Friday, April 22, 2022

Strength

Just as we need daily nourishment to maintain physical strength, we also need daily nourishment to maintain spiritual strength. We cannot expect to be nourished spiritually if we study the scriptures and pray only occasionally.

Wednesday, April 20, 2022

Just Breathe.

If you're managing higher levels of stress these days, there's a tool we all have immediate access to: breathing.

It might sound simple, but when done properly, breathing can make the difference between panic and resilience. Research shows that different emotions are associated with different forms of breathing.

For example, when you feel anxious or angry, your breathing becomes irregular, short, and fast. When you feel joy or relaxation, your breathing will be regular, deep, and slow. And believe it or not, when you follow breathing patterns associated with different emotions, you begin to feel those corresponding emotions.

So next time you're feeling stress start to bubble up, try changing the ratio of your inhale to exhale. When you inhale, your heart rate speeds up. When you exhale, it slows down. Take a few minutes and breathe in for a count of four and out for a count of eight — this will calm your nervous system and keep stress at bay. By tweaking your breathing, you'll start to feel a bit better.


Monday, April 18, 2022

Risen Hope by Joseph Brickey


This painting entitled, “Risen Hope,” by our neighbor and friend Joseph Brickey hangs in the annex of the Salt Lake Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

A rarely seen painting of the risen Savior bearing personal witness to Mary, reminds of us of the need to focus on Jesus Christ.

In a world of uncertainty, heartache, and challenges, Jesus Christ is our hope.

In creating the artwork, Joseph drew from lessons learned about hope while on his full-time mission and spiritual experiences at the garden tomb in Jerusalem, which he had visited three times before. While painting, he paid special attention to where the light would have fallen on that first Easter morning and how he imagines it would have emanated from the Savior.

“The light reinforces that idea of overcoming death and darkness, of rising above despair, of finding hope. Not only is Christ risen, but also Mary’s hope rises when she hears her name from His lips. She represents each of us—this very personal interaction typifies Christ’s role in our lives. He knows us. He watches over us when we weep. His voice overcomes darkness and brings resplendent hope,” Joseph said.

Wednesday, April 13, 2022

Validation


To validate someone means that we are 
acknowledging another person's emotions, thoughts, experiences, values, and beliefs. Validation isn't about agreeing, placating, “fixing” the other person, trying to get someone to change, or repeating back what the other person has said.

Tuesday, March 29, 2022

"What Is The Great Reset?"

Not an easy read, but I highly recommend taking the time if you really want to understand what's going on, instead of walking around shaking our heads wondering what's going on.
Some excerpts: "The Great Reset promises inclusion in a shared destiny. But the subordination of so-called “netizens” implies economic and political disenfranchisement, a hyper-vigilance over self and others, and social isolation—or what Hannah Arendt called “organized loneliness”—on a global scale. This organized loneliness is already manifest in lockdowns, masking, social distancing, and the social exclusion of the unvaccinated. The title of the Ad Council’s March 2020 public service announcement—“Alone Together”—perfectly captures this sense of organized loneliness."
"Just as Schwab and the WEF predicted, the COVID crisis has accelerated the Great Reset. Monopolistic corporations have consolidated their grip on the economy from above, while socialism continues to advance for the rest of us below. In partnership with Big Digital, Big Pharma, the mainstream media, national and international health agencies, and compliant populations, hitherto democratic Western states—think especially of Australia, New Zealand, and Austria—are being transformed into totalitarian regimes modeled after China.
But let me end on a note of hope. Because the goals of the Great Reset depend on the obliteration not only of free markets, but of individual liberty and free will, it is, perhaps ironically, unsustainable. Like earlier attempts at totalitarianism, the Great Reset is doomed to ultimate failure. That doesn’t mean, however, that it won’t, again like those earlier attempts, leave a lot of destruction in its wake­—which is all the more reason to oppose it now and with all our might."