Snap Out of It!!!

I've had one of those mornings where I am in a funk. I feel kind of down in the dumps. Emotional. Lonely. You know those days where nothing is really wrong but somehow you feel kinda stinky. Well, that's today.

It reminded me of this picture by Mary Engelbreit and the perfect phrase suggesting that I, "SNAP OUT OF IT!"

I know that I am not the only one who has these kind of days or moments so what do you do when you are in a funk? What are some things you do to Snap Out of It? I am sure we all could glean something from each other's funny, silly, or even spiritual antidotes for a case of funkitis.

BRitD

This post was written a little while back and was posted only partly on this blog and entirely on Modern Molly Mormon where I am a small contributor (known as Mystery Molly). I decided to post the whole thing here, enjoy!

My husband and I have been trying to get our house in order. This means cleaning out closets, going through boxes, and taking a whole slew of things to the D.I. It has been quite the undertaking and is still a work in progress. But as I have gone through some boxes of things I haven’t seen in a very long time I came across a t-shirt, in fact I came across way to many t-shirts. Most of them I put in a box to carry downstairs and sort them later. One of the t-shirts ended up in my drawer. It was a shirt given to me as part of an extended family reunion. I have many of these kinds of shirts all with a different acronyms on them. I was unable to attend this specific reunion but still was given a shirt.

The back of the shirt reads like this:



The other night I chose it as the shirt I was going to wear to bed and I quickly remembered what those letters represent – Be Righteous in the Dark. At first glance I felt like I knew what our reunion was about even without being in attendance but then my brain started stewing over this seemingly simple phrase. What did it really mean or what could it mean?

So today I decided to ponder this a little and came up with four different ways to look at Being Righteous in the Dark. Many questions floated around in my head and ended up here as well. And of course with my love of the meaning of words I decided to look up the word dark.

1 - One meaning of the word dark is hidden or secret –

Are you righteous behind closed doors? Are you righteous in your hidden thoughts? Are you righteous in the darkness of your own solitude?

We must learn to be righteous when we are alone.

2 - Another meaning of the word dark is evil or wicked -

Are you seeking for righteousness in the darkness of this evil world? Are you taking to heart the phrase “be in the world but not of it”? Do you shun evil and worldly things and seek after the things of God? Do you stand up for what you believe even when you stand alone?

We must learn to be righteous amid the evils of the world.


3 – Another meaning of the word dark is gloomy or cheerless.

Are you righteous when in the midst of your trials and days of gloom? Do you seek the healing power of the atonement? Do you pray more fervently? Or do you question the love of God and forget to turn to Him in your times of need?

We must learn to be righteous during the battle of our trials.


4 – The last meaning I chose for the word dark is hard to understand or obscure.

Are you righteous and filled with faith even when a doctrine of the Gospel or the weight and purpose of a trial are hard to understand? Do you follow the words of the Prophet or other church leaders even when at first the purpose may seem unclear or unnecessary to you?

We must learn to be righteous and have a greater faith in God’s plan for us.

Brigham Young was the one to make this statement, “…we must learn to be righteous in the dark.” (Brigham Young’s Office Journal, 28 January 1857.)

What a powerful and true phrase that is. It is and will more profoundly continue to be a necessity, a must, an essential to Be Righteous in the Dark.

I challenge us all to find our greatest struggle in the dark and become more righteous there.

A Lesson from "Green Eggs and Ham"

Last night while I was reading my little boy a bed-time story, "Green Eggs and Ham", by Dr. Seuss, one of the illustrations stuck out to me. Well, I have always quite enjoyed these two pages, they just make me smile. I generally find them clever and funny and refreshing but this time they stuck out to me spiritually and I made a parallel.

So here are the two pictures. Take a close look, maybe even click on them to enlarge them. Look at the faces of all of the characters.

Maybe you caught what I saw or maybe you are thinking "yeah, so they're all happy and smiling, what's the big deal?" Well, now take a closer look at their situation. I love it. In the first picture they have just plummeted off the railroad track and landed upside down on a boat and yes they are still smiling, most with their eyes closed, and look quite simply content. In the second picture, they are sinking into the water. The driver of the boat is upside down in the water still holding the wheel and is as happy as clam. The passengers of the train, the sinking train, look quite peaceful and content themselves again with their eyes closed. I really quite enjoy these pages.

So you are probably wondering what spiritual parallel I possibly made with these two pictures, and well here it goes.

Have you ever started to "sink" spiritually but didn't even realize it until a big wake up call? Do you ever allow Satan to convince you that you can be content and maybe even complacent with where you are at and slowly but surely he starts to drag you down with a smile?

Now maybe take a look at the pictures again: We are the drivers of our own ships (lives) but do we sometimes allow Satan to take our ship out from underneath us and we don't even see it? Are we sometimes the passengers on Satan's train and don't even recognize it? Are our eyes sometimes closed to the things of the Spirit?

I think we all sometimes fall into the category of being Spiritually Blind. I think that this is one of Satan's greatest tools. In Doctrine and Covenants 78:10 it reads, "...Satan seeketh to turn their hearts away from the truth, that they become blinded..."

Satan is the darkness that blinds us and the Savior can be our Light to make us see. Under Blindness in the Bible dictionary it reads, "In addition to the healing of physical blindness, the mission of Jesus included curing blindness to the things of the spirit. He made an application of this in John 9: 5 when, in conjunction with healing the man born blind, he declared that he (Jesus) was “the light of the world.”


James E. Faust shares how we might gain this Light for ourselves:
"The Light in Their Eyes," Ensign, Nov. 2005, 21

"Hearing the words of the Lord lifts us out of spiritual blindness 'into his marvelous light' (1 Peter 2:9). Much of that light comes from our discipline, dedication, and consecration..."

One of my very favorite scriptures also talks about staying away from this spiritual darkness or blindness and receiving more light, it reads (D&C 50:23-24):

"And that which doth not edify is not of God, and is darkness. That which is of God is light; and he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light; and that light groweth brighter and brighter until the perfect day."

Let us open our eyes to the Light of the Lord. Let us strive for the companionship of the Holy Ghost that we might know when we are sinking and becoming spiritually blinded. Let us ask ourselves if the things we are doing are edifying us, and then if not, let us seek for the Light and help it grow in our lives. Let us open our eyes to the spiritual Light of the Savior.

BRitD

I am also a contributor on Modern Molly Mormon and just made a post there. I am known as Mysti or Mystery Molly there, if you would like to read some of my posts there.

Here is the beginning of the post found on MMM:

My husband and I have been trying to get our house in order. This means cleaning out closets, going through boxes, and taking a whole slew of things to the D.I. It has been quite the undertaking and is still a work in progress. But as I have gone through some boxes of things I haven’t seen in a very long time I came across a t-shirt, in fact I came across way to many t-shirts. Most of them I put in a box to carry downstairs and sort them later. One of the t-shirts ended up in my drawer. It was a shirt given to me as part of an extended family reunion. I have many of these kinds of shirts all with a different acronyms on them. I was unable to attend this specific reunion but still was given a shirt.

The back of the shirt reads like this:


The other night I chose it as the shirt I was going to wear to bed and I quickly remembered what those letters represent – Be Righteous in the Dark. At first glance I felt like I knew what our reunion was about even without being in attendance but then my brain started stewing over this seemingly simple phrase. What did it really mean or what could it mean?

To read what I discovered you can read the remainder of the post HERE.

Walk in the Light

I thought I would share this talk since most of us probably didn't get to hear it in the YW conference. It is a wonderul message. This will be my last official scheduled post - read the bolded text on the left side of the blog for more details.

Walk in the Light
Young Women Conference April 2008

President Henry B. Eyring
First Counselor in the First Presidency

"You are remarkable, even among those who chose right in the contest in the spirit world. You qualified to come into mortality and to make this journey at a time when the gospel of Jesus Christ was on the earth. And among the billions of Heavenly Father's children now living, you were privileged to find the gospel of Jesus Christ and His true Church. "

I think sometimes I lose sight of how blessed I am to be born into mortality in the circumstances that I am in. As members of the Church we truly are so blessed to have the Gospel on the earth at this time and to have it in our lives.

"You make choices every day and almost every hour that keep you walking in the light or moving away toward darkness. Some of the most important choices are about what you set your heart upon.

There are so many things you may consider desirable. For instance, all of us want, to some degree, the approval of other people. All of us feel a need for friends. All of us are searching for some evidence that we are persons of worth. We make choices based on those desires. Some might lead us away from the light God offers us as a guide. Some may brighten that light by which we can find our way."

I have always really liked the phrase in the scriptures about our hearts being set upon something such as riches. Each day our heart might be set on something different. Is it set on riches? Is it set on being better than others? Or if we checked our hearts would we find it set on the foundation of Christ?

What a wonderful message from President Eyring. To read the whole talk click on the title at the top of the post.

Light vs. Darkness

Doctrine and Covenants 50:23-24

23 And that which doth not edify is not of God, and is darkness.

24 That which is of God is light; and he that receiveth light, and continueth in God, receiveth more light; and that light groweth brighter and brighter until the perfect day.

Moroni 7:13

13...that which is of God inviteth and enticeth to do good continually; wherefore, every thing which inviteth and enticeth to do good, and to love God, and to serve him, is inspired of God.

These are a few of my absolute favorite scriptures because they teach us how to know right from wrong or light from dark.

In the past, whenever I questioned if what I was doing was the right thing to be doing I would ask myself if I was edified while participating in that particular activity. To edify means to uplift, instruct, or encourage you to intellectually, morally, and/or spiritually improve. So more simply I would ask myself if I was being uplifted or if I was improving while engaging in that particular activity. Sometimes I found that what I was doing wasn't necessarily bad but maybe it wasn't the best thing I could've been doing.

Along with edifying us, the way we spend our time and the choices we make should also invite and entice us to do good continually. I love the word continually. In both scriptures the word is used. If we do good continually and continue in God we will receive more light that will continue to grow as we continue to do good. I really like the word continue because it means that we never leave or depart from that which is good. It means that we endure and are persistant even when it might be hard to choose light over dark or to be constantly obedient.

Both of these scriptures can be used to check ourselves and to continually watch ourselves. I think we would be perfectly guided in our daily pursuits if we asked ourselves if what we were doing edified, invited, and enticed us to do good and to become better.