Henry and the Craziest Family Tree

(Just an FYI: Mormons are encouraged to fill out a 4 generation chart, hence the joke. It's sort of like the cheesy line from Cars, you always know where your going if you know where you've been. This is doubly true for Henry Swann-Fire and I think he should really start asking some questions about Cora's parents because his great grandmother will probably turn out to be Evil Winnie the Pooh)

Cruel Hope

Hey Steph!

Sometimes it is easier to walk around suppressing your deepest desires. Peace and happiness is found in the here and now. And focusing on your desired but seemingly unattainable future can be torturous.

When I was a young girl, all I dreamed about was holding babies and being in love. When I was a teen, my life's ambition was to be a wife and mother. When I was in college, I nervously lived day to day hoping for these dreams to be realized. They weren't. Heartbreak happened and to cope with it, I clung tight to what I could rely on: my family, a few friends, my job, my status as a student. I went back to school, and I found a version of myself I didn't know before. I had a lot of dreams that were hidden away. I wanted to be a musician, and a hiker of mountains, a runner of 10Ks, a voice for women, and a person full of service in her hands. I even wanted to be successful professionally as an editor. I had no idea all of that was in me. I had had tunnel vision all my life on those two goals: marriage and motherhood.

The knowledge of being a more complex being than I ever realized is priceless to me. I wouldn't trade it for the world. But part of that coping has been pushing aside the deep and fervent desires for a family of my own. A friend told me recently that hope is bittersweet. Opening yourself to hope is a test in vulnerability. It is putting your emotions in an unfulfilled future--a future that may never be. When it comes to me and hope, at times I look it in the eye for a split-second than turn around and run cowardly away. I'm not sure I have the emotional stamina to dream (at least about romance and motherhood). Instead, I focus on right now, on how to live my life each day better, on how to achieve all the other dreams I can make happen. And I'm happy.

And then I saw this video:




Wow! Motherhood is beautiful. It is something I still want. And sometimes it's okay to pull out those desires and just let it hurt.

Cheers,

A dreamer if only for today

The Care and Keeping of Extroverts (A Poorly Drawn Comic)

Hey Amanda,

So I dunno about you, but my internet life has been filled with counterintuitive declarations of introverted pride. There was this fantastic TED Talk going around, and about three million personality tests. And I dunno. I was feeling like Extroversion was getting maligned and vastly misunderstood . Everyone needs some alone time to recharge. Everyone hurts when their needs aren't met. No one likes meaningless conversations about the weather. No one likes huge crowds of people they don't know.  So if that's your definition of extroverts, yeah, definitely, those people are overrated. But more than that, no one is an extrovert or an introvert 100% of the time.

So in response to this webcomic....I drew one of my own for extroverts. (I had a super difficult time getting the comic to both be legible and not be so mammoth-ly big that I I had to scroll right to left to read it...so here's my hack. Do it with me. Find the ALT button. Hold it down. Now find the + on your keyboard and press it a few times until you can read the text. YAY! You can let go of the ALT button now)

(To right your screen, hold down ALT and press the - key (that's the minus key) on your keyboard until it's normal)

Extroverted: adj.  doesn't mean annoying and bombastic. Doesn't even mean you value social interactions, because that's everyone. If you don't occasionally crave human interaction, you aren't called an introvert. You're called a sociopath. 

Extrovert,
Stephanie

A Look into God's Mirror

Hi Steph,
  I believe in the power of our thoughts. The way we think determines the way we see the world, ourselves, and our choices. For example, a person that sees themselves the victim of their circumstances will see their choices as limited to what happens to them rather than what they can do. When I was a little girl, I learned a song about our thoughts:

If on occasion you have found

Your language is in question,

Or ugly thoughts come to your mind,

Then here's a good suggestion:

Just hum your favorite hymn,

Sing out with vigor and vim,

And you will find it clears your mind.

Hum your favorite hymn.

It's a simple child's song, but I still on occasion mentally hum a song when a gossipy or mean or sexual thought comes to my mind. Beyond being a good way to distract myself of these negative thoughts, it also serves as a label and a reminder: these thoughts are not appropriate, are not helpful, and are not godly. 

In regard to our thoughts, we often talk about thoughts and images of a pornographic nature. We talk of pornography as an epidemic, as an addiction, and as an imprisonment. But I'm not going to write about pornography today. I want to discuss a different epidemic of our thoughts that I see again and again, particularly among women. 

The epidemic is negative self-talk.

negative self-talk: the pervasive need to regularly think mean thoughts of oneself, often related to physical appearance but can also be related to any part of one's being. 


I hear my dear, amazing friends and family members say things all the time that make me want to scream out: "That is a absurd lie!" They'll say things like, "Man, I'm really fat" or "Why would any guy want to date me?" or "I'm too ugly for anyone to notice me." If these things are coming out of their mouths, how many other mean things are they thinking inside their heads?

I hear a lot of people speak to women about how wonderful they are. It's true. Women are wonderful! Sometimes, I think this is done to build up women and boost self-esteem. While I think this approach can be beneficial, I'm not going to sugarcoat anything with this post. 

Ladies, these negative thoughts are evil. They are not appropriate. They are not helpful. They are not godly. These thoughts are from the Adversary. Plain and simple. If we suggest to men (and women), that they should remove an unclean, immoral thought or image from their mind immediately, then we women (and men) need to remove these negative, self-degrading thoughts from our minds just as rapidly. Both these type of thoughts--the immoral and the self-degrading--come from the same source: the Devil. 

My friends, my sisters, you are capable of so much more than a brain filled with thoughts of inability, inadequacy, and inferiority. Your brain was meant to be used for so much more than that! Think of all the energy you could reroute to other things. Instead of being consumed by how you looked at a party, you could be consumed by how to befriend others at a party. Instead of letting your voice go quiet in insecurity, you can let your voice rise in words of comfort and love. You are the hands of Christ. Why are you throwing away that ability by focusing on what you think you can't do? It's selfish. 

All of these negative thoughts keep us focused on the wrong thing--ourselves. There's a world of people around us just hoping for someone to care for them, but most of those someones are too caught up in thinking they are worthless to notice. Just like pornography, negative self-talk hurts our relationships.  The resulting low confidence of this self-bullying does not allow friends and partners to truly address problems in order to protect weak self-esteems. Open communication and solutions are stopped at the mirror of lost potential that your wife (or husband) stares into all day.

Several years ago, I had an awakening to my own negative self-talk. A wise professor explained that this practice was simply a habit. It was not an inevitable, insurmountable condition. So, just as I had set other goals to brush my teeth everyday and clean my room regularly, I set the goal to remove the negative thoughts from my head. The first thing I had to do was label it: this thought is leading me away from my potential and from what God wants of me. In that sense, it is a sin. Once labelled, it was easier to want to quickly replace it. Sometimes I would hum a song, but more often than not, I would think of something else, like school, work, or what was going to happen in the last Harry Potter book. And then I repeated this process again and again and again. And again. Like any bad habit, it was extremely hard to break. Thinking negatively of myself was such a common practice that it seemed a part of my personality, something impossible to truly remove. But I kept working at it. I failed many, many times, but instead of giving in to those thoughts of inability--"You're weak. How can you win this battle?"--I kept going. 

It took a long time, but years later, I can say that negative thoughts are uncommon and passing for me. They sometimes come into my mind, but I pay them little attention. They no longer are the natural route for my mind to go down and focus on. And the fight has been completely worth it. I am free. 

To anyone reading this, imprisoned by a constant barrage of mean thoughts: you can be free of them too. If you're out there thinking, "But it's true, I am fat (or ugly or stupid or socially awkward or whatever else it may be)," I would reiterate that these thoughts are lies that are not from God. Jesus would look at you and see not a fat or stupid or socially awkward person but a complex being full of individual potential to fulfill His needs. He would see a worthy disciple to do His work. He would see someone He died for. That's what you are. Don't loose sight of that mission by only seeing all that you think you aren't. You are worth fighting for, so start the fight.

A look for truth in God's mirror.

With sincere love for the divine beings around me,

Amanda Kae

Create Your Own Religion: A How-to

Hey Amanda,

The Twenty-Something Crisis of Faith should be a thing. Because at the time you are completely convinced that you are the only one going through it. You have the uneasy feeling that if a diabolical entitiy exists he is laughing at you. And in the back of your mind is the growing surety that no matter how hard you try, you can never go back to the way things were before.  And you'd be right. You can't.

You can't have the faith you had as a child again. "Jesus said love everyone" won't be enough to guide you through the morally ambiguous world you navigate. The aphorisms aren't always true.  And the elegant simplicity of your childhood religion reveals itself to be a complex balance of opposing mandates and your worried you can't trust it.  But this isn't the time panic. I know you want to. You feel guilty and scared. But don't worry.

Your religious life is about to get awesome.

Because when you were a child, you needed the hand-holding, someone to tell you what God wanted from you. You needed those aphorisms. But not anymore. It's time to draw up the blueprints for your own understanding of God.

Don't worry, I'm not encouraging moral relativity.  I am completely convinced that there are some absolute truths in this world. Nor am I suggesting that organized religion is bad. Or even that orthodoxy is unimportant.

What I'm saying is that within all religions there is a built-in seam allowance, and it can  be tailored to your soul. Because Jesus of Nazareth talked about sparrows with compassion (Matt. 10:29) and He also whipped the sacrilegious (John 2:13-17).  Tender kindness, and fierce devotion. They are both Christian ideals--which one would you emphasize? Which one do you need more of?

Jesus is complicated. WWJD?  Isn't that the question of a lifetime?
Temple Incident by Cosmas Damian Asam

So here's the how to:

1. Read for yourself everything you've been used to getting second-hand. Get your hands on a bible and read it. You don't need anyone to tell you what Jesus taught (or Buddha or Muhammad for that matter). Read it yourself or you'll never know know what it teaches you.

2. Embrace what makes you a better, happier person. And accept that that won't necessarily be the same thing that makes your mom a better, happier person.  Many different fruits have the same vitamins. Just because something inspires you, it doesn't make it inspirational to others. It doesn't make it wrong either, and the inverse is also true. You don't have to worry when something doesn't speak to your soul like it does to someone you care about, because...

3. We are Individual, with Individual Worth. God made all of us, and He made us dissimilar. The variety of godly virtues are  taught by the various passions that drive all of us. Some are more committed to Justice, Compassion, Stewardship, Obedience, or Sacrifice than others, and its the plurality of  living examples that makes us all better people. As we share what God looks like through our eyes, we gain a fuller, more beautiful rendering of who He actually is.

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know [Him] even as also I am known. (1 Cor. 13:12)

And just as a reminder to those in the throes of a crisis of faith- sometimes you only have to figure out what you want to believe. Hang in there.

-Stephanie











 

Giving Up on Getting 100% on Life's Test

"This life is a test." I heard this phrase over and over at Church growing up, but I feel like I'm just getting the concept. I've always been someone who really enjoyed learning, and I was lucky enough to test well at school. In a way, I enjoyed taking tests. They were often like games to me, and I got excited about figuring out the right answer. To be honest, I still like tests. (Nerd alert!)

So, when I learned that we were sent here to be tested, I naively thought of that as a series of choices.

True or False:

1. It is appropriate to use foul language.
2. You should study scriptures everyday.
3. Telling lies is all right, but only if you have a good reason to do so.

I knew all the answers! 1. False! 2. True! 3. False! Though I could answer correctly all these questions of morality and righteousness, I didn't always act in accordance with what I knew was right. That is where I saw the importance of the Atonement come in. When I made a mistake, the Savior was there to correct the missteps.

The last few years I've realized I'm actually a really slow learner. Yes, the Atonement covers our sins and makes up for the times we use our actions to incorrectly "answer" choices of good and evil. But life isn't just a test of choosing good from evil. It is a test of faith, a test of hope, a test of endurance, a test of courage, a test of character, a test of limits. But the word test still doesn't work for me here. All the tests that we have here on earth just don't equate to the test administered by Deity. The best we can do is use metaphors.

crucible: a pot which can withstand high temperatures in order to test materials at high temperatures

In chemistry, a crucible is used to heat elements to extreme temperatures. All other substances are burned off, leaving only the pure element. Then the element is cooled and weighed at room temperature. Special tongs are used to move the crucible because even fingerprints can add mass to the crucible and element weight! This method helps provide accuracy of atomic mass up to six figures. To put this in academic test terms, this is like asking when the Civil War ended, and not only looking for the day the treaty was signed in Appomattox Courthouse, but the hour, the minute, and the second it was signed. This is precision.

The catch here is that we are the element being brought to extreme temperatures. Our test isn't to know exactly how much we amount to in the crucible but to go through the crucible itself. We are heated, or tried, until our purest form remains--who we are when brought to our limits. If we are going through a crucible testing patience, we will be "heated" for the longest period we can think of and then longer. If we are going through the crucible of faith, we will be "heated" to a place where we feel we don't know anything, until only faith remains. And then we are measured and our true weight is found.

I've found that our perceived level of strength is no where near where God knows it to be. So these experiments in crucibles are often longer, more extreme, and more exhausting than we ever thought was possible. Only the omniscience of God could create such a perfectly personal test of our character. And because we are highly complex beings, one bout in the crucible can't fully measure us. We will be tossed back in to test all our attributes.

The beauty of being tested in the crucibles of life is that the test itself changes us and strengthens us because we are here not just to test well, but to become like God. Once again, only an all-loving, omniscient God can create an assessment that simultaneously measures and teaches His pupils.

Just a few of my thoughts.

Cheers,

Amanda

Real Halloween Animals that Look like they Shouldn't Exist

Hey Amanda, 

Here's some real animals that remind us that not all monsters are fiction. 

Painted Bat---A creature so fake, I had to check the edits page on its wikipedia article.

 (Source)

Blobfish---to get a more self-explanatory name you'd have to watch Pokemon

(Source)

Myrianida pachycera --- Like a video game boss,  pachycera spawns clones of itself on its own body which then split off  to swim away and lay eggs. Better go back and look for a 1-Up

(Source and a really awesome blog)

Pacu Fish --looks like a necromancer stole a man's jaw and frankenstein-ed it into a fishes face

(Source)

Glaucus Atlanticus-- ...the alien invasion started in the ocean. 

He's actually pretty cute. (Source)

Goblin Shark-- my brain has never invented a nightmare creature more frightening. 

Shudders. (Source)

I'd include a definition of reality but it's been thrown into question.

Happy All Saints Day/ Día de los Inocentes,

Stephanie