The Noblest of Virtues

   “If ingratitude be numbered among the serious sins, then gratitude takes its place among the noblest of virtues.” -President Thomas S. Monson

I could end with just that. 

   If you were to wake up one morning, only to have the things that you thanked God for the previous night, what would still be there?

   I try to think of this every time I pray, but I still wouldn’t wake up with even a fraction of what I have today. As scary as this statement might seem - it’s our reality. If we're not grateful and don't recognize our blessings, we kinda forget they’re there - and isn’t that the same as not having them at all?

   There’s a statement from Elder Dieter F. Uchtdorf that helped me survive my mission: “No matter our circumstances, no matter our challenges or trials, there is something in each day to embrace and cherish. There is something in each day that can bring gratitude and joy if only we will see and appreciate it.”

   In the worst of my depression, I started a gratitude journal - strictly for times I laughed that day and any tender mercies I saw. I would re-read entries 3 times a day for weeks, and I still cleave to it. I was in the worst state physically, mentally, emotionally - but when I took the time to let my Spirit recognize just small blessings - it changed my outlook and helped me take on one day, one hour at a time. There have been studies done that show how a grateful heart can affect the brain. It won’t completely heal depression, I still struggle with it even on my most grateful of days, but it quickly brings the Spirit which heals any broken heart. 

   One of the neat thing about counting our blessings is that they’re truths - they’re very real, very tangible mercies that are ever present. They’re truths from God - just like the scriptures, so why don’t depend on them as such?

   One of the most optimistic, gratitude filled quotes I’ve read is that of L. R. Knost: “Life is amazing. And then it’s awful. And then it’s amazing again. And in between the amazing and the awful it’s ordinary and mundane and routine. Breathe in the amazing, hold on through the awful, and relax and exhale during the ordinary. That’s just living heartbreaking, soul-healing, amazing awful, ordinary life. And it’s breathtakingly beautiful.”

   I often look back at my gratitude journal and am disappointed that I wasn’t more grateful, especially through my hard times. If I compare my gratitude journal to my actual journal, they’re polar opposites, even for the same days. One journal entry reads:

 “Don’t even know where to start. I’m just a mess. We were out all day - got nowhere with no one. My anxiety was at an all time high and it wouldn’t let me talk to people. Felt super awkward street contacting. A dog almost attacked us. President and Sister Craig called us - they had just gotten off the phone with mom. She was up late last night and dad’s freaking out. Sister Craig said they’re going to do everything they can for me and Mom and Dad are on my side, but I still broke down sobbing and cried myself to sleep.” 

That exact same day, my gratitude journal reads this:

“The elders were making fun of their day on the bike and made me laugh a lot. We had the car today! Sister Call is the best, I’m so blessed to have her as a companion. Went to Sister Link’s and she just makes me feel so helpful and more like the Sister Carr I want to become. Felt so much peace listening to my David Archuleta CD. President and Sister Craig are the best.” 

   Absolutely nothing but blessings. And it’s funny because I remember nothing about that dog almost attacking us or the phone call with the Craigs, but I do remember feeling good serving Sister Link and the funny comment the elders made. It’s the blessings that I remember and there's always blessings to be counted. Gratitude has changed me - it completely erases the negative. 

   Even on the plane ride home, as soon as the plane wheels left Florida ground, an overwhelming feeling of gratitude hit me. Even though that land brought the hardest experiences I've ever faced - I had been haunted with PTSD for months, was so depressed that I was a completely different person, had faced some of my worst nightmares and some of the meanest people I've ever met - that land represented my living hell and I hated it. Every face I met flashed through my mind, the wards that loved me, the lives that I've seen changed, all those that had forever changed me. I felt so much gratitude for them and that I was able to leave all my blood, sweat, and tears in that land. Grateful that I had accomplished all I needed to and for the people that had helped me along the way. All the hatred left and for the first time in a while, I was completely filled with peace. 

“If ingratitude be numbered among the serious sins, then gratitude takes its place among the noblest of virtues.” Thomas S. Monson

I am a Child of God.

     Ben Hooper was the governor of Tennessee from 1911-1915. He was born to a single mother and grew up as the mock of the town because he had no father. He said 

     "‘I used to go off by myself at recess and during lunchtime because the taunts of my playmates. What was worse was going downtown on Saturday afternoon and feeling every eye burning a hole through you. They were all wondering just who my real father was.'     One Sunday, a new preacher came to town. Ben tried to slip out of church early to avoid getting stuck in the crowd. Before he got out the door, he felt a hand on his shoulder, and turned to see the preacher looking right at him.     ‘Who are you, son? Whose boy are you?’     ‘I felt the old weight come on me. It was like a big black cloud. Even the preacher was putting me down. But as he looked down at me, studying my face, he began to smile a big smile of recognition. ‘Wait a minute,’ he said, ‘I know who you are. I see the family resemblance. You are a son of God.’With that he slapped me across the rump and said, ‘Boy you’ve got a great inheritance. Go and claim it.’    ‘That was the most important single sentence ever said to me.’”

     We are children of God. One of the most important truths we have, one that we take for granted, we are children of our Heavenly Father. This means that He doesn’t just sit there and govern from above - He’s actively involved in our lives. He cares about us, protects us, and wants us to return to Him. This basic truth gives us so much worth and a sense of belonging above anything that we can build for ourselves.

     In this past General Women’s Conference, Sister Rosemary M. Wixom declared, “Because you are His child, He knows who you can become. He knows your fears and your dreams. He relishes your potential. He waits for you to come to Him in prayer. Because you are His child, you not only need Him, but He also needs you."

     One day in Florida, my companion and I went to an apartment complex inviting people to a community event the stake was hosting. Not one single person wanted to talk to us. The people of Jacksonville liked to play hide and seek with us, but we were always it. Everyone scatters and hides when the missionaries come out. We tried to contact people for a while, I was so unbelievably miserable and was already having an awful day - way past the end of my rope. I was ready to leave when we heard the sweetest voice behind us, "Hey ladies, what you handing out?" We turned to see the cutest little girl, probably only 6 or 7, anxiously coming up to us. We told her we were inviting people to church and her eyes immediately lit up. "Oooh, can I bring my mommy?!" Yes, please! "How old do you have to be? Where your church at?" I walked out of that apartment so overwhelmed with love and gratitude for that miracle. I wanted to teach that little girl all about her Savior and how she was so unbelievably precious, she was a daughter of God. It was amazing how the curiosity of a 6 year old taught me the biggest lesson about God's love. It was obvious that even though I was done, Heavenly Father wasn't done with me. 

     One of my favorite scriptures is in Doctrine & Covenants 61:36, "Be of good cheer, little children; for I am in your midst, and I have not forsaken you." 

     There have been so many times where it's very obvious that Heavenly Father has not forsaken me. Times when we're trying to teach a lesson when we see police lights outside and walk out to see an investigator's sister getting arrested on the front lawn, the police just look us and let us leave without getting involved in that craziness. When we felt prompted to not knock on a door, barely avoiding a pitbull attack. When you're having the worst day ever and a friend calls just to see how you're doing. Those are evidences that God sure as heck loves me.

     Henry B. Eyring has said of our relationship with Heavenly Father, “You were tutored by Him before you came into this life. He helped you understand and accept that you would have trials, tests, and opportunities perfectly chosen just for you. You learned that our Father had a plan of happiness to get you safely through those trials.”

     Now we're here on earth and we're scared, we're terrified, we don't know what to do. But we do know that we have a Father who will protect us and guide us back to Him. He loved us enough to teach and comfort us before we came to earth and He's not going to abandon us now.

     These are truths we have to hang onto. There are days when my anxiety and depression create a dark haze in my head. So dark that I give up on hope that usually would be so apparent and can't grasp any truths unless they're degrading towards myself. If someone comes up to me and compliments my outfit or whatever, I undoubtly, within the hour, will be sobbing in my room wondering what's wrong with me and why that person hates me so much. It doesn't make sense, but when the haze takes over, that's my reality. 

     So as part of my therapy, I have to have a list of truths readily available. Truths that mean something to my identity and that are strong enough to bring me back to reality. The majority of the list is of experiences where I’ve felt that God’s still there - feeling the Spirit in the temple, seeing rays of light through Florida's Spanish Moss letting me know God was there and His cause was worth it, getting an answer to a prayer asking if He loved me, etc. Even though the haze makes me feel alone and hopeless, these truths are so real and so strong, that they’ve literally saved my life in the worst of times.

     No matter how alone we may feel, He will not forsake us, because we are His child. 

     I know without a doubt that God's still there. I've had too many manifestations to not have a reason to believe it. I've been watched over and protected too many times to not know He's active in our lives. Because of God, all is well. We may be stuck in a haze, but as Romans 8:16 teaches us, the Spirit will tell us that we come from God. We are His.

Lessons to be Learned.

Trying to escape Florida's infamous storms

          In Mark 6, Christ teaches us an important lesson about the trials we face in mortality. He had left his apostles to go pray and when He came back, He found them stuck in a storm, struggling for their lives. It’s recorded that He waited until the “fourth watch of the night”, about 3 AM, to help them. He sat and watched them, not because He wanted them to struggle, but because there was a lesson that needed to be learned.

One night on the mission, I was talking to our senior couple, the Vans, about trials. Elder Van asked, “Isn’t it a wonder how 1/3 of God’s children didn’t choose this? And now we have to deal with all this crap.” It sure is crap, but that’s what we signed up for. WE ASKED FOR THIS - for all the storms and trials and garbage in our lives - and we’re probably all wondering why, but we knew where it would take us, what we would learn from it. Heavenly Father knows that, Christ knows it, we just need to remember.

I can see Christ sitting up there, watching us. I know He often mutters under his breath, “Seriously, Chelsea? You’re a mess, get yourself together! Be patient, turn to me. It’s almost over - you’re fine.” I’m sure He said the same thing about His disciples as He sat watching them. 

Mark goes on - Christ did eventually come, not when the disciples wanted, but He came when the time was right, in the fourth watch. He knew that the longer the trial ensued, the quicker they’d turn to Him. So He miraculously approaches them walking on the water, and thanks to Peter, we learn one of the most important lessons regarding our relationship with Christ. I’m sure each apostle looked back and realized that it was worth going through 10 storms of that magnitude just to experience such great events. There was a lesson to be learned. 

My anxiety and depression has been off the charts this week and I was given a priesthood blessing in which I was promised, “There’s an end in sight - you just have to learn the lesson that’s meant to be learned.” So great, the storm ain’t stoppin’. Awesome. But there’s an end. It’s just coming in the fourth watch of the night.

           Despite the storm that’s still ensuing, I’m finally at a point where I can notice the good moments and see the lessons I’ve learned from all my struggles. There’s some that came forcefully, while others were just expanded upon, but I’m grateful for each and every one and for each and every sleepless, tearful night that brought me here. 

Lessons learned:

-It’s okay to rely on others sometimes, it’s okay to collapse and be taken care of

-It’s okay to see doctors and be on meds, I’m not any less because of it

Orlando, Florida temple 
withstanding a storm

-Life’s awful

-God often comforts us using others

-Moms are the best and there are specific reasons why I was sent to Julie Carr 

-God’s plan is totally different from my own

-Trust God’s will, even if I don’t understand - be naive

-Trust the Spirit, my mind’s constantly lying to me, but the Spirit will always tell me what’s really going on

-I have no right to ever be mad at God, I have NO IDEA what He has up His sleeve

-You never know what’s going on in other’s lives

-Pain hurts, but that’s all it does, it’s no threat

-I am not my body

-“We are infinitely more than our limitations or our afflictions!” -Jeffrey R. Holland

-The Atonement covers literally everything
-There's very real protection that comes from the temple.

-God knows I’m there

-Certain people are put in my life for a reason, family is essential in any healing process

-GOD IS OH SO GOOD

-When there’s no one else, Christ is there

-Breathe and be patient

-Ice cream is amazing

-Life will eventually make sense and line up, and when it does, it’s beyond perfect

-Prayers and priesthood blessings help in the greatest and smallest of ways
-Believe in the miracles that surround you.

Parable of the Race Car

From the Stig's perspective, cause you know, who doesn't love the Stig?

      Long story short - I had a doctor in the mission field that changed my life - helped me understand my health condition, gave me hope, helped me accept my situation, yada, yada, yada. There was one analogy he shared with me that I've thought about every day since and has been on my mind 24/7 lately so I thought I'd share:

      This life is a giant racetrack and we're all little cars zooming round doing our own thing. But for some reason, some of us weren't built like the rest of the cars . Some of us were built with 2 gears, some of us with 3, some of us with 5 - why were we built like that? Who knows? We just were.      

      Those of us with only 2 look around, and see that we're not going as fast as the other cars, no matter how fast we're trying to go and no matter what we try to do. Engine's screaming, all cylinders are on fire, but we refuse to stop - we have to keep up with the Ferrari ahead even though we're doing all we can with our 2 cylinders.    

     What we refuse to understand is that we don't need to go racing speed, we don't have to keep up with the all-star elder Lamborghini that's getting 8 baptisms a month or the Relief Society President that's doing everything and still looks perfect doing it all, we only have two gears, we just can't keep up with that. 

      So here we are going around our little racetrack of life and as soon as the mission hits, we're thrown into this huge race. No one has ever experienced this high speed lifestyle before the mission, and that's the time when us 2 geared folk struggle the hardest - that's when we break. It's nothing we can prevent, it's nothing we did wrong, it's just the way it is. So we have the choice to accept it or not - you can keep going as hard as you can, but something's eventually going to break and you will explode.         

       So because of my little stubborn self, I was the one that completely wore myself out to the breaking point. Staying out in the mission field and working even harder than I could broke me down more than it should've. It's okay to slow down and take a breather, no matter how hard it is. I was talking to my Dad this morning about how my mission played out and through all my blabbering and complaining, his only response was, "I'm just glad you're home." I'm grateful I'm home. I'm grateful for the pain I had to go through to learn that it's okay to go a little slower than everyone else, it's okay to take a break. I'm grateful for the break I was forced to take before I broke down even more. 

Approved.

Definition of hot mess: Last painful week as a missionary. Those bags though, am I right?

        We all struggle. And there's a lot of people that are struggling with the same mental and emotional challenges as I am. I’m praying that this will help someone - anyone - out, just to know it’s okay, even though it’s really not and that you’re not alone. The Spirit’s been pushing me to post this, and I’m finally listening this time, so here goes nothing. 

  I’ve been home from my mission for almost 9 months now, 5 months earlier than I’d like, but hey, here we are. Life’s the lamest sometimes.
        My last post nine months ago was about an insanely miraculous conference we had from Elder D. Todd Christofferson - so why not complete the circle? Elder Christofferson came last minute to a stake conference in Kingsland, Georgia, the most northern part of our mission. We got a text from the Assistants on Saturday night that SURPRISE - Elder Christofferson was in town and could only meet with a few of us, and we were one of the few zones chosen. We were way beyond stoked to say the least. 

  At that time, I had been out for a little over a year. The last 6 months I had been struggling way hard - I would cry randomly throughout the day, had no motivation, truly believed the police were out to get me, had panic attacks whenever the blinds were left open, my body would shut down throughout the day, I couldn’t drive, felt isolated and abandoned - by God and everyone else, was always exhausted no matter how much I slept, couldn’t talk to men because I was convinced they were going to attack me, and little things took twice as long and twice as much energy to accomplish. And I couldn’t understand why or what even the heck was going on. Nine months in, I saw a doctor and started therapy - they diagnosed me with Major Depression Disorder. And later, I would be diagnosed with a minor Paranoia disorder, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and Generalized Anxiety Disorder. Fun stuff right?

        So anyway, end of background tangent. Three days after Elder Christofferson’s appearance, I was on the phone with my mission president when he first mentioned the possibility of going home. I was really upset after the phone call and kind of ticked off that he would even mention that - because the perfectionist in me was fine and I was convinced that I could fight it off. I had hung up and told my companions (another great story - trio with Sister Call, Sister Call, and Sister Carr) what he had said and pretty much screamed (yeah, I screamed) “The only way President could even get me near a plane was if the Prophet himself came and told me to.” Then it felt like the Spirit slapped me in the face (I get that a lot) and I very clearly heard, “Why on earth do you think Elder Christofferson showed up?” Then I sobbed (like a lot) and after that, there was no arguing with the Spirit, no matter how much I tried. 

Elder Christofferson’s message from that conference is pretty clear and I can perfectly see how little of a coincidence it was. As he was speaking to us, he stopped mid-sentence, had his own little revelatory moment right in front of us (most amazing thing ever) and went on with this: 

“Some of you, maybe all of you, some are very concerned about the acceptability of your service and how you measure up in His eyes. And I’m here to tell you that you’re approved. If you want a personal witness on where you stand, how He feels about your service and about your desires, I bless you that you will receive that witness. Sometimes in the next few days or weeks, in His way, in His time, you will receive that witness that you’re okay, that He loves you and that He accepts your offering. And that your service is worthy and acceptable, you’re standing approved in His sight. 

It’s a wonderful thing for the Lord to say, ‘I accept your offer.’ So, that’s why I am here today. Some of you want to have that witness come more than once. You want it at the end of your mission. You want it at other times as you go forward after this mission. And the Lord is generous and is kind, and not too often, but once in a while you’ll know, you’ll get that. And that gives you strength to go on happily. Even when you’re stuck in the mud, you can still go forward happily.”

        No matter what, Heavenly Father is still there. There were so many times that my emotions refused to let me feel that, but He’s there. I prayed to get that acceptance that Elder Christofferson promised.  I got an answer - that my service had been beyond accepted - on the plane ride (a 5 months early plane ride) home. 

He continued on: 

“I look around the circle of The Twelve and I see one that has some challenges with dementia, I see two with oxygen tanks, and I say, 'Well, there’s my future.' But what I admire is that they are all doing as much as they can, from President Monson on down. And maybe it’s just a fraction of what they used to be able to do, but it’s everything - it’s one hundred percent. And that’s what the Lord asks - is everything.”

If anyone is struggling with any physical, mental, emotional hardship at all - whether you’re a missionary, early returned missionary, parent, student, grandparent or whatever, you’re accepted. We were given this life, challenges and all, specifically tailored to what we need. Even when it’s impossible to feel it, God’s there and the 15% you’re doing is 110% in His eyes. The darkness will eventually clear and if you ask, He’ll let you of His approval. PLEASE know you're not alone.