Life's Shadows

Most of the shadows of this life are caused by our standing in our own sunshine. 

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Celebrate Others Successes

Promise yourself today to be just as enthusiastic about the success of others as you are about your own. 

-Christian D. Larson

Apologizing

Apologizing does not always mean that you’re wrong and the other person is right. 

It just means that you value your relationship more than your ego.

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Weak Person's Imitation of Strength

"Rudeness is the weak person’s imitation of strength." 

~Eric Hoffer 

 So why not be strong, and be kind:)

Intellectual Pride

“Intellectual pride is very prevalent in our day. Some people exalt themselves above God and His anointed servants because of their learning and scholarly achievements. We must never allow our intellect to take priority over our spirit. Our intellect can feed our spirit and our spirit can feed our intellect, but if we allow our intellect to take precedence over our spirit, we will stumble, find fault, and may even lose our testimonies”.


(Joseph B. Wirthlin, “Press On,” Liahona, Nov 2004, 101–4)

What Have I Lost?

"Brother [Thomas B.] Marsh was one of the first modern-day Apostles . . . . He eventually became President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.

"While the Saints were in Far West, Missouri, Elizabeth Marsh, Thomas's wife, and her friend Sister Harris decided they would exchange milk in order to make more cheese than they otherwise could. . . . They agreed that they should not save what were called the strippings. . . . Strippings came at the end of the milking and were richer in cream.

"Sister Harris was faithful to the agreement, but Sister Marsh, desiring to make some especially delicious cheese, saved a pint of strippings from each cow and sent Sister Harris the milk without the strippings. This caused the two women to quarrel. . . . The matter was referred to the home teachers to settle. They found Elizabeth Marsh guilty of failure to keep her agreement. She and her husband were upset with the decision, and the matter was then referred to the bishop for a Church trial. The bishop's court decided that the strippings were wrongfully saved. . . .

"Thomas Marsh appealed to the high council, and the men comprising this council confirmed the bishop's decision. He then appealed to the First Presidency of the Church. Joseph Smith and his counselors considered the case and upheld the decision of the high council.

"Elder Thomas B. Marsh, who sided with his wife through all of this, became angrier with each successive decision—so angry, in fact, that he went before a magistrate and swore that the Mormons were hostile toward the state of Missouri. . . .

"After 19 years of rancor and loss, Thomas B. Marsh made his way to the Salt Lake Valley and asked President Brigham Young for forgiveness. . . . Said Brother Marsh: 'The Lord could get along very well without me and He . . . lost nothing by my falling out of the ranks; But O what have I lost?! Riches, greater riches than all this world or many planets like this could afford' (Thomas B. Marsh to Heber C. Kimball, May 5, 1857, Brigham Young Collection, Church History Library)."

Thomas S. Monson , "School Thy Feelings, O My Brother," Ensign, Nov. 2009, 68

Food for Thought

"It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit." 

-John Wooden

Spiritual Snoozing

President Ezra Taft Benson, said as he spoke to regional representatives of the Church in 1977, while he was president of the Council of the Twelve Apostles:

"Do you know what peace and prosperity can do to a people—It can put them to sleep. The Book of Mormon warned us of how the devil, in the last days, would lead us away carefully down to hell.

"The Lord has on the earth some potential spiritual giants whom He saved for some six thousand years to help bear off the Kingdom triumphantly, and the devil is trying to put them to sleep. The devil knows that he probably won't be too successful in getting them to commit many great and malignant sins of commission. So he puts them into a deep sleep, like Gulliver, while he strands them with little sins of omission. And what good is a sleepy, neutralized, lukewarm giant as a leader?

"We have too many potential spiritual giants who should be more vigorously lifting their homes, the kingdom, and the country. We have many who feel they are good men, but they need to be good for something—stronger patriarchs, courageous missionaries, valiant genealogists and temple workers, dedicated patriots, devoted quorum members. In short, we must be shaken and awakened from a spiritual snooze."
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Given a choice (and maybe we were given such a choice long before we came to earth), who wouldn't choose ease and affluence rather than pain and suffering? It sounds so attractive, so generous of the Lord. And all we have to do is keep the commandments, using our affluence to build the kingdom of God and serve others. Why is that so difficult? Because ease and affluence tend toward self-indulgence and self-importance. We can become spiritually flabby and casual in our prayers because we seem to need nothing, indifferent to the needs of others because we do not know how it feels to go without. Not liking to be reminded that others have needs, we remove ourselves from the inner city of life to the "quiet hedonism of suburbia," both temporally and spiritually. We can gorge ourselves with temporal things to the point of spiritual death.

Alma provides the answer to where the spiritual 'smelling salts' can be obtained to bring us back to a conscious state:

"Behold, he changed their hearts; yea, he awakened them out of a deep sleep, and they awoke unto God. Behold, they were in the midst of darkness; nevertheless, their souls were illuminated by the light of the everlasting word; ..." (Alma 5:7).

A love for, and a relationship with the Saviour is what gives us life. As we come closer to Him through studying the scriptures and prayer we will be snoozing no longer.