The Value of Life.

Today has caught me by surprise. Last night I received an email from my best friend who has been going through some really hard struggles of her own. Then I get into work wearing my Christmas colors because today was the day we get the Christmas Tree out, only to discover that a colleague and friend passed away. At first, both these events were bearable until they both sunk in… together.

After a very emotional meeting at work I came back to my desk and wrote an email to my best friend. As I was writing I was fighting back tears and emotions that were trying to force their way through my heart and tear ducts. Anyway, this blog post has most of the email I sent to my best friend but it is mostly about the value of life regardless of the trials within it.

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In the context of what you're going through, you need to value three things in the order I am about to tell you, we'll talk mostly about the first two. (1) God (2) Yourself. Everyone else comes later (3). 

(1) God - When I was younger I contemplated suicide but quickly banished the thought from my mind. Although life is hard as hell and the in between and everything else, life is above all a precious gift from God. No one, not even you have the right to take life away from yourself or anyone else, no matter how hard the journey is. Only what God has given can HE take away from you. 

(2) Yourself - I don't mean this in a prideful manner but rather we should remember that we have value. That even though sometimes we cannot fully 100% love ourselves as God does but maybe we can feel a fraction of that love for ourselves. As the saying goes, God doesn't make junk. YOU matter to him! So love yourself. Be it 99%, 85%, 63%, 53%, 40%, 32%, 23%, 16%, or .03733%?

I don't believe we truly understand the life that we live. I know that life hurts and is painful. Life is life whether you're in a concentration camp, in a mansion, on the street, or at home. I KNOW that it is hard, I really do. I know that sometimes we feel that we spend more of our lives crying than laughing. I know that we feel we spend more time THINKING about life rather than LIVING it. But I also know that that knowledge has always made me happy. When I cried until I could cry no more I realized that I was still alive. I still had a beating heart. That regardless of the things I was going through I knew that Heavenly Father had a greater purpose for me. As long as there is breath within this body of mine I know that I cannot EVER take life for granted even though I complain about it a lot. God has made us conquerers and sometimes the best thing you can do is keep moving forward. One foot in front of the other. One day at a time.

Your (Best Friend's) email, coupled with Lui's death has hit me hard especially at the time of the Year that we are grateful for the birth and life of Christ. 

CHRISTMAS!

"Tough" is an understatement about the description of the life that Christ would live, but He chose to live it anyway. Once He was actually living this mortal life I am sure there were times that he, for a split second, considered taking His life. As a baby he was sought after to be destroyed, later he was tempted  by the devil after fasting for 40 days and 40 nights (Matthew 4), made fun of, left by his friends (Isaiah 6:3,5), denied by his head disciple (Matthew 26), mocked, beaten, bled from every pore of his body (Mosiah 3:7), and all manner of afflictions that cannot be listed. Yet He knew that as long as breath still flowed within Him, He had a mission to complete. He loved (1) God, His Father, and followed His will. He loved (2) himself because He knew He was of value and had a purpose. That purpose was to save (3) all others. 

Can you imagine the calamity that would follow if He gave up His life before it was time? We would be angels to a devil (2 Nephi 9:9). Your mother and father would be angels to a devil. Your children would be in bondage to the adversary. The bondage that the Nephites faced under the Lamanites, or the Israelites under the Egyptians would be nothing compared to the bondage of angels unto a devil. 

Jesus Christ is the ultimate blessing - His love, birth, life, atonement, death, and gospel. 

But, we cannot be truly grateful for His blessings if we do not live a life that emulates His. 

The prophet said it best: 

 

Do not take this life for granted, death could be just around the corner. So live and choose life centered in Christ even though death, for some, would be a less painful option.

because He loved me first...

I sit here and think about what I am grateful for. A flood of blessings and examples flows into my mind but one that remains constant would be and has always been the love that God has given me, though undeserved.

As a child and teenager I would cry because I could not understand why people around me who deserved all the goodness this world could offer were the ones who suffered much. They were the ones who the Lord felt needed to be tried. I asked Why them? It wasn't the "Why do bad things happen to good people" question. In fact, it was the complete opposite. I couldn't understand why God felt the need to protect me from these bad things when I wasn't a perfect person. I was a spoilt brat. I wasn't always a loyal friend. I let my parents down time and time again. I never reached my potential or even tried that hard. I was ungrateful. I can come up with many more thoughts that would run through my mind. I doubted my value because as they say, only the truly valiant saints are the ones who are tried the most. For instance, Job, Stephen, Abinadi etc etc etc. But I wasn't tried at all. At least in my mind they were not as devastating as others have gone through. At one point I even thought that Heavenly Father didn't think me valiant or strong enough. I was saddened at the snippets of doubt that made me think Heavenly Father thought me weak; that I couldn't handle trials and tribulations…

BUT I have always held to the knowledge that even though I am nothing in the grand scheme of things that I am everything to Heavenly Father. And although I couldn't understand why things were the way that they were, I was grateful nonetheless for His Love. Although I did not deserve the blessings He felt the need to give me, I was thankful anyway.

All that I am and all that I hope to be is as a result of the Love that God has for me.

Overall, I am grateful for a Loving Heavenly Father.

"He loves us because He is filled with an infinite measure of holy, pure, and indescribable love. We are important to God not because of our resume but because we are His children. He loves every one of us, even those who are flawed, rejected, awkward, sorrowful, or broken. God's love is so great that He loves even the proud, the selfish, the arrogant, and the wicked. What this means is that regardless of our current state, there is hope for us." - Pres. Dieter F. Uchtdorf.

I love My Heavenly Father...

 because He first loved Me.

 Love of God by President Dieter F. Uchtdorf

Pain, My Unrelenting Teacher

I have learned much from this teacher, Pain.

As a child, I learned that if I threw a tantrum then I would get a beating. I remember one time I cried SO much because my mom left and I wanted to go with her. I was on the floor, whining, screaming, crying out loud, and doing everything else a spoilt little brat would do in order to get her way. Suffice to say, my grandma beat that personality out of me. Well, most of it. HaHa. I am grateful for the pain that taught me as a child to give up some foolish and inconsiderate ways. There was no need to cry or throw tantrums because my mom was coming back.

It is experiences similar to this that taught me patience and understanding.

Patience:

If you keep giving children what they want, how else will they learn patience? If you do not teach them patience enough to wait until they get home to eat, and patience enough to wait until it's their turn, then how will they learn to be patient in their relationships, patient with those on the road, and patient with children. If they learn to be patient with small things then they will learn to be patient with bigger things.

President Dieter F. Uchtdorf said,

"Patience - the ability to put our desires on hold for a time - is a precious and rare virtue. We want what we want, and we want it now. Therefore, the very idea of patience may seem unpleasant and, at times, bitter.

Nevertheless, without patience, we cannot please God; we cannot become perfect. Indeed, patience is a purifying process that refines understanding, deepens happiness, focuses action, and offers hope for peace… if children are ever going to mature and reach their potential, they must learn to wait. "

Understanding:

This then leads me to how pain taught me understanding by first teaching me patience. When one learns to be patient one can look at all the components of the puzzle. In fact, when dealing with any puzzle, one must examine each piece, noting its specific shape, pattern, and color in order to place it in the right place. Such is life, if you rush and quickly grab the pieces that look most colorful or are shaped better they will not fit when you place them on the board. If we are patient we then understand that ALL pieces are needed if you want to complete the puzzle. We also note that all pieces are different, have a purpose and have a place. We have the special corner pieces, side puzzle pieces, and random in between pieces. We get frustrated with the pieces that all look similar but are not the same. You know which pieces I’m talking about. The 60 or so pieces in a 100 piece puzzle that make up the sky, or the ocean, or the trees. You can’t base your puzzle placement solely on how it looks instead you have to place each one next to a piece on the board. Pick up a piece and place it next to another blue one. Nope, doesn’t fit. Next piece. Nope, doesn’t fit. Next piece. Yes, it sort of fits if I just squish it in this way. Ugh. Fine. It doesn’t fit. You try this about 10 or so times until (1) you find the right piece (2) you move to another scenery or (3) you get bored of and/or lose patience with the puzzle. Patience is an important part of understanding.

So, thank you for being patient and reading through my analogy. If you have been patient enough in your life and have gathered much understanding my analogy might make sense to you.

There are many of us who rush into things and grasp at the bright lights and good-looking objects of this world. Those who are not patient will put the money that they do not have into things that will not last. Fancy clothes. Fancy cars. Fancy boyfriends or girlfriends. Sometimes we get frustrated when we get stuck with the puzzle part that has the expansive field of grass. So plain and difficult to compile BUT admittedly when the whole puzzle is done and completed. All things coming together, the field of green grass lays in stark contrast to the pink, orange, red, yellow, and blue hues of the sky. If we are patient with solving the puzzle of our lives instead of desperately clutching at everything deceptively beautiful, we realize that the true beauty of the puzzle is not the amount of bright pieces in it, but the harmony in which all pieces work together in order to make a masterpiece. 

Some rights reserved by Andrew Gibson.

Variegated Tulips

I have been thinking somewhat about what I should write. However, nothing inspirational came up. It's like that saying, "If you ain't got nothing nice to say, then don't say nothing". It is not that I was going to come up here and spout off some gossip or drama but for me it's, "If i'm not inspired to say anything, then say nothing". HaHa. Not exactly the same, but similar.

Anyhow, I was walking to the other building at work and I noticed a leaf on the ground. It reminded me of a Variegated Tulip. Then I remember that I had written something about Variegated Tulips before but I just didn't remember WHERE! Searched on Facebook Notes. Nothing. Searched my Hard Drive. Nothing. Searched another blog website. Nothing. Search came out empty. THEN! THEN! I remembered that I had actually written about a Variegated Tulip to one of my bestest friends who was going through a rather hard time.

This is what I wrote:

Aren't they so beautiful?

I don't know if you know this, but these tulips look this way because they're infected with a type of Mosaic Virus. In a metaphorical way we can apply it to our lives.

Sometimes we think that because of bad things that infect our lives, like the virus, we think that we look ugly, or that no one would want us or desire us. But it's actually the opposite. We are still beautiful and desirable. No matter what we go through, the trials we have to face, the stupid people we have to put up with, and the persecution that comes through no fault of our own... we will always be beautiful! Just like the infected tulip.

Not that I'm saying you are virally infected... HaHa... But just that no matter the troubles you've faced, or the imperfections you feel you have, it only makes you a different kind of beautiful. Rather than a fully red, or a fully yellow tulip, you are your own kind of beautiful.

Remember: What makes you different makes you beautiful. 

Therefore, You Are Your Own Kind of Beautiful.