Consistency

During General Conference last month, I was pretty sure Elder Bednar was talking to me directly when he talked about consistency with family prayer, scripture study and Family Home Evening. I could list a million reasons why we're not "consistent" with these things, but they all boil down to just being excuses so I will waste nobody's time to expound on that. I will say that I feel such a need to do these things, but "other stuff" always gets in the way. I'm reminded of C.S. Lewis's "Screwtape Letters" when the uncle encourages the nephew to do whatever he can do to distract the person they're working on. I know that in my life, that is one of Satan's most powerful tools. I used to have a tile in my house that said, "Do not neglect the things that matter the most because of the things that matter least." Maybe I need to bust that puppy out again so we can see it and be reminded of it. For our activity FHE tonight, I thought it'd be fun to trace our hands and feet and make turkeys out of them and we could write what we're thankful for on each of the "feathers." (By the by, LOVE the new Gospel Art Picture Kit! Jack picks a picture and we read the scripture that goes along with it. Thanks to the Gift of the Holy Ghost, we were able to turn the story of Potipher's wife hitting on Joseph into a lesson about how when we're around people that try to make us make bad choices we should get away from them and it's wrong to lie and accuse people of doing things they didn't do because it's not fair for them to get into trouble when they really didn't do anything. Wow.) Anyhoo--so we're trying to make these turkeys, but the phone is ringing and things need to be done in the middle of FHE "just real quick" and Jack is asking when he gets treats and if "this is going to be a long story" (Thank you Uncle Russ for creating the legacy in our home of asking this question!) I was getting so frustrated. I was absolutely exhausted (more about that to follow) and was just getting really cranky. We finally got through it and it was a good exercise--the very first thing Jack said he was grateful for is Grandpa Gary, which was so amazing. I'm so grateful that I made the book about his life. We read it often and I love that Jack feels like he knows his Grandpa because we read his story so often. So he said he was grateful for Grandpa Gary because he loves him--sweet--and a bunch of other stuff. It was good for us to go through that exercise, I think, to remember how blessed we are to have "enough." We're most certainly not rolling in excess but we have what we need and a little bit more. That is a good life and I guess these moments of crazy frustration and guilt for not doing those things that A. I really do WANT to do and B. I know I SHOULD do are just those things that give us the umph to actually act instead of want to act.
On that note--Scott and I were talking last night about how we're doing. Just a wee check-in on one another. I said that my answer is almost always going to be same. I almost always feel tired, overwhelmed and life I'm failing miserably at everything I try to accomplish. A couple of weeks ago, I found myself just beyond overwhelmed. I have had so much on my plate lately and it has just seemed like too much. I found myself on my knees praying. I don't know for what--strength, clarity, confirmation that something had to be given up and which of my commitments that needed to be...I was a mess. So I'm praying and sobbing and the answer came to me so clearly. Want to know what that answer was? "You've got to work harder. You've got to manage it. You need to be involved in all of these things for a reason and you need to know how to manage a busy life." What a crappy answer! I have to say, though, that I felt such peace. I remembered what my friend Anissa told me awhile ago--essentially--if you don't like your life change it. It's that simple. It's so true. I can sit around and complain and cry that I'm overwhelmed and it's too much or I can get up and get to work. So I started today by scrubbing pretty much every inch of my house. Walls, floors, baseboards..it was so awesome and therapeutic. It was exhausting but I realized that in the year we've been here it really hadn't been done. Scott did a lot of cleaning to try and get the mystery smells out that made me so sick while I was pregnant, but the people that rented the house before we bought it just really trashed it and I was so sick when we moved in that I just couldn't be bothered to do anything about it. But now we're spic and span (well, I still need to scrub out the cupboards, pull out the fridge and stove and scrub that down but you get the point) and I feel so much better for doing just what I was prompted to do. Work harder. (Will someone please tell Santa that all I want for Christmas is my upstairs painted? I've been good!) ;o) Anyway, the morals of this blog are A. Elder Bednar was right. Be consistent. Even if you're cranky from doing manual labor all day and your 4 year old is more worried about getting a doughnut hole than practical lessons on thankfulness (see proof that we made it through below!) and B. If you don't like where you are in your life, fix it. Change it. Don't make excuses, get to work. It sucks but the easy thing is almost NEVER the right thing. It benefits no one to justify our personal negligence/laziness/apathy.
Loves.