Ask

Ask for things. 

Ask for things that feel unreasonable, to make sure your intuitions about what's reasonable are accurate.

9 Choices

Foster &Hicks

The nine choices are:

1) Intention - having the active desire and commitment to be happy and making the fully conscious decision to choose happiness over unhappiness;
2) Accountability - assuming full responsibility for your actions, thoughts and feelings and the emphatic refusal to blame others for your own unhappiness;
3) Identification – the ongoing process of looking deeply within yourself to assess what makes you uniquely happy, apart from what you’re told by others should make you happy;
4) Centrality – the nonnegotiable insistence on making that which creates happiness central to your life;
5) Recasting – the choice to convert problems into opportunities and challenges and to transform trauma into something meaningful, important and a source of emotional energy;
6) Options – the decision to approach life by creating multiple scenarios, to be open to new possibilities and to adopt a flexible approach to life’s journey;
7) Appreciation – the choice to appreciate deeply your life and the people in it and to stay in the present by turning each experience into something precious;
8) Giving – the choice to share yourself with friends and community and to give to the world at large without expectation of a “return;”
9) Truthfulness – the choice to be honest with yourself and others in an accountable manner by not allowing social, corporate or family demands to violate your internal contract.

Strengthening Faith

Faith is a belief - without guarantees - that if I do this thing, there will be a good outcome.

As I contemplate a choice, I will predict and envision an outcome.

I can choose what outcome to predict and envision. 

And I am free to choose one that makes me feel happy, or at least peaceful.

This is the godlike power of spiritual time travel.

Mourning

Mourning involves processing ,(reframing?) and moving past feelings of anger, sadness, and fear - the fear that sudden losses are normal, and that another loss will happen any second.

On Fasting

It's not about fasting causing hunger, it's suffering from a desire for something inaccessible. Emptiness, need, want, loss, absence. The goal is to transform the suffering. To learn how to be joyful - or at least peaceful - while feeling these hard things.

This self mastery makes me more like Him.

The Feeling Stays

People won't remember what you said. They will remember how you made them feel.

-Maya Angelou (paraphrased)

The Pause

Pause before reacting.

This would also be a good time to straighten my spine 

The Motions

When I don't feel like it, I can go through the motions. Going through the motions gives me my best chance of getting through the dead spot and back into the groove.

How to Count Blessings

Take note of the times when something I have no control over breaks my way.

Not Alone

 I should not try to figure it out all by myself.

Always Questions

 Have a question in mind while reading scriptures 

Progress

 Make small changes regularly.

I Want to See How It Turns Out

If you appeal to curiosity, it pulls you forward. The irresistible desire to know more propels you.

-Ingrid Fetell Lee

Make the Most

"You’ll have no problem finding people with a head start.

That’s not the point.

The point is: when you get your opportunity, you make the most of it."

-James Clear

Struggling with Mistakes

 I am not the mistake.

I can still have joy.

"But first you have to..."

No. I can still have joy.

The mistake... all I have to do is put it down and walk away. 

He'll take care of it.

I'm free to find joy.

Progress on Autopilot

 When I don't want to change, how do I flip the switch to start making progress again?

I can deliberately anchor a reframe or pattern interrupt. I can make it automatic so there's no choice or willpower involved. Just force of habit.

In My Favor

 Every good thing I say or do counts, and I'm more like Him than I think.

Or than the adversary wants me to believe.

Doing Better Than I Think

This training is mostly about how we can do service better. But I had the peculiar thought that what we really need is to be better at giving ourselves credit for the service we already do.

For example, if the Bishop asked "did anyone do any acts of service recently?" I would keep my mouth shut, because I didn't organize dozens of people to labor for several hours. I DID fill up my wife's water bottle, but I don't count that because it was quick and only helped one person, and she's my wife. Everyone knows that serving my own family doesn't count.

But even though little acts of service take less time and affect fewer people may not count for as much, it does NOT count as zero. 

What I'm suggesting is that by giving yourself credit for small acts service, you stop seeing service as something that's either "a huge thing that you do over there" or "nothing". You can start seeing  every kind word you say and every  thoughtful thing you do as being a part of a life of service. You can start thinking of yourself as one who lives a life of service, just like Jesus. 

And as you begin to think of yourself as being more like Jesus, you actually become more like Jesus. 

I invite you to count every good thing you say and do as being part of a larger life of Christ-like service, and see... if that perspective makes a difference. 

And I leave that with you in the name of Jesus Christ, amen

Tranquility

The more tranquil a man becomes, the greater is his success, his influence, his power for good

-James Allen

Young Again

"If you're 37... Instead of regretting that you can't wake up age 18 again, pretend to yourself that you're 90 and you've woken up age 37 again, and that you get to magically, wonderfully have the next 50 years again."