my personality and temperament was not well-suited to child rearing. In my Patriarchal Blessing, I was told that the task the Lord set for me, among others, was to be a mother in Zion. The words of my Patriarchal Blessing rocked me to my knees, and I spent the next four years changing my paradigm. If the Lord wanted me to be a mother, I'd focus all my energy on learning to do it right.

I changed career plans, served a mission, and over the course of the next two or three years, became someone who not only submitted to the will of the Lord as spoken in my blessing, but actually craved it. Which is why, as I realized that I could not succeed in being a good wife to the man I had married, it cut so deeply. I sacrificed to be the kind of person who could be a good wife, and one simple decision—choosing a man who later decided to not choose God—meant that my sacrifices were pointless. It has done more than ended a marriage. It killed my confidence in myself, and broke my hope to become what the Lord wanted of me.

Faith Unto Joy

Not long after the events which eventually led to the final end of my marriage, I had the opportunity to receive a blessing from my father. It had been years since I received a blessing, because my husband was not comfortable with giving them, and I felt it would undermine him to ask for one elsewhere.

It was a very dark time in my life, when fear was nearly overwhelming. I had no idea how I could protect my children. I was nauseated from early pregnancy, and my stress level was so high that I would months later experience adrenaline withdrawal. I felt like my life would never be free from feeling in constant danger.

A Perspective of Joy

Twice I have stood on the ground of Dachau, closing my eyes as the horrors of history reached into the present to sanctify through suffering. I have spoken to survivors of Auschwitz, and read the stories of many others. My own grandfather was captured near Strasbourg, France, and survived a death march in World War II.

Two things I have gathered from those who have survived horrors: That all are given a choice between allowing the darkness to make you his own, or to fight to find joy in the midst of atrocity; and that there are some things too dark to talk about.

When another human being chooses to do everything in their power to hurt you, words fail. There is nothing that can be said about that particular use of agency which fully communicates the way it changes your perspective, tries its best to warp your faith and rob you of power.

While not all of us will face the unspeakable hell faced by the victims of the Nazi regime, we will all at some point be injured by the deliberate actions of another. We will all have the choice to face aggression with returned aggression, or meet it with candor and acceptance...which is far easier talked about from a distance than up close. How, when you are attacked by another human being, can you truly forgive?

The Passing of a Great Man

Everyone is mourning the loss of Robin Williams. Through his gift of acting, he has inspired, blessed, and cheered us. In Dead Poet's Society he taught us to be more than what we are. In Mrs. Doubtfire and Hook, he taught us to love our families. His smile is iconic. His soft voice makes us feel love.

And yet, he was bipolar. His family life was chaotic, and he may have finally committed suicide.

We all love Robin Williams for what he gave us, but there was a cost. His life was turbulent, his internal emotions intense and swinging. I relate to that somewhat. Though I'm not bipolar, I am very passionate. But it is from that very place of pain that genius is born.

I think, when we tell people they can "choose to be happy" or "positive outcomes only," we invalidate their pain. We medicate sorrow as if it's a disease, and we tell ourselves to avoid people in pain as if it is communicable. We are increasingly unable to deal with sorrow, to mourn with others who mourn and to comfort them. We are unable to reach out to make the very connections that make our burdens light.

A Prodigal Daughter

"Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment: and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends: but as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf."
—Luke 15:29-30

This parable of the prodigal son has long troubled me. Partly for the same reasons it troubled the elder son. The younger was lazy, wasteful. He didn't care about his father's example, teachings, or entreaties. While the older son labored diligently to honor his father, it was the younger son who received honor simply for coming home.

Noblesse Oblige

I hadn't thought about it for years...decades, even. I was pondering something completely unrelated, and this image flashed before my eyes of an old, wrinkled Portuguese man sitting in front of a basket of wicker reeds smiling at me. I know who he was. He was the man my mother purchased wicker from. This was back in the mid-eighties and we were living on a tiny island called Terceira in the Açores, Portugal.

I was only a child, somewhere between eight and ten. My memories are not crystal clear, and of course I'm interpreting them now through an adult lens. I don't even know how accurate my memories are. But I remember his brown, wrinkled skin contorted into a smile. I remember his hands, callused from hours of working the tough reeds, softened by hours of soaking in water. All you had to do was take a picture of something made from wicker, give him dimensions, and he would make it for you. He was smiling because I had tried to speak to him in Portuguese, a language of which I remember practically nothing, now.

Healing Through Repeat Trauma

When I first created and named this blog, I didn't know it would be so prophetic. Then, I only chose this name because it fit my screen name, and I loved the parable of the houses built upon sand and rock. Since then, my house has truly been buffeted by storms I did not imagine at the time. There have been times that I was sure that my foundations would crumble. I could feel some sands upon which my life had been built washing away from under me. There have been times I've clung desperately to the rock that was left, sobbing for help. Some of those times, there was someone to help. Many of them, there was no one.

After the night my ex-husband left for the final time, I had symptoms of post traumatic stress. For days, I got no sleep and for weeks I got very little. Someone would use a word, or I'd see an object that was involved that night, and the world would skip ahead. To others, I would cease to respond for a few seconds as my mind blanked out. Certain interactions, especially those involving any kind of conflict, no matter how mild, would leave me trembling for hours. I'd get flashbacks. And that is only a few of the things that had suddenly become a part of my life for months and years.

Beautiful Sorrow

In the mornings and throughout my day, my Facebook is filled with people posting "uplifting" quotes. I know that many people feel supported and uplifted by positive thinking quotes, or lists of what to do to be "happy." I'm not trying to put that effort down for them, but just to mull over why it doesn't work for me.

When I hear things that say, essentially, "just think yourself out of sadness or negativity," I hear "your sadness is not valid, your negativity is all in your head. You don't (or shouldn't) feel what you feel. If you were a better person, you wouldn't feel that way." It's a lie, a pervasive and sneaky lie that masquerades as truth. Happiness doesn't drown sorrow, sorrow births happiness. We NEED to experience pain and sorrow, in order to know joy.

We tend to believe in our medicated, comfortable lives that pain is evil. If something causes us pain, it must be changed or avoided. Well, my life has an element in it that causes pain that I cannot remove. Though a part of me wishes it were simply gone, I am thankful for it. It has taught me that not everything which causes pain is evil.

The Seventh Day: Eternal Life

"On the seventh day of Christmas,
my true love gave to me
seven swans a-swimming."

Eternal life is a tricky one. Most of us think of it as something we will get in the future, like an ultimate prize for righteousness. We love to joke about how much we can get away with and still "get into" heaven. Even within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we often talk about "making it" to the Celestial Kingdom.

Eternal life is more than just living forever. It is living as God lives. Eternal life is His life. To live as God lives we must be willing to be what He is. That is not some prize to be won, it is something to become. And face it, we don't know all that much about God.

What we do know is nearly impossible to understand.

The Sixth Day: Joseph Smith's Vision

"On the sixth day of Christmas,
my true love gave to me
six geese a-laying."

When young Joseph Smith went into a nearby grove of trees to address his Maker, I doubt he had any intention of founding a Church or becoming a martyr. When I was fourteen, my family returned to America from six years in Europe. Rather than flying directly to our new home in the West, we touched down in an eastern airport. We visited a long series of historical sites, both in American history and in the history of the Church.

Although at the time, I was determined to seem as much interested in my books as I was in the scenery, that journey sparked a slow change in me. I stood in the room where our forefathers argued the points of the Constitution. I wandered through the Smithsonian, where the works of men over ages are gathered.

And I stood in a small, unassuming grove of trees.

Being Perfect

The drive to be perfect hurts. Yet, there is definitely a doctrinal imperative to strive for perfection. The most oft-quoted scripture to this effect is Christ's commandment to be perfect.

Often, we explain this scripture with the footnote, which seems to indicate that perfection is to be fully developed or complete, but as I've studied this concept, I have come to believe that touches only the surface of what Christ meant. If you read the context in which Christ made this commandment, you will see that He is discussing love as the climax of His new Law which will supersede the Law of Moses.

In that speech, He has just commanded us to love our enemies and to do good to those who despitefully use us and persecute us. In general, this seems quite easy. It is not hard to love those who commit day-to-day offenses and injustices. It quickly becomes difficult when we begin to apply it to those who truly and unapologetically hurt us. But this is when it is most important.

Take, for example, a Priesthood leader who is discounting or ignoring you. It is so tempting to become angry and frustrated, to rail against priesthood hierarchy or to turn away from participating fully in our religious community. But to be perfect—to follow the Father in Heaven's path—we have to push past that first, natural reaction and learn to love. We have to allow space for others' weakness and even for the evil in them. That does not mean to tolerate the evil, but it does mean to learn to see beyond it.

Believe me, I know how hard this can be. So hard, that I suspect it is only possible to achieve by cultivating a true companionship with the Holy Spirit. As we seek after this love, I believe it is possible to become perfect in this world. That doesn't mean without fault or error. It means perfect in love. In order to demonstrate this love without possibility for misinterpretation, God the Son came to earth and subjected Himself to our weakness and our evil.

This is the love that heals. It is necessary to develop this quality to truly be a disciple of Christ. And when we learn this love, we become perfect.

The Myth of Happiness

I read a recent Salon.com article about a non-LDS woman who finds herself obsessed with Mormon Mommy-type blogs. Now, although I am both Mormon and a Mommy, and though I blog, this blog is not really a Mormon Mommy type blog (though I do sort of have one). I'm not really sure what type of blog this is, to be honest. I suppose, like the title suggests, it documents my spiritual and emotional life, the things I think about and struggle with on an internal level.

I don't know that most of what I blog about here are strictly "happy" things. They are faithful and hopeful, I hope, but not particularly "happy".

In reading the comments, I noted that an overwhelming number of the comments treated the Mormon Mommy blogs as fake. Whether they supposed they were commercial or evangelical efforts, the general consensus seemed to be that "Mormon women cannot be as happy as they seem, so they are being deceptive. Deception is for a reason, therefore they must be getting something out of this." Plenty of people cited the old Utah Women Take Antidepressants study, many others delighted in highlighting the "dark side" that must exist.

Of course there is some filtering when it comes to blogs. Whatever the main focus of the blog, not everything in a blogger's life ends up online. But these women have chosen to highlight the things that bring them joy. Very few of them sound to me like their "faking it until they make it" online. They genuinely seem to find things to be happy about. Of course, it is possible that if they were suffer some life-altering disaster, such as divorce or losing a child, that the walls would come tumbling down, but as NieNie has demonstrated, this isn't necessarily the case.

I think this is the key. Too often, we expect to be happy when certain conditions are met. But I believe that true happiness is generally unconditional. It is a choice. I've had a really hard time in my life the past several years. And yet, there are many things that have brought me immense joy. Some of those things I remember to chronicle in my "mommy blog", but some of them are just for me. Some of these things are things that others might not expect me to find joy in, given my circumstances, such as the doctrine of eternal families, having occasional alone time, watching my children grow.

True, I could look at the lives of some of these women and be jealous. To be honest, sometimes I am. The husband/provider, wife/caretaker dichotomy is something I worked really hard for, believed in, and lost. But though I mourn that loss for myself, I can also find joy in the evidence that it can work, and I find so much joy in the wonderful blessings I do still have.

So I don't think that happiness is a myth. I just don't think it is what some people think it is. And maybe that's why so many are "obsessed" with Mormon Mommy blogs. They sense something beyond the surface of reupholstering chairs, photographing children in pumpkin patches, and keeping a spotless house. Something that has nothing to do with lifestyle.

They sense the reality of happiness.

True Prayer

I am finally getting around to reading June's Ensign. For some reason, until Friday morning, I felt little desire to read Elder Uchtdorf's message meant to be used for home teaching. That morning, however, I felt drawn to it. His messages often speak to my heart, and this one was no different.

It never ceases to astonish me how the things I have been taught by the Spirit often come into concrete description as I read scripture. Once, I read to learn. Lately, it seems I read to cement knowledge in my mind and heart. As I read this article, one phrase in particular stood out to me: "Our prayers should spring from our deepest yearning to be one with our Father in Heaven."

As I read this, the thought came clearly that not only should prayers spring from our desire to be one with God, but that our prayers are that desire. When Amulek taught that we should "let [our] hearts be full, drawn out in prayer unto him continually for [our] welfare, and also for the welfare of those who are around [us]," he was referring to this desire to be one with God, and to be one with His other children.

In Luke, Jesus teaches that if we pray always, we "may be accounted worthy to escape all [the] things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man." In other words, if we are able to make the desire to be one with God, and one with His other children (which may be called charity) part of our deepest yearning, part of what imprints our very souls, we will be worthy to escape the consequences of sin and unite ourselves with the Savior.

I do not think that this is a fringe doctrine. I believe it is the doctrine around which everything in the Gospel hinges. It is this yearning to not only be one with God the Father ourselves, but to be one with all of His children who also yearn to be one with Him, that caused the greatest spirit of us all to humbly and meekly submit to spiritual, emotional and physical pain beyond imagining. It is the pain He suffered—which He did not need to suffer—which enabled Him to offer us freedom from that pain, to offer the cancellation of that debt we incur when we sin.

"And [this] remission of sins bringeth meekness, and lowliness of heart; and because of meekness and lowliness of heart cometh the visitation of the Holy Ghost, which Comforter filleth with hope and perfect love (the desire to be united with our brothers and sisters), which love endureth by diligence unto prayer (the desire to be united to God), until the end shall come, when all the saints shall dwell with God."
Moroni 8:26

That They Might Have Joy

When Adam and Eve were cast out of the Garden of Eden for their choices, the Lord speaks to them in outwardly-harsh words, often referred to as the curse of Adam and Eve:

"Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

"And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life; Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field; In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return."

I have thought about this lately, especially in light of the oft-quoted scripture: "Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy."

I have felt the weight of this verse lately, guilty because I am not as joyful as I would like to be. But as I went back and read this scripture again, I saw that as it goes on, it becomes clear that joy is a choice. It is the Atonement which has made it possible for us to choose joy.

That being said, however, the words of Christ himself are the most poignant: "ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: and ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. . . . ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you."

That is, after all, the message of Easter. It is not that Christ suffered and died for our sins. It is that He lives. It is that He lives so that our sorrows and sufferings, even our death, might end. Because of Him, there is light at the end of the long, dark tunnel of mortality. Because of Him, there is hope for healing. Our choices may cause pain for others, others' choices may cause us pain, but the Savior sealed this promise with His life: that pain has an end, that death itself has no power, and that we may be free from the hatred and judgment of Satan and those who listen to him.

It is true that this life is ordained to be a life of sorrow, but as a daughter of God still held in this mortal existence, I need not feel guilty for not now feeling the joy I long to feel. "Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning."

May the morning come soon.

Biology vs. the Bible: To Have Joy

Wow. Just wow. Rarely has a blog post left me so glad to have read it as this one from Nathan Richardson. Something I have always known is suddenly given words and thought.

Thank you for a most powerful insight into the nature of an eternal perspective.

The Maverick of the (Sanity) Ward

A very interesting conversation over at BCC hits close to home for me. They are asking members to be a little kinder to those who do not agree with them, a little more thoughtful of the "outliers". While I completely agree that a little more kindness, a little larger place would be nice, I feel I have something to say from the bottom of the pile, so to speak.

I am currently absolutely furious about a situation in my ward as it concerns my family. I won't say I'm rationally furious, as it does not come from rational thought but from a wellspring of pent up frustration and loneliness. Most of my fury is focused around a man who happens to be the current leader of the ward. In complete honesty, I can say that I admire him. He is a good, plainspoken man. He has a very homey way about him completely free of guile and manipulation. As a person, I like him very much. Unfortunately, I don't think he understands much about me or my life. This isn't for lack of trying to communicate on either side of the issue, but it is there, all the same. Hence, the frustration.

In other words, I am the recipient of some very biased attitudes. Much of it is my fault for being who I am, much is just the fallout from the situation.

But I want to say that, while I would appreciate (and HAVE appreciated) little acts of kindness from members in my ward, I can recognize how much I have grown from the struggle. Because the people around me are imperfect, I can get a little more perfect. If everyone around me was perfectly kind and accepting of whatever I did, I would have no reason to change, no reason to examine myself and my actions. I have been able to weigh my lifestyle, my pride and comfort against my faith, and decide what is truly important to me.

Therefore, I recognize my fury as pointless and temporary, and can appreciate the chance to learn and grow, even if I don't like it, and even if it breaks my heart.

After all, it is a broken heart which God asks of me.

Becoming One With God

I understand that my outlook on this may be controversial, but I feel it lies at the core of my beliefs and at the core of the person I have become. Oddly, we use the phrase "one with God" frequently in Sunday School settings, but I don't think we really think about what it means.

The first step of becoming one with God is baptism. As missionaries, sometimes we get so caught up in the event of baptism, we forget the purpose of it. It isn't only to be washed clean of our sins in preparation to receive the Spirit, though it is certainly that, too. It is also a covenant to stand as God's witness all the time and to act as His hands to all His children. Essentially, it is a covenant to become one with God. We are symbolically killing the natural man to be reborn as a disciple of the divine. We are then given the gift of the Spirit to help us do that.

Becoming one with God means shame from "the world". Since I was fourteen or so, I have made some decisions that guide my behavior for which I've been mocked, and even persecuted, often by those who love me most. One of these decisions, for example, was to no longer watch PG-13 or higher-rated movies. I have my reasons for this decision. For some reason, my refusal to watch these movies strikes a cord of derision in many. I have been mocked for allowing a secular rating system determine what I watch. (For the record, I have walked out of PG movies before, so it's not as arbitrary of a decision as it seems.) I have been laughed at because I watch only "kiddie shows". I have been verbally pummeled by people wanting to share a particularly good movie with me. I have been tempted frequently over the last decade to break that decision and watch "just one". It was hardest that first year, but after the first flush of effort, it hasn't gotten much easier over the course of the next several years. There is no "happily ever after" with such things during this life.

Becoming one with God means to always have His Spirit with you, and to always be thinking about Him. Some find the thought of always having God in mind rather oppressive, or even unhealthy. Although I'm sure we have all met people who are overly pious, defining everything in terms of what is proper (much like the Pharisees), restricting laughter and stringently restricting behavior, that isn't what I believe is meant by these scriptures. God is a whole God, a balanced and complete God. The more He is in your thoughts and heart, the more balanced you become. There are no words to describe this wholeness. It purifies and sanctifies laughter and joy, as well as somberness and sorrow. Everything becomes deeper and more meaningful. Fun is more fun, sorrow is more pure. I have tasted this feeling, though I am far from completely achieving it. It is the key to the end of my depression. It is the key to my ability to forgive others of devastating blows. It is the key to true joy. It is my ultimate goal for this life.

I wish I had the ability to describe it. It is one of those things I think you have to experience to understand. I can attest to the fact that before I felt it, I had absolutely no idea that this was what the scriptures were trying to say. This is what the gospel is all about. It makes a "spiritual experience" merely a stepping stone. It makes your life into a spiritual experience.

Men Are That They Might Have Joy

This isn't a long post, as I don't have much to say that hasn't already been said on this scripture. In my reading, I came across this scripture mastery scripture: 2 Nephi 2:25 "Adam fell that men might be; and men are, that they might have joy."

It's a very central distinguishing factor in the doctrine of Mormonism. Rarely in the Christian world is Adam and Eve's Fall looked upon as anything other than filthy sin. The doctrine of the LDS Church, however, teaches that Adam and Eve's Fall had a purpose in the great plan of our God, namely to bring about his work of bringing to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. Without the ability to choose, we humans could not learn to choose wisely. We could not grow. We could not learn to be actors instead of the acted-upon. We could not have learned the power and joy of having a family and children. We could not have learned joy without knowing sorrow. Importantly, LDS doctrine teaches that God knew what Adam and Eve would choose, and then prepared a way for them, if they chose wisely, to be forgiven. Namely, He provided a Savior for them, whose atonement would erase the consequences of Adam and Eve's Fall for all those willing to choose righteously and to repent.

As someone intermittently beset by a lack of joy, I've often wondered about this verse. Sometimes, I've wondered what was wrong with me. If men exist in order to have joy, why was I finding it so difficult? Something that struck me this time, however, was the word "might". Adam didn't Fall in order that men have joy, but to give a chance for men to have joy. There is an opportunity, a chance, for all of us, no matter our position in life, our wealth, our social status, our health, to find that joy. It's not something that comes naturally, it's something that must be worked for. The common modern perception that somehow comfort and joy ought to be handed to all is simply wrong. If a person is given everything they wish, they will not be able to understand joy when they have it. Joy must be worked for, and most importantly, sorrow must be understood in order to appreciate joy.

Only when sorrow pushes the strength of our souls can we understand, just a little bit more, the Price that was paid for our joy. When we do that, we realize how very great the worth of souls is to Him. Imagine! We humans are so valuable, He was willing to undergo humiliation and death, the Father was willing to send His Son to us, knowing all our weaknesses and filth. Yet, despite the fact that we crucified our God, our worth to Him is beyond comprehension. That is humbling, and it brings me great joy.