Category: Faith

For me, finding fulfillment in motherhood is often tied to my faith, which promotes families and mothers.

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Fulfillment Faith

May is for mothers!

It’s May (already!) and Mother’s Day is fast approaching. For so many mothers, what is supposed to be a celebration of all that we do for our families has become a dreaded occasion. Maybe we don’t hate Mother’s Day, just the maudlin commercialism that’s associated with it. Or maybe it’s that we look forward to this day where our children are kind and loving and appreciative, but we wake up that morning and they’re just the same kids as yesterday. Or maybe it’s that we have “issues” with our own mothers. Or maybe it’s that we have to confront that we’re not the moms we wished we were.

No matter what the reason, I think it doesn’t have to be that way. We can redefine our expectations. Maybe instead of a day we expect our family to be perfect and treat us like a queen, we can strive for a day where we reflect on the things we’ve learned about motherhood, or the things we love about motherhood—or even just the things we love about our children.

On that note, I asked a few friends to post about lessons they’ve learned from motherhood. Their posts have already touched my heart and I hope they will yours, too.

So please read and comment on this week’s guest posts—and think about what you need to do to make Mother’s Day merry!

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Faith

T is for Testimony

And now, after the many testimonies which have been given of him, this is the testimony, last of all, which we give of Him:

That He lives!

For we saw him, even on the right hand of God; and we heard the voice bearing record that he is the Only Begotten of the Father—

That by him, and through him, and of him, the worlds are and were created, and the inhabitants thereof are begotten sons and daughters unto God.

—Doctrine & Covenants 76:22-24

Happy Easter!

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Fulfillment Faith

J is for Joy!

Yeah, I know, J was Tuesday. But I did L Tuesday and now I’m doing J. It’s all good.

Men are, that they might have joy.


Typically, people define the difference between happiness and joy with happiness being more fleeting, and joy being deeper, stronger, and longer lasting.

I think that’s pretty accurate. Joy and happiness can co-exist. I see both in the little moments of motherhood.

I think Joy is built from little moments of happiness, with the assurance (or at least the conviction) that our choices are on the right track—that we’re doing what we should be.

What do you think? How do you define Joy? When do you feel it?

Photo by Collin Mel Cunningham

Categories
Kids/Parenting Faith

LDS Writer Blogfest: “What Manner of Men Ought Ye to Be?”

So, because I’m seriously scheduling deficient, today is L (and J will be Thursday). I volunteered to be a part of the LDS Writer Blogfest, thinking it would fit perfectly because L is on Thursday . . . but yeah, it was set for today, Tuesday. (Oh well.)

Every year, on the first weekend in April and October, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints holds a General Conference. Speakers from the leadership (general authorities, including a living prophet, apostles and seventies) give talks which are televised, translated and transmitted throughout the world. Today, a number of writers who are members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are blogging about their personal favorites among these addresses.

I'm a Mormon.With ten hours of material to choose from, it’s hard to pick a favorite, but one talk in particular touched my heart during the conference. Elder Lynn G. Robbins of the First Quorum of the Seventy gave a talk called “What Manner of Men Ought Ye to Be?” I loved this talk because it helped me to see very specifically how I can be a better parent and a better person.

We often focus on all that we have to do, to the detriment of what we need to be. I find myself focusing on what I have to do, to the detriment of being a good mom sometimes. I need to focus on being, changing myself by focusing on my heart, instead of focusing on just its outward manifestations, my actions.

Of course, the most important thing for us to be is to be like Christ. To become like Christ, Elder Robbins recommends that we pray as individuals and families: “Because Christlike attributes are gifts from God and cannot be developed without His help, in family and personal prayers, pray for those gifts.”

We also need to teach our children to be like Him, and not just at Family Home Evening (Monday night church lessons + activity + treat), but all the time:

When children misbehave, let’s say when they quarrel with each other, we often misdirect our discipline on what they did, or the quarreling we observed. But the do—their behavior—is only a symptom of the unseen motive in their hearts. We might ask ourselves, “What attributes, if understood by the child, would correct this behavior in the future? Being patient and forgiving when annoyed? Loving and being a peacemaker? Taking personal responsibility for one’s actions and not blaming?”

How do parents teach these attributes to their children? We will never have a greater opportunity to teach and show Christlike attributes to our children than in the way we discipline them. Discipline comes from the same root word as disciple and implies patience and teaching on our part. It should not be done in anger.

Not only do we have to teach our children to be like Christ, we have to be like Him ourselves. I often have a short temper—but patience is something I’m working on being. To that effect, earlier this year I read Soft-Spoken Parenting: 50 Ways to Not Lose Your Temper With Your Kids (and I’m thinking it might be time to work on that again).

When Elder Robbins spoke of the motives in our children’s hearts, I thought of a scripture from the Book of Mormon, describing the peace that reigned in the land for 200 years after Christ visited the Americas: “And it came to pass that there was no contention in the land because of the love of God which did dwell in the hearts of the people” (4 Ne. 1:15). My mother had my sisters and I memorize that scripture when we were younger, trying to help us get along better. That didn’t mean that we instantly stopped arguing, but I do believe that teaching our children to love righteousness and be like Christ—and becoming like Him ourselves—is the most important task we have as parents. And Elder Robbins’s talk helped me better understand how to do that.

What do you think? How has focusing on motivations instead of actions helped you as a person or a parent? Did you watch conference?

Read more LDS writers’ responses to General Conference today!

Annette Lyon: “Desire”
Annie Cechini: “The Spirit of Revelation”
Ben Spendlove: “The Atonement Covers All Pain”
Chantele Sedgwick: “LDS Women Are Incredible!”
Charity Bradford: “LDS Women Are Incredible!”
Jackee Alston: “The Eternal Blessings of Marriage”
Jenilyn Tolley: “What Manner of Men and Women Ought Ye to Be?”
Jennifer McFadden: “Establishing a Christ-Centered Home”
Jessie Oliveros: “Establishing a Christ-Centered Home”
Jolene Perry: “It’s Conference Once Again”
Jordan McCollum: “What Manner of Men and Women Ought Ye to Be?”
Kasey Tross: “Guided by the Holy Spirit”		 Kayeleen Hamblin: “Become as a Little Child”
Kelly Bryson: “The Atonement Covers All Pain”
Krista Van Dolzer: “Opportunities to Do Good”
Melanie Stanford: “What Manner of Men and Women Ought Ye to Be?”
Michelle Merrill: “The Eternal Blessings of Marriage”
Myrna Foster: “Opportunities to Do Good”
Nisa Swineford: “Desire”
Sallee Mathews: “The Eternal Blessings of Marriage”
Sierra Gardner: “The Atonement Covers All Pain”
Tamara Hart Heiner: “Waiting on the Road to Damascus”
The Writing Lair: “Waiting on the Road to Damascus”
Categories
Fulfillment Faith

A little of both

I’m quoted today in “Of Tigers, Guilt and Beehive Mothers,” an LDS/Mormon response to the WSJ’s “Tiger mother” article on a Jewish website. Multicultural FTW!

When I was a freshman in college, one of our reading assignments was an essay by a woman diagnosed with Lupus. I took great offense at her thesis, which I remember as being something about God creating the good and the bad parts of everything.

I think what she meant to say was that because we live in a “fallen” world, we will always experience only a taste of the ultimate perfection, tempered with the tang of the poison. A little heavy, maybe, but ultimately the point.

In motherhood, we often get to experience these things side-by-side, the extremes of heaven and hell in a single day. I’ve come across several tales of this twinning lately, the manic depressive nature of the challenges of motherhood.

two faces of rachel

One minute, we’re on top of the world, juggling a passel of kids and our home and our hobbies and skills AND loving every second. (It’s so easy to love when you’re on top of it!) The next, suddenly all of those things are the burdens piled on our back.

I do this most days, when I go from cuddling a sleeping angel to refereeing the bickering ones. Or I plan and prepare three really fun activities that go really well—but spend ten minutes of extra prep snapping at my kids to back off until I’m ready.

And I know I’m not alone. Janelle at Regally Blonde recently posted about a single day where she had one of those sublime, blissful moments—and hours later, she’s wallowing in Poopageddon. My friend Shannon posted about this today, outlining the highs and lows so typical of motherhood, and how sometimes, dancing as fast as we can, we can bridge that gap.

I guess the point is just to keep dancing: keep trying to bridge the gap, striving for those sublime moments, reveling when they come—and holding onto them through Poopageddon.

How do you balance the extremes of motherhood? How do you keep those slices of heaven in mind when passing through the valley of the shadow of poop?

Categories
Fulfillment Faith

A good woman

Think about a good woman you know—your mother, a friend, a neighbor. What does she do that makes her so good?

For me, it’s not so much what the good women that I know do, it’s how much. As Proverbs says, a virtuous woman “looketh well to the ways of her household, and eateth not the bread of idleness.” I’m always impressed by the women around me who take the time (because they don’t just find it!) to care for their families, and for others around them; women who seem to always be thinking of others and providing for them; women who still worry they’re not doing enough.

These women have busy, full lives—and perhaps surprisingly, they always end up worrying they’ve neglected something or forgotten someone, or that they need to cram more into their lives of service.

Last week at the LDS General Conference, General Relief Society President Julie B. Beck agreed that good women simply have more to do than their lives can fit:

A good woman knows that she does not have enough time, energy, or opportunity to take care of all of the people or do all of the worthy things her heart yearns to do. Life is not calm for most women, and each day seems to require the accomplishment of a million things, most of which are important.

I definitely have that part down 😉 . It’s Sister Beck’s next point that I’ve been struggling with a lot lately:

A good woman must constantly resist alluring and deceptive messages from many sources telling her that she is entitled to more time away from her responsibilities and that she deserves a life of greater ease and independence.

Sometimes, the more I fret over whether I’m doing enough, inside my home and out, the more I shut down and try to escape from even the most basic of my responsibilities. (Usually by wasting time online—and I don’t mean something even as productive as blogging. I mean the kind of time suck where after two hours, you can’t really remember what you’ve been doing.)

Sister Beck points out that the best way we can be a good woman isn’t to try to accomplish everything, and it’s especially not to focus only on ourselves. While we definitely need to remember to make time for ourselves (or there won’t be anything for us to give!), we have to focus on our responsibilities and prioritize as well.

So what do you think you can let go of? Can you tell the difference when you focus more on yourself—or too much on yourself?

(In case you’re wondering, Sister Beck says that the best way to prioritize is through personal revelation from God about what is most important and best for us and our families.)

Photo by Tom Goskar