The First Mile by Quinn Ashton

Over the past few years I have trained for and run a few marathons.  For those who don't know, a marathon is 26.2 miles.  To train for a marathon, it takes a lot of hours, dedication, and consistency.  Each time I train for a marathon, I use an 18-week training program that consists of various distance runs, 6 days a week.  The runs range in distance from 4 miles to 20 miles.  Over a 6 day period, I will run as far as 60 miles and as little as 24 miles.  The key to these training programs is consistency.  When I visit with people about my training, I get lots of interesting questions.  The other day I got a new question that I had never been asked before, "What is the toughest part of each run?"  Even though I had never been asked the question before, my response came quickly without much thought, "The first mile."  I went on to explain that when I take off to begin my run for the day, I struggle to catch my breath, and then I settle into a pace and my breathing evens out.  This struggle for oxygen in that first mile is painful and at times a little scary.  We all know that without oxygen the body will shut down and eventually die.  The lack of oxygen in my lungs spreads through my chest causing some discomfort in my heart.  Some people would describe this feeling by saying it feels like an elephant is sitting on their chest.  Having experienced this day after day, I know that the remedy is to take big deep breaths and continue on.  Oxygen will eventually fill my lungs, and the pain in my heart and chest will go away. 

When I was 19 years old, I made some decisions in my life that were not good.  As the consequences for those decisions piled up, I began to experience a physical pain in my chest like I described above.  I felt like I was struggling for oxygen and that pain was spreading through my chest and into my heart.  There were days that the pain became so great that I felt like my heart and lungs were going to explode.  At that time, I learned that the best remedy for my poor decisions was to move forward one step at a time and try to make good decisions as I moved forward.  Of course at that stage in my life making good decisions was not easy.  But, I found comfort in good choices.  Good choices eased the pain in my chest.  Good choices gave me oxygen.

Just recently I had an experience where this same chest crushing sensation came forward.  As my mind tried to wrap itself around the facts of this situation, I found myself struggling for oxygen.  My lungs burned, and my heart ached.  I felt like I was in the middle of my first mile, but this time I didn't know if continuing forward would be the solution. This particular situation presented problems that I didn't have answers to.  I had never been down this road before, and I was lost.  I decided I wasn't going to find the answers on my own, so I prayed!  Although it took a few days, the pain subsided, and I could breathe again. 

As Christ suffered in the Garden of Gethsemane, he bled from every pore.  We know he bled from every pore as a consequence for our sins.  Each one of our individual sins was paid for by the shedding of his blood.  But the suffering did not end in the Garden.  Elder James E. Talmage believes the Savior literally died of a broken heart while hanging on the cross.  "While, as stated in the text, the yielding up of life was voluntary on the part of Jesus Christ, for He had life in Himself and no man could take His life except as He willed to allow it to be taken, there was of necessity a direct physical cause of dissolution... The strong, loud utterance, immediately following which He bowed His head and 'gave up the ghost,' when considered in connection with other recorded details, points to a physical rupture of the heart as the direct cause of death...Great mental stress, poignant emotion either of grief or joy, and intense spiritual struggle are among the recognized causes of heart rupture."  In the book, "The Infinite Atonement" by Tad R. Callister, he says, "If the Savior's broken heart was the last straw, the final blow symbolizing the quintessence of suffering in all of its terrible reality, then such a rupture might likewise symbolize that moment of climax when his mortal and spiritual frame could neither endure any more, nor need do so.  He had given his all.  His heart had broken in the giving process.  There was nothing left to give nor any further price to pay."

At times in our lives when we encounter difficult situations or challenges, it feels like we are running that first mile.  It feels like we can't get any oxygen.  It feels like our heart is going to break!  But it doesn't need to.  Our Savior has already paid the price.  We need to take advantage of this beautiful gift, and let the Atonement work in our lives.  I don't think it is coincidental that the repentance process includes a broken heart and a contrite spirit!

Look Closer by Nicole Johnson

Growing up, I always hated how my hands looked. I felt I had stubby fingers with no femininity. I tried to make them look better by always having my nails done, and I kept my skin smooth with lotion.

Years later, I was in the hospital with my mom, and I held her hand. As she drew nearer to heaven, I held tighter. It was then I looked down and saw our hands, interlocked, identical. I saw the potential my hands had, to be as hers. While I'll never be the woman she is, I see my hands differently now. I see the beauty. And as I saw this, I reflected on the tender mercies of her hands in my life. I see that I can work, serve, and love as she did. Her hands now live through me.

Reflection

My mother's hands soft and clean

Rub softly on my head

As she sings to me a lullaby

While I lay sleepy in my bed. 

My mother's hands rough and warn

As she faces a long, hard day.

Those hands give selflessly

Serving others along their way

My mother's hands warm and safe

Gently wipe away my tears.

She calms my every doubt

She calms my every fear. 

My mother's hands aged and whole

Grasp my infant's hand.

As she whispers sweet I love yous

A tender mercy, from where I stand. 

My mother's hands are weary 

As her spirit is called home. 

I hold them tightly, seeing

Her hands are like my own. 

Choose Happy by Holly Nelson

Shortly after having my fourth baby, I found myself having some ‘baby-blues.’  I was in a slump and couldn’t seem to get out of it.  Things that I normally wouldn’t give a second thought to got under my skin, and I would allow them to fester.  It was becoming a growing problem that, luckily, I realized a change needed to happen.  After a particularly hard day and going to bed with a heavy amount of guilt I placed on my shoulders for not being a ‘happy perfect Pinterest mom,’ I knew change had to happen and happen that day.  As I lay in bed that night, I tried to think of something positive I had said that day and couldn’t think of one thing. NOT. ONE. THING.

You’ve all heard the saying, “If mama ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy.”  Well, that saying was absolutely true in our house.  My negative attitude was rubbing off onto my family.  My kids seemed to walk on eggshells on how I would react to a mess or a fight or if their rooms weren’t clean, and I hated it. I hated to see how my negativity was affecting their sweet happy selves

I decided then that I would CHOOSE HAPPY.  I made a big sign that says “CHOOSE HAPPY” and hung it prominently in my home, somewhere I would see it multiple times a day.  I started small by writing down just one thing every day that made me happy.  It was hard at first.  Especially on the days that my newly mopped kitchen floor was covered in powdered sugar or when my couch had a one-of-a-kind Sharpie artwork drawn on it by my 2-year-old or when I burnt funeral potatoes that needed to be at the church in 15 minutes… but I did, and I wrote them down each day.  Just one thing.  It was amazing to see a change in my attitude just a few days in and how much easier it became to find several things a day just a few weeks in.

President Thomas S. Monson said- “Of this be sure: you do not find the happy life, you make it.”

You make it by the daily choices you make.  You make it by how you react to a situation.  You make it by learning to love your life.   You make it on how you treat other people.

Now, I’m not saying that since I’ve made the choice to CHOOSE HAPPY that my life has been all rainbows and sunshine- there are still hard days but a quote that has helped on those ‘ready to pull my hair out’ kind of days by President Gordon B Hinckley states:

“Those who have faith and move forward with a happy spirit will find that things ALWAYS WORK OUT."

In John 16:33 it states “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace.  In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”

Focusing on the Things of God by Hailey Overson

To distract: to draw away or divert, as the mind or attention; to disturb or trouble greatly in mind; to provide a pleasant diversion for. These are the dictionary definitions… and I wanted to share them with you, why? Because this is happening ALL THE TIME.

Bruna had been completely prepared by the Lord. Upon our first time teaching her, we all shed tears of joy as she received answers to prayers. As she realized that the true church of Jesus Christ was here on the earth. As she realized that she could be washed clean from every sin she had ever committed. We invited her to be baptized - she accepted - and to read the Book of Mormon and pray about her decision. Bruna continued to progress. She was GLOWING. And she was focused on making the necessary changes to bring her life into alignment with the teachings of our Lord. 

However, we know that it is at these crucial times in our lives that Satan will try his hardest to draw us away from the path of peace and light. It’s what he did to Bruna. She had an ex-husband, a job, and friends that began to distract her.  Bruna’s story is tragic. She did a 180 and began smoking (an old habit), drinking (not even an old habit), and got back with her abusive ex-husband. She told us that she had really felt something different the first day we’d talked with her, but that there was no room in her life for something like this Gospel.

Now I know we don’t all have experiences like this. We don’t just go off the deep end and say we don’t want anything to do with this Gospel at all, but, in our own ways, we definitely get distracted from our true purpose. We get caught up in the hustle and bustle of everyday life, and we forget to stop and ponder. We forget to look for opportunities to grow and be more like Christ. We begin to live for work and school and for the craziness of everything else. That’s NOT why we’re here. We’re not here to have a great job, be the smartest, have a hot body, post perfect pictures on Facebook, or anything of the sort, and yet these things take up most of our thoughts. We focus on this much more than we focus on the words of the prophets, the counsel of our bishop, the holy scriptures, and the promptings sent to us through the Holy Ghost by our Savior.

I hope we will all choose today to figure this out. We can pray for strength to focus. We can put the things of God before the things of men- because the things of men obviously still have to get done. We don’t have to be distracted.  Our Heavenly Father doesn’t want it that way. He’s totally got our back on this one. So when we focus and try, His Son will carry us and make us into the people we want to be. 

And moreover, I would desire that ye should consider on the

blessed and happy state of those that keep the commandments of God. For behold, they are blessed in all things, both temporal and spiritual; and if they hold out faithful to the end they are received into heaven, that thereby they may dwell with God in a state of never-ending happiness.

Mosiah 2:41