The Value of Valuing

Identifying our New Year’s Goals is identifying our general goals—our long-term goals.  It’s like asking, “What do you believe in?”  or “What are your values?” or "What do you value?"

Every year we have the New-Year’s-Goals meeting in our family.  We have tried to help our kids connect these general goals with their monthly, weekly, and daily goals.  If we don’t move their thought processes into the more specific tasks that need to be done on a daily or weekly basis, the actual work that needs to be done to accomplish the goal remains separate from the goal itself.  And that means they  never accomplish it.

What if a child wants the general goal but doesn’t want to accomplish the specific goals--the action steps one needs to take for actual achievment?  What if she moans and groans over how terrible the perspective journey appears? 

How could we want to get to a destination but not want to actually take the journey to get there?  Isn’t the joy in the journey?  The challenge? 

Value

Value is established and FELT when we actually have to journey, fight, work, sweat to obtain something.  The experience of struggling to obtain a goal is what gives us evidence of its worth.  No matter how much value something is inherently, we can not personally value it until we have personally struggled to obtain it.  Taking shortcuts or cheating in order to obtain the same result will never return the same degree of joy. 

Listen:  "The Climb" by Myley Cyrus

I like to say that Joy is in the Journey and in the final destination. The intensity of joy that we have in the final destination depends on the intensity of the sacrifice required of us to arrive there.  The greater the sacrifice, the more intensely we value it.  The level of ability to value something defines our level of ability to experience joy.   The greater the sacrifice, the more intense the joy.  

Listen:  Overnight by Amy Grant (feat. Sarah Chapman)

But it's important to note here that the sacrifice needs to be voluntary throughout the entire experience.  It can't be forced upon us.  It can't be made against our will.  And that is the hard part.  Most of us have an automatic reflexive and self-defensive response to pain and sorrow after we experience so much of it.  To actually accept the pain and sorrow and be able to carry it is not always within our present ability.  This is similar to not being able to sustain a muscular contraction against a weight and against a duration of time that is beyond our current capacity and endurance level.

One example of this is what Jim Caviezel said about his experience in portraying Christ during the final scenes of his life.

"And let me tell you, I was on that cross. Many people who looked up there, I may be playing Christ, but a lot of times I felt like Satan. I had obscenities wanting to come out of me. It was so cold it was like knives coming through me. I had hypothermia. I don't know whether you've dealt with that, but on one day of hypothermia I was so cold I could barely get the lines out. My mouth was shaking uncontrollably. My arms and legs went numb. I was suffocating on that cross. In the mean time, you watch people have coffee and laugh. They were very indifferent about what I was going through" (The 700 Club).

In one interview that I watched a few years ago, Jim Caviezel said that even though they were only acting and he was being "fake" whipped and "fake" pushed around, he wanted to defend himself, curse them, abuse them back.  He couldn't stop the feelings from welling up inside of him yet his desire was "I don't want people to see me. I just want them to see Jesus" (The 700 Club).   

Yet we know that we can grow muscle, at least to a certain point, through incremental trial.

Failure

Have you ever realized that we can’t fail unless we set a goal?  We have all experienced the frustration of failure.  It inevitably happens in all journeys to some degree.  Maybe we’ve started the journey to achieve a particular goal a million times before only to meet with a lack of results. We journey, sweat, and toil but still the result remains out of our reach!  We can’t see where the pathway goes from here.  It feels like we’ve reached a dead end, a wall, an impasse.  The process to obtain our desire seems to be a mystery that we’re never going to figure out. 

That is so discouraging.  This kind of failure makes me want to curl up into a ball under the covers and never come out again.  It kills my motivation to progress and to set goals.  And when I get to this place it is just not enough to hear, “You just need to keep trying.”  Blah, blah, blah...

Blah, blah, blah...

I know I need to keep trying.  And I will get up again...soon.  Sometimes I just can’t do that immediately. 

When I finally receive motivation to do it, it is because I’m beginning to see things from a different perspective.  Sometimes just holding steadfast in the process I was already engaged in is the answer but usually for me I need to make at least a course adjustment in my thinking in order to get going again.  This new perspective is always the result of “going back to the drawing board.”  

My “drawing board” is the place where my Cause (Exemplar, Provider, Teacher, Evaluator) resides.  I need to talk to him all about it.  I need to study his journey again--the road map he has given me--searching for additional clues.   

 I often hear the words of a song by Seals andCrofts (“Get Closer”) come into my mind when I feel so frustrated about my journey and can’t understand why I haven’t obtained my goal yet:

 There’s a line
I can’t cross over

It’s no good for me
And it’s no good for you.

These words seem to be coming from my Cause.  I think the line he means is the line of value, the line where it's me who has to sacrifice in order to get what I want.  I have got to journey to obtain my goal, I have got to experience the pain and sorrow from doing that, otherwise I won’t be able to value it as much as I NEED to value it in the end.  He can’t give that to me.  I’m sure he would if he could.  But the reality of it is that I have to journey, strive, sweat, toil, work, REACH to obtain it.  There is no other way.

I’ve learned that it’s my job, my responsibility, to identify that line.  I have to at least be asking the questions and be open to the answers.  That takes humility because usually I’m thinking I’m already doing the best I can.  Finding out that I haven’t been doing everything right is humbling.  And the longer I journey, the more I realize that there isn’t going to come a time when I’m doing everything right until I actually arrive at my desired destination.  Sometimes that’s such a bummer to hear. 

But when I rise up again, with hope (it always comes back even when it seems impossible in the moment), I’m ready to consider once again that joy is in the journey.  I actually DO NOT want my desire to be just given to me.  It’s part of my inherent character to NEED to value what I obtain.  I can't stand when things are value-less to me.

One note of caution here that I always need to add when speaking about the general principles of grace and works.  Journeying is not about doing it all by myself with no help from any other source.  It's not about all works and no grace.  But neither is it about all grace and no works.  We have to do something.  EVERYTHING testifies of that including these two scriptures:

"For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also."

James 2: 26 

"For we labor diligently to write, to persuade our children, and also our brethren, to believe in Christ, and to be reconciled to God; for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all we can do."

2 Nephi 2:25

Even if I have not reached my final destination, the next milestone is not so very distant.  Reaching the next milestone means that I will understand things from a whole new perspective when I get there.  It means I will have learned something new. 

Each of these milestones tends to resolve a certain conflict that has held me back from being able to experience a greater level of joy.  When I reach them I gain a vantage point that enables me to see not only my pathway but everything in my life from a higher level.  And that brings me a kind of Joy that no other source has to offer.  

Listen:  "As I Am" by Jeff McLean and Michael McLean

Getting A Life!

As my boys were growing up and started being interested in girls I tried to teach them to get a life first.  What I meant by that was to figure out what they were passionate about.  Was it to succeed in athletics or academics or some of both?  Which sport did they prefer?  What specific classes in school did they find they excelled in? 

But I didn’t want them to chase those things down in order to gain popularity and praise from external sources.  I wanted them to find in their hearts where they were passionate to serve and make a difference in our family, at school, at church, and in our neighborhood.

The following describes how I wanted my kids to view their service, their duty to their fellow men.  Nephi and Lehi who lived about 30 B.C. were named after honored historical figures in their society.  In these few verses their father tells them why they were thus named and what his desires of them were.

Helaman 5:6-8 (click here to read the full account):

6 Behold, my sons,…I have given unto you the names of our first parents who came out of the land of Jerusalem; and this I have done that when you remember your names ye may remember them; and when ye remember them ye may remember their works; and when ye remember their works ye may know how that it is said, and also written, that they were good. 

7 Therefore, my sons, I would that ye should do that which is good, that it may be said of you, and also written, even as it has been said and written of them.

8 And now my sons, behold I have somewhat more to desire of you, which desire is, that ye may not do these things that ye may boast, but that ye may do these things to lay up for yourselves a treasure in heaven, yea, which is eternal, and which fadeth not away; yea, that ye may have that precious gift of eternal life, which we have reason to suppose hath been given to our fathers.

Aaron chose ice hockey when he was younger and then football, academics and getting a job in high school.

Chris chose baseball when he was younger and then ice hockey, academics, and getting a job in high school.

Matthew has chosen basketball and more recently cross country as well as academics and getting a job in high school.

The job is so they can have a car.  In our family they need to assist with insurance and registration as well as pay for their own gas.

Laura just started high school.  She is a different specimen than the boys.  She prefers art, writing, interior design, baking, but like her brothers has a strong talent in academics.  Unlike them, she has been self-organized in all her school work and self-motivated in keeping up with all of her assignments.

All of them have chosen to remain faithful to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to pay a sufficient amount of attention to the study of it and how it applies to their individual lives.   

Matthew and Laura are still in high school—still baking in the oven.  But by Chris’ and Aaron’s senior years and into college they were a delight for me to watch among their peers.  I saw them interacting with others, interested in what they had to say and participating fully in the conversation.

On their missions they took off like EAGLES!  That was when they seriously got a life.  And it was all about losing it in service of others but also in service to a Cause they believed in with all of their heart.

This was my desire for them from when they were younger.  Find what you are most passionate about and give your life to it….even if it means giving up the girl FOR NOW.

And Aaron did just that.  He had a girlfriend before he left on his mission.  He loved her.  When he left he hoped she would still be available when he got back but who knew?  On his mission, he couldn’t focus on her (although he wrote her regularly).  He had to let her go and focus on the work he was assigned.  I can’t say how impressed I was.  He was on fire with the Cause he was engaged in.  On fire with helping others, teaching them about the Gospel of Jesus Christ, finding ways to reach those who were also reaching for help but didn’t know where to turn.  WHAT A BEAUTIFUL SIGHT!

And then the unimaginable happened.  The girl back home broke it off with him.  And he was left to sink or swim.  Sometimes both the young man or young woman in a relationship can get so wrapped up in each other that they consider the other to be that thing that they are most passionate about.  And yes, there definitely is passion.  But I would like to state a theory here that maybe is not widely accepted.   It is what I am figuring out for myself through my own experience to be completely necessary in order to obtain Sustainable Attraction in a relationship.

Sustainable Attraction Theory:  if a man or woman doesn’t have a life in addition to the passion they have for each other, their Attraction for each other will not be Sustainable. 

I’ll share the end of what happened with Aaron in a minute (most of you already know).  But first I want to share a story that was recently shared with me by a good friend during our women’s group meeting at church.  I do this in order to explain what I mean by that Theory.  I have felt this theory inside of me for quite some time but I haven’t been able to put my finger on it exactly.  Thanks to my friend, Kristine Jenkins, I can explain it now.  I will forever be thankful to her for sharing this story.  She had recorded her husband reading it on her iphone so it was even more powerful.  I felt the most intense feelings in my heart.  It has helped me understand something that was only vaguely known to me before.

She got this story from a talk entitled, “On, On to the Victory” that was given in June of 2010 by Elder Richard H. Winkel (Former Member of the Second Quorum of the Seventy). 

Major Sullivan Ballou

In the talk, Elder Winkel speaks of a man named Sullivan Ballou who lived from the mid to late 1800s during the time of the American Civil War.  He was married to a woman named Sarah who he utterly and completely adored and together they had two boys (who he also loved with a deep fatherly passion).  Sullivan Ballou was a major in the United States Army.  As you probably recall, this war was between the Northern and Southern states.  The North wanted to maintain the constitution and the governmental system of Liberty to all men that was set up by the founding fathers which included abolishing slavery, a practice that was deeply interwoven into Southern culture and economics.  Sullivan was passionate about maintaining the government that so many people before him had given their lives to establish.  At the time the following letter was written, he was about to head his troops into a battle from which he wasn’t sure he would come out of alive.  The letter demonstrates the conflict he felt between his love of country and his love of his wife and boys.

A picture of the actual letter

July the 14th, 1861

Washington D.C.

My very dear Sarah:

The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days—perhaps tomorrow.  Lest I should not be able to write you again, I feel impelled to write lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more.     

Our movement may be one of a few days duration and full of pleasure—and it may be one of severe conflict and death to me.  Not my will, but thine O God, be done.  It is necessary that I should fall on the battlefield for my country, I am ready.  I have no misgivings about, or lack of confidence in, the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter.  I know how strongly American Civilization now leans upon the triumph of the Government, and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us-through the blood and suffering of the Revolution.  And I am willing – perfectly –willing –to lay down all my joys in this life, to help maintain this Government, and to pay that debt.

But, my dear wife, when I know that with my own joys I lay down nearly all of yours, and replace them in this life with cares and sorrows – when, after having eaten for long years the bitter fruit of orphanage myself, I must offer it as their only sustenance to my dear little children.  Is it weak or dishonorable, while the banner of my purpose floats calmly and proudly in the breeze, that my unbounded love for you, my darling wife and children, should struggle in fierce, though useless, contest with my love of country?

I cannot describe to you my feelings on this calm summer night, when two thousand men are sleeping around me, many of them enjoying the last/perhaps/before that of death – and I, suspicious that Death is creeping behind me with his fatal dart,...

I have sought most closely and diligently, and often in my breast, for a wrong motive in thus hazarding the happiness of those I loved/ and I could not find one.  A pure love of my country ...and “the name of honor that I love more than I fear death” have called upon me, and I have obeyed.

Listen:  Faithfully by Journey

Sarah, my love for you is deathless, it seems to bind me to you with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break; and yet my love of Country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me irresistibly on with all these chains to the battlefield.

The memories of the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most gratified to God and to you that I have enjoyed them so long.  And hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when God willing, we might still have lived and loved together and seen our sons grow up to honorable manhood around us.  I have, I know, but few and small claims upon Divine Providence, but something whispers to me – perhaps it is the prayer of my little Edgar – that I shall return to my loved ones unharmed.  If I do not, my dear Sarah, never forget how much I loved you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battlefield, it will whisper your name. 

Forgive my many faults, and the many pains I have caused you.  How thoughtless and foolish I have oftentimes been!  How gladly would I wash out with my tears every little spot upon your happiness, and struggle with all the misfortune of this world, to shield you and my children from harm.  But I cannot.  I must watch you from the spirit land and hover near you, while you buffet the storms with your precious little freight, and wait with sad patience till we meet to part no more. 

But, O Sarah! If the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they love, I shall always be near you:  in the garish day and in the darkest night – amidst your happiest scenes and gloomiest hours – always, always; and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall be my breath; or when the air fans your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by. 

(Better to just listen than to watch because while the song conveys the feelings of the letter, the video distracts from it)

Sarah, do not mourn me dead;...for we shall meet again.

 As for my little boys, they will grow as I have done, and never know a father’s love and care.  Little Willie is too young to remember me long, and my blue-eyed Edgar will keep my frolics with him among the dimmest memories of his childhood.  Sarah, I have unlimited confidence in your maternal care and your development of their characters...I call God’s blessing upon you.  O Sarah, I wait for you there!  Come to me, and lead thither my children.

Sullivan

Sullivan was mortally wounded in the battle and died shortly thereafter.

Listen:  "Right Here Waiting" by Donny Osmond

In expressing my desire for my boys to get a life, I haven’t meant to teach them to run after riches and fame or anything else that could never sustain long-term happiness and put those things above his commitment to his wife and children.  I have meant for them to give their lives to a greater Cause, a true Cause, a deep and abiding Cause, the Cause of God.  And I want it to be a powerful conflict for them between being with their wife and children in happily ever after RIGHT NOW and fulfilling their duty to God, church, and country.  I want them to find their rest, peace, and Joy at home with their beautiful wife and children but also have an energy, a motivation, and a fire for their duty to act in the name of what’s right for a larger Cause whatever that personally means to each one of them.

I cannot tell you how ATTRACTIVE  a man who does this is to a woman (and to his children).  How amazingly attractive is a man who has this real conflict inside of him without faking it because it is known to any sincere and honest woman when a man fakes his passion for duty.  A man who views his relationship with his wife as his own LIFE but then must give up that life FOR NOW to whatever degree that his God requires of him in order to maintain or regain the Liberty of his Country (which ultimately includes his wife and children) is the most powerfully attractive man that exists.

I guess what I’m saying is that I want my sons to love their God more than anything else, even more than their selves.  And their “selves” include their complete and utter love of their wife.  IT’S SO PARADOXICAL!

Listen:  "Nothing Compares 2 U" by Sinead O'Connor

And us women need to allow this sacrifice KNOWING that Sustainable Attraction is ETERNAL.  The love between a man and a woman with a relationship like this is ETERNAL.  It will never die spiritually even though physical death may part them temporarily.  That’s not easy for us women.  We too have a duty to God to perform.  And it is giving up our lives—that beautiful man that belongs to us, who is apart of our very souls—which pierces us to the depths of our hearts.  Yet in this very act, this very deepest pain, is where Sustainable Attraction is made ETERNAL.   Sealed forever to each other.  Soul to soul.

The truth of the matter is that we don't want to be the center of a man's life where his God should be.  We don't want to be made into his idol.  We can feel when a man does this and it is a bad feeling for all of us who desire Sustainable Attraction.  Although it may feel good in the beginning, it can't last. Yet we don't want to be disregarded.  This is a conflicting desire, I know.  But Sullivan Men satisfy a woman's conflicting desires with their own conflicting desires to love both their God and their wives. 

Read:  JST Mark 8:37-38

This is what I have wanted my boys to understand.  I want each to seek out that woman who will be his LIFE but to start first with GETTING A LIFE by figuring out what sacrifice God requires him to specifically make on this earth to maintain or regain the Liberty of man kind—the right to choose.  That probably won't mean they will be required to make a sacrifice exactly like Sullivan but I'm sure they will be required to sacrifice to the degree they desire Sustainable Joy and Attraction.

As a mother, it really has never been about my kids succeeding in sports or academics or having a car as an end.  Those things were a means to an end.  It was about teaching them to pay attention to their core desire, whatever it was at their age.  I knew or rather hoped that desire would be refined as they matured.  Refined to become more like Sullivan’s desires.  I know my own has been refined over time.  

Back to Aaron's story:  When he saw his LIFE seemingly crumbling before his eyes while serving his mission, he had a choice:  sink or swim.  He chose to swim!  I saw him cleave unto his God and trust in him.  He believed that if he continued doing all he could to honor his commitment to God, all would work out, however it worked out.  It was not easy for him.  His love for this beautiful daughter of God was intense.  But he did it.  He allowed himself to be swallowed up in his duty to God while allowing her the space she needed.

Here are two songs that he sent me while he was still on his mission that illustrate his Sullivan love of God and Country.

He sent me "Middle of Your Heart" when he was really struggling with the whole break-up.

The End (and the Beginning):  They got back together after he returned home.

Aaron & Lindsey from Kelly Newman on Vimeo.

Influence and Karma

It seems like everyone wants to influence someone else.  Why?  Well ideally it's because we have found something amazing to share with someone else.  It made us happy and we want to make others happy. 

Not so ideally, we sometimes may influence others in order to indirectly validate our own beliefs.  When someone does what we're doing it gives us a sense of confidence.  We're not alone.  The more people who do what we're doing, the better we feel about ourselves.  And let's be honest, it is a good feeling when we're part of a group or when we are the ones to set a trend.  But if we rely on the validation of those we are trying to influence, anyone who won't do what we're doing or who even dares speak out against it becomes our sudden mortal enemy.  In fact we can't seem to rest easy because that person disagrees with us.  We may even choose to start picking that person apart, searching for some kind of flaw to prove s/he is dead wrong.

This happens in the story of Mordecai and Haman.  Haman is one of the main princes under King Ahasuerus.  King Ahasuerus is the one who chooses Esther to be his queen.  (This story is found in the Bible in the Book of Esther.)  But there is another story that unfolds right around this one between the afore mentioned men. 

Mordecai is Esther's older cousin.  He takes her as his own daughter when her parents die.  After Esther is chosen to be the new queen, Mordecai hangs out by the gate of the palace.  While he is there he hears two men conspiring against the king.  They want to take him out.  Mordecai reports this to Esther.  And Esther reports it to the king.  When an inquisition is made, the two men are found guilty and are both hanged. 

This opens up a spot for Haman to ascend to the main prince role.  He's not a son of the king.  He is an adviser.  So when he walks outside of the palace it's a rule that all the city of Shushan reverence him.  But when Haman passes by Mordecai, he doesn't.  And this is because he's Jewish and has covenanted not to bow down to anyone but his God.  Everyone else is bowing down to Haman.  Is that not enough?  Apparently not because when he notices that Mordecai isn't bowing down he's as mad as all get out. 

So what does he do?  He proceeds to find a way to ELIMINATE HIM.  But not just him.  His ENTIRE RACE.  Prejudice is born.  He knows Mordecai is Jewish so he gets the king to sign a decree that all Jewish people will be destroyed on a certain day.  Just wipe 'em all out and that will take care of the problem.

But before that time comes to pass, Haman still has to walk by Mordecai.  Again everyone else is reverencing him.  Just one person isn't.   He talks to his family and friends about what he should do because it grates on him day in and day out.  They tell him to construct a gallows to hang him on.  What a great idea!  And he commands his servants to do it.  The next morning he goes into the king to get his seal of approval for this plan. 

But the night before the king hadn't been able to sleep.  So he gets up and started reading the palace records.  He stumbles across the incident where Mordecai discovered the conspiracy against the king.  He asks  his servants what has been done to honor this man.  They tell him that nothing has been done.  So he asks who of his princes-advisers are in the court this morning.  They tell him that Haman is out there waiting to talk to him.  Send him in!

And the king says to Haaman, "What shall be done unto the man whom the king desires to honor?"

Haman thinks, well if there's anyone who the king desires to honor, it's me!  So he says, "Get some of the kings royal wardrobe and dress him in it.  Then put him on a horse and lead him through the city crying, 'Thus shall it be done to the man whom the king delighteth to honour!'"

The king then replies to Haman, "Make haste, and take the apparel and the horse, as thou hast said, and do even so to Mordecai the Jew, that sitteth at the king’s gate: let nothing fail of all that thou hast spoken."

There was no getting out of it.  Haman had to do it!  Haha.  So he took "the apparel and the horse, and arrayed Mordecai, and brought him on horseback through the street of the city, and proclaimed before him, Thus shall it be done unto the man whom the king delighteth to honour."

And after the whole episode was over Haman "hasted to his house mourning, and having his head covered."  That's when his family and friends predict that he's a goner.  This same day he had been invited to a feast with the king and queen Esther.  He had gloried in being personally singled out like this.  But at this banquet, Esther tells the king about how Haman plans to kill her and all of her people.  The king can't believe it.  He is so mad!  When he also hears that Haman had constructed a gallows to hang the very man that saved the king's life, that's the end of it.  "Then the king said, Hang him thereon."

Add caption

Karma.

There are no good endings to trying to influence others in order to receive validation, glory, confirmation for ourselves.  We have to do it for the real reasons.  A tell-tale sign that we are doing it for the wrong reasons is that we can barely stand it when someone disagrees with us.  It hurts our pride.  We can't let them have their own opinion.  It somehow negates the rightness of our own actions in our minds.  When we influence others for the right reasons, we stand in confidence.  Yes, there will still be those who disagree with us and we may struggle with it.  But the way to obtain validation is to hope for the joy, happiness, and success of others.  That has to be the reason we want to influence them. 

When I'm genuinely unsure of the value of what I'm advocating, I have learned through much error of my own that I need to take some more time studying it, experimenting upon it and then listening to my heart.  I know when something is of value when the Joy I experience is Sustainable.  And that means I can't know it over night.  It takes time.  And most of the time it takes me making mistakes as I experiment upon it.  Yet I've learned my attitude can't be to convince others that it is right.  It needs to be a teachable--I'm trying to figure this out--attitude.

Do unto others as you would have done unto you because it will be done unto you.

 I believe in this with all my heart. It most likely will not be as immediate or even as apparent as Mordecai and Haman's story but it will eventually come to pass.  It's the way the pendulum swings.

The end.

Eternity Is Being Constructed Now

"And I wonder why would I wait 'till I die to come alive...I'm [getting] ready now..." Listen:  "Afterlife" by Switchfoot

Each of the systems in our body are equipped with what I call Effect Sensors.The eyes have photoreceptors. The ears have sound receptors. The nose has olfactory receptors. The type of Energy each system receives is specific to that system. The eyes receive Energy in the form of light. The ears receive it in the form of sound. The nose receives it in the form of smells. Each system also contains a taskforce of Energy Converters. These convert the specific form of Energy to electrical signals that communicate something to the brain.  The brain then interprets these signals and converts them into meaning.  And meaning is spiritual.

When these two Processes of receiving and converting Energy are in Balance, that body system is Balanced and Healthy.

I love to compare the physical to the spiritual.  I believe everything that is physical also exists spiritually in a similar order.  So the spirit has systems similar to the body.  We have Spiritual eyes, ears, noses, and so forth.

Our Spiritual Effect Sensors also receive Energy but in the form of meaning, truth, and light.  Our spiritual eyes have the capacity to see the light of truth (D&C 93:36). 

Listen:  "I Am The Light" by Maxine Soakai (feat. David Osmond)

Our spiritual ears receive personal revelation, inspiration, or a good idea that seems to come out of nowhere.

The smells that the physical nose senses are actually airborne molecular matter.   So picture someone is cooking something downstairs.  You don’t know what it is but its scent makes its way upstairs and into your nostrils.  You haven’t touched it, seen it, or tasted its immediate physical matter.  Yet because the matter expands into the air in the form of microscopic molecules past its physical borders, we are able to have a small “taste” of what it is that is cooking downstairs.  Our Spiritual nose discerns things before we actually see or touch them.  This is the power of Discernment.

 

Our Spiritual Energy Converters represent how we interpret meaning.  Meaning, truth, and light exist independently.  We just describe what we see.  When our eyes, ears, and noses see, read, hear, or detect things our Spiritual Energy Converters determine what is Truth and what is False similar to how our physical eyes phototransduct light from darkness.  They do this to identify general truth as well as how it specifically applies to us and our individual story.

 It is during this conversion Process that our individuality appears.  How each of us evaluates the world around us is unique.  What are we looking for?  What are we paying attention to?  What do we spend our time focusing on?  Through this evaluation Process, we demonstrate who we are.

We receive clues before actual discernment takes place.  When the physical systems of the body send the converted electrical signals to the brain, the brain matches or Summarizes these signals with what has been previously experienced.  When we receive clues about someone or something that we are seeking to gain a greater knowledge of, our mind matches these up with what is previously known.  When we add all of these clues up we can discern who someone is who we have not yet physically seen or touched.

If all the systems of our body and spirit are receiving and converting Energy in Balance then we exist at our Optimum Level.  And that’s where we experience Sustainable Joy as well as Health.

Listne:  "I Nee You Now (How Many Times) by Plumb

What usually trips us up is that we start relying too much on physical Energy and don’t even realize how much our spirits need spiritual Energy.  If we don't take the time and focus to really digest meaning, truth, and light both generally and SPECIFICALLY as it applies to our personal story we will feel starved and no amount of physical Energy will ever be enough.  But usually, in order to resolve that conflict, we increase the consumption of physical Energy and it's like we gulp down our food without ever really tasting it, savoring it, enjoying it, and being grateful for it.

When we over-consume physical Energy in any of our body systems, that system becomes numb not only to the physical Energy but also the spiritual.  If we don’t know what’s going on and are truly tenacious then we will up the dose of physical Energy.  That just creates a more severe numbness, a state that is even harder to get out of.  In the scriptures some of the words used to describe Numbness are Past Feeling and Hardened Heart.  Check it out:

Ephesians 4:19
1 Nephi 17:43
Moroni 9:20
Alma 12:13-14
Mark 6:52

Exodus 9:34
Ether 11:13

left:  Healthy Effect Sensors.  right: Numbed Effect Sensors 

If we want to increase our ability to experience Energy, indulging in too much physical Energy is not going to work.  It will only leave us numb, forever desiring yet never able to obtain.  That's hell (John 4:13; Isaiah 29:8).

Listen:  "Stronger" by Nashville Tribute Band

There is a pathway inherent to the Desire to increase our ability to experience Energy.  This pathway doesn’t end in numbness but in the Sustainability of exactly what we want to feel.  This pathway is the Strengthening Process.  If we desire to increase the intensity of the physical Effects we experience then we need to challenge our bodies at regular intervals and within our own personal Threshold. 

Listen:  "He Said" by Group 1 Crew (feat. Chris August)

If we go beyond our Threshold we promote injury and illness and we have to stop and recuperate.  If we do this enough times, we will lose hope and motivation to continue because it doesn't seem like we’re getting anywhere.  

If we don’t take advantage of the Strengthening Process to our capacity, we promote atrophy in our body.  That means we get weaker which subsequently promotes injury and illness even with our day to day tasks.

Finding that personal Threshold is key to our success.  And that’s where the spiritual Effect Sensors come into play.  They can help us detect where that is for us.  We don’t have to progress to injury before we know we’ve gone too far.  If we have already numbed our Effect Sensors then our first goal is to eliminate the excess Energy we have been continuously partaking of.  The scriptures refer to this process as Repentance. 

So answer these questions:

Are you satisfied with the level of Energy you feel on a daily basis?

Do you have to consume Pseudo Effects to get you through the day?

If you eliminate all Pseudo Effects (excess physical Energy), how would you feel? (Note that this is how we’re going to feel after we die or when our Effect Sensors get numb enough.  At that point we can no longer be sustained by Pseudo Effects so we might as well start weaning ourselves off them now and work to develop our Effect Sensors to the level we need to be happy.)  Listen:  "Wasted" by Carrie Underwood

Do you understand that you only need to work within your own personal Threshold to start, not to the woman’s on TV or to the next door neighbor’s?

Check out the following:

D&C 93:33-36

1 Corinthians 9:27

1 Corinthians 15:44

Moses 3:5