This last weekend Beth went out of town so it was Daddy weekend with my girls. We had an awesome weekend. We had Daddy Dinners which included meals Dad loves but Mom doesn’t (there’s a whole lotta chili involved). We spent a whole day at the pool. We went to a Notre Dame High School barbeque with food, snacks, and activities. We went to the grocery store TWO times. We had a movie night in Dad’s bed with the projector. It was a great weekend.
Ivy has had some behavior challenges of late. Those challenges continued over the weekend.
On Sunday, the last day before Mom was coming home, we went to church. Ivy did not do a good job and we had to leave before the first meeting was over.
I was so frustrated. I loaded all three girls in the car and turned on the AC. I had to go back into church and clean up the mess we always leave behind, while the church meeting continued around me, load it up, and take the girls home.
When we got home I put Wren down for her nap, setup Sage on the couch to watch a show, and took Ivy to her room.
Despite the awesome weekend, Ivy’s misbehaviors loomed large. The most challenging thing as a parent is when your child is awesome 95% of the time and then does really, really bad things the other 5%. Because of the 95% you know she’s so capable.
I won’t go into detail on the behavior but lest you think me a harsh, mean Dad, I’ll just say the behavior was unacceptable and important to be corrected. I’ll leave it at that.
After Ivy was in her room I stood over her fuming. I was so frustrated. I took deep breaths to calm myself. I told Ivy I had to spank her.
We don’t spank. It has happened maybe twice in our family and I don’t like it. But enough was enough. Ivy had to learn some things were unacceptable. I didn’t know how else to bring that lesson home.
She freaked out a little when I said I had to spank her. As she was doing that, I closed my eyes and prayed.
She asked what I was doing.
I told her I was praying asking Heavenly Father what I should do. I was asking for help on how to deal with my daughter with love. How to show her I loved her but that her behavior had to be better. I desperately didn’t want to spank her. But I didn’t know what to do.
Ivy loves pretending to be characters. It’s a fun thing about her. I love it. I love her creativity and her mind. All day every day she’ll pretend to be Dash from the Incredibles, the red head girl from the movie Leap, Alfalfa from Little Rascals, Justin Bieber when she’s singing, Ghost Spider, Huckleberry Finn, Snow White. You name it. If it’s a fictional character (or sometimes not fictional, see Justin Bieber), Ivy has pretended to be them.
Back in Ivy’s room, considering spanking, not wanting to, praying for help, I don’t even remember thinking it. The next part just happened. I told her no more characters until she could improve on the things she wasn’t improving on. I told her I was not participating in her fun ritual of being different characters throughout the day until she could fix her behavior.
Ivy reacted way worse at this than if I had actually spanked her. You’d have thought I told her the world was ending. She was beside herself. Distraught. She begged me to let her be a character. I told her not until she improved and I left her in her room for nap time.
I did not spank her.
When Ivy woke up she immediately asked if she could be a character and I said no. I told her she could be a character after three days of making good decisions.
That was two days ago as I’m writing this and Ivy’s behavior has improved 100-fold. Zero issues. Zero problems. Every day she has asked when she could be a character again. I’ve told her the day it can happen if she keeps doing a good job. She has accepted this.
Now it’s Tuesday night and I’m writing this. She is very excited to be Justin Bieber tomorrow.
I reminded her that if her actions revert back it will be another 3 days of no characters. I don’t think it will come to that. This has been a brutal 3 days for her.
This is your reminder that prayer is real, and prayer is powerful.
I was praying for help and I received it. I say again, I didn’t even realize what I was doing. It just came out of my mouth. “Ivy no more characters until you start to behave better.”
I didn’t want to resort to spanking, but I thought I was out of options. I didn’t know what to do. With God, and prayer, there is always something else you can do.
God answered my prayer that day and I’m so grateful for that. I know Ivy and Sage and Wren will have other challenges. They’ll never be perfect and I don’t want them to be. I hope they’ll accept that I’m extremely, very much, far from a perfect dad.
But as their behavior is challenging and I think I’ve run out of options, I hope I can remember to pray.
The Father of me, you, and the universe answers. In this life I’ll never be a perfect Father. But they still have a perfect Father.
These are the highlights of the book Lighten Up that I read in 2021.
“…” usually indicates the next part of the quote was later in the paragraph.
Quotation marks indicate the author is quoting someone else.
A line starting without a capitalized letter indicates my highlight starts in the middle of a sentence.
This is a book written for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints about going easier on themselves, and lightening up.
Rejoicing in Diversity (Chapter 1-4)
Chapter 1 Lighten Up!
The greatest bridge of all is the culture of the gospel.
Love is not just a nice feeling about someone. It is the pure and joyful pulse of the universe, and being in tune with it means you are in tune with the forces that bind together the stars on one hand and the atoms on the other.
According to the measurements we usually use, for the most part Jesus did not make people’s lives physically better.
We are the rainbow, but it is Christ who is the light.
Chapter 2 Principles and Practices
We should never compare ourselves spiritually to someone else.
Sometimes we think we can’t be united unless we’re all the same – doing the same things, talking the same way, understanding a gospel idea the same way. I think the Apostle Paul has a very different opinion.
Let us be careful not to snicker at jokes that demean and belittle others because of religious, cultural, racial, national, or gender differences.
(on 300 families surveyed that were considered “Effective Mormon Families” by their stake presidents) 99 percent of these families always paid their tithing; 93 percent said they always accepted Church callings; nearly all of them were sealed in the temple;…When the interviewers asked if they usually had family prayer, 73 percent of them said yes; 66 percent usually held family home evening; 24 percent went to the temple regularly, and 28 percent had regular family scripture study…lots of leeway on practices. Yet all of these families were, in the opinion of their stake presidents, effective and successful. Isn’t that encouraging?
(effective families continued) “You don’t have to come from a strong LDS family yourself to have one. Forty-nine percent of the husbands and 39 percent of the wives had not graduated from seminary. Only 21 percent of the husbands had been on missions. Twenty percent of the fathers and 18 percent of the mothers were not baptized at age eight. Between 15 and 18 percent were baptized after the age of twelve.
“At some point, sometimes before marriage, sometimes as a couple, these people decided that their own children would be raised up in a gospel environment…. [And] they followed it up with action.”
What’s the principle? Teach your children the gospel.
Lighten up about yourself – and about other people.
“Ideals are stars to steer by. They are not a stick to beat yourselves with.”
If we focus on principles instead of practices, we free ourselves from the unwarranted and unnecessary burden of guilt that often ensues when our practices do not match those of everyone else. We also free ourselves from the even more terrible burden of judging others because their practices don’t match ours.
“The one great stumbling block to our progress in faith is rule-keeping that does not spring from an honest heart…Jesus Christ never condemned the honest heart. His wrath was kindled against the hypocritically empty rule-keeping of the Pharisees.”
If I know how you feel about Jesus Christ, I am much less worried with how you feel about many other things.
Chapter 3 Walk in My Zori
We cannot replay God for his blessings.
Whatever your season is, enjoy it. Don’t try to concentrate on the tasks of another season.
A mission…wisdom of our leaders…it is a full-time assignment that deserves and receives the missionary’s complete concentration.
Meet the season of your life wholeheartedly.
Our marriage was like that – a team effort – and It might not have worked so well if we had spent much time thinking about who the leader was.
I knew that I must not let this time of physical weakness become a time of spiritual weakness as well.
(Lessons of the zori) One: Mutual obligation to each other…Two: relishing each season of life in turn without trying to rush through them all…Three: knowing that progress comes by teamwork and by each person in a marriage taking turns…Four: there is a time to bear heavy responsibilities and a time to let those responsibilities shift to someone else.
My great task in this life is the task the Savior has given all of us: “Learn of me.”
Chapter 4 Limitations: A Fine Line
We waste tremendous energy when we fret about our limitations instead of getting on with those portions of our life that are under our control.
(On consecrating what we have and what we are to the Lord’s work, a woman who said she “took my blackness with me…and that was part of what I consecrated. A woman cried saying she never had the privilege of doing this for a black woman before and she replied) “That’s one of the things I can do for you that no one else in the temple today could do.’”
Magnifying our callings doesn’t mean multiplying our tasks.
(The earth is ours. Why? Because we’ve deserved it? Because we’ve earned it?) No, because it is our Father’s delight to give it to us: “And it pleaseth God that he had given all these things unto [you]; for unto this end were they made to be used, with judgement…”
When we can thank God for trials, tribulations, irritations, and afflictions, something happens to transform them into blessings.
(Being grateful for fleas, concentration camp where guards let them be so they could read their Bible) “My mind rushed back to our first hour in this place. I remembered Betsie’s bowed head, remembered her thanks to God for creatures I cold see no use for” (The Hiding Place, pp. 2018-9.).
I could have chosen to feel frightened and let the children and parents feel that.
“And if [you] come unto me, I will show unto [you your] weakness. I give unto [you] weakness that [you] may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all who humble themselves before me; for if [you] humble [yourself] before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong” (Ether 12:27).
Defining Ourselves (Chapters 5-9)
Chapter 5 “For Such a Time as This”
We, like Esther, have come to our place for such a time as this…”we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places”
(Story of Elizabeth Francis Yeates conversion) “When I had read it all,” she wrote, “I said aloud ‘praise the Lord. I have found the right way at last.’”…”I could see no other way but to repent of my sins and to be baptized. I knew my people would bitterly oppose it when they knew it, and that my former friends would treat me coldly but it was worse than I ever thought.” That one sentence, “It was worse than I ever thought,” contains an agony of heartbreak.
She did not falter. Her last moment of hesitation had come on the very brink of her baptism when she looked down into the dark river at midnight, December 4, 1855. (The ceremony was performed in secret because of the risk of persecution.) She wrote, “[I] felt as though I could not possibly go in it, but a Voice seemed to say ‘There is no other way.’” In faith, she took that step. “It seemed after that,” she wrote, “that every thing had changed. The scales had fallen from my eyes, and the gospel plan was glorious, and I covenanted with my Heavenly Father that however dark the clouds may be, if friends turned to be foes that by His help I would serve Him.
“And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on His. When He tells us to love our enemies, He gives, along with the command, the love itself (The Hiding Place, p. 239).
“The Holy Ghost filled me with the awareness that my mother had been handicapped in mortal life. She had an emotional handicap, the source of which remains a secret to me. But she is handicapped no longer. And neither am I” (“Forgiving My Mother,” Ensign, August 1990, p. 49).
Joy comes from serving others and delighting in our sisterhood – in ministering to rather than administering for each other.
You, in whatever callings you have throughout your own life, will face many choices between serving the program and serving an individual. I believe that if we truly serve individuals in the Lord’s way, we’ll have less trouble with the program. There’s a wonderful story about President McKay that illustrates the distinction. Irene Bates tells the story, which involved her husband, Bill, the first British president of Manchester Stake in England during the 1960s. (The story goes – It was normal for stake presidents and two bishops to be invited to General Conference with all traveling expenses paid. Instructions came to have all bishops and branch presidents come. A stake president named Bill was sure this was an error, but eventually gave the names of all the bishops and branch presidents in his stake. There was one branch president who was overjoyed for the chance to go to General Conference. He and his wife opened up their home in their little town to have church. The local paper featured a story about the trip. Word came down that it was a mistake. The stake president was distraught. He called the president of the British Mission who provided the prophet, David O. McKay’s, direct number. The stake president “looked at the number for a long moment, then said, ‘I’ve got to do it.’” He phoned President McKay and laid the whole situation before him. His response: “You’re quite right, President Bates. It would be very wrong to do that to that good man. We must have them all come. Please do me a favor and let me call President Tanner.” Bill came out of the office with tears streaming down his face.
Chapter 6 “A House of Glory”
Each of us wants to be friends with time, Comfortable waiting for toast to pop,
The trick is to find out whether a minute is worth more
Crammed or empty. And, either way, to get on with it.
Heavenly Father doesn’t save up all his spiritual experiences just for sacrament meeting or the temple.
And that’s because you’re a temple – a living, breathing, walking temple on two legs with a spirit that’s in motion, seeing the needs of many.
I know that I am nothing; as to my strength I am weak; therefore I will not boast of myself, but I will boast of my God, for in his strength I can do all things.
Chapter 7 Motherhood: Less Guilt, More Joy
How grateful the entire house of Israel could be that Moses’ mother did not insist on being Moses’ only mother.
Our agency is eternal.
(speaking of her sons) it was far more important to us that they pay their tithing, attend their meetings, and administer the sacrament worthily than it was for their hair to be a certain length.
“They have their agency.”
(her son) instantly identifies and summarily rejects attempts to make him feel guilty about not being married. How foolish I would be to pick up the guilt my son has properly rejected and bind it on my own shoulders, to create a burden where none exists!
(about mothers) guilt is a burden they need not pick up.
Chapter 8 Defining Ourselves
Now, the point I want to make is this: Ed was trying to be the best son, the best son-in-law, and the best Mormon he could be. I was trying to be the best daughter, daughter-in-law, and Mormon I could be. Those were three role definitions apiece we were trying to work out with our families and the Church – not to mention trying to be the best husband and wife to each other we could be. How we succeeded had a large impact on our self-esteem. But there came a point where we had to choose. Ed couldn’t be the best son – in terms of Japanese culture and in terms of what his mother wanted – and also be the best Mormon he could be. I couldn’t be the best daughter-in-law – in terms of what his mother wanted – and still be the best Mormon I could be. Being a good daughter-in-law was important to me, but being a good Mormon was more important. Being a good son was important to Ed, but being a good Mormon was more important. So he had to establish that definition of himself without knowing if his mother would ever come to terms with it.
Do you feel that newness? Do you feel that strong connection to Jesus and the love that he has for you? If you do, it makes it easy to choose being a good member of the Church first.
Minimize the areas of conflict.
You want your family to see that you’re a better, happier person as a result of belonging to the Church.
Chapter 9 Three Ideas for a Brighter Life
But it was the fear of making a mistake that paralyzed him, traumatized him, and made him dissolve in tears…. Does that happen to us sometimes?
Old proverb – “He who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything.”
Sin involves two characteristics: knowing the law and willfully breaking the law
D&C 80:3 “it mattereth not, for ye cannot go amiss.”
The Japanese word for this self-motivated goodness is kigatsuku.
Embracing Charity (Chapters 10-13)
Chapter 10 The Pure Spirit of Charity
(On teaching and knowing the first day what child would be difficult) I learned that I must go immediately to that child and return to him or her often during the day – to give a hug, to ruffle up his hair, to pat her shoulder. If I would do that, by day’s end, whatever in me sensed a difficult difference about that child had dissolved, and we had created the special bond that had come spontaneously with the others.
(Her husband while Mission President in Japan, when a woman criticized him for helping to setup a tent) “My title may be president, but that only means that I am the Lord’s servant here in Japan.”
Chapter 11 Surrounded by Samaritans
We all know why children behave this way. They want to feel special and important – and Satan’s counterfeit way of achieving that goal, even in little children, is to make someone else feel unimportant, unspecial, wrong.
(dream told by Jude Inmpey of the Aba area of Nigeria) “He dreamed he was at a major social event where an organ was being played, but the sound from the organ was painful. Upon investigation, he found that the organist was playing only on the white keys. The interpretation came to him sometime later at a Church gathering: ‘The Church has for many years played the white keys on the keyboard,’ he said, ‘and now they’re playing both the white and the black, and the music is much sweeter.’”
But I think of growing up on a plantation in Mahukona. I think of the Hawaiian women in that tiny Mormon branch who welcomed a Japanese Buddhist girl who edged shyly in the door. They made room for her beside their own children, taught her to sing the hymns, and loved her – not because she was going to be the first counselor in the Relief Society general presidency fifty years later, but because she was there and because they had loving hearts.
Chapter 12 The Power of Charity
What I’m suggesting is that our expectations need to communicate confidence and joy, rather than anxiety and pressure.
(Question she and her husband asked themselves when talking about goals for their sons) “If we continue with these same goals and priorities for Ken, will they help him reach his eternal potential?”
He (Christ) talks about his Father who, in a parched desert land, sends rain “on the just and on the unjust” and permits his sun “to rise on the evil and on the good.” Then he says, “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father…is perfect.” How is our Father perfect? In not withholding the blessings of this sun and rain – which I think are symbols for his love – for anyone.
love doesn’t make distinctions about whether someone is evil or good, deserving or not deserving. Love will spill over in blessing, simply because that’s the nature of love.
We only imperfectly grasp his (God’s) immense patience.
the need we have to achieve perfection. There is no waste. And there is no haste. We will all have all the time we need. We have a loving Father who makes sure we will receive the experiences we need to achieve perfection.
we definitely don’t need to inspect other people.
The reason “charity never faileth” is because we aren’t in charge of the supply department.
Chapter 13 “Neither Do I Condemn Thee…”
Neither do I condemn thee (John 8)
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, no anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8)
Seeking the Light of Christ (Chapters 14-Epilogue)
Chapter 14 Opening the Door to Christ
The gospel is not a system that distrusts or despises the world.
Illness and adversity are not punishments for being alive; they are natural accompaniments of life.
If one great constant in the universe is the unfailing love of the Savior, the other great constant is his unfailing respect for human agency.
He wants to hear real prayers, honest prayers.
But who are we trying to kid? Jesus has just seen the stove where the spaghetti boiled over, and it was pretty obvious that wasn’t the only thing that had ever boiled over on the stove. He heard what you muttered when you picked up that one sock, just as you’ve been doing for the past eight years. He caught that worry about the dentist bill that flashed across your mind when you were putting toothpaste on your brush. He doesn’t want polite platitudes. He wants you! All of you! He wants to be the center of your total life – the worried you, the mad you, and the sad you as well as the inspired, happy, obedient, loving you.
(From a missionary after saying a no substance prayer and wondering why God wouldn’t help her) “This time, I didn’t say a prayer – I prayed.”
don’t think anything is too small for the Savior’s loving attention.
Chapter 15 Spiritual Preparation
But a life centered in the future is not really the kind of life that makes living today worthwhile.
the gospel brings peace. Even when it stretches us and makes us work hard, it brings peace.
(After listing all the “shoulds” in the church, or things we’re told we should do) You should do what works for you.
many of the good women of the world (in whom there is often such an inner sense of spirituality) will be drawn to the Church in large numbers. – Spencer W. Kimball
Chapter 16 “Learn of Me”
There are two things I want us to remember about light: First, light doesn’t compete with darkness. It dispels darkness. And second, Christ’s burden is light.
For all of us – whether we are converts or were born in the Church – there comes a moment when the gospel becomes real to us in a way that it hasn’t been before. These are moments of a reality beyond realness. They make a light go on permanently, a light that never goes off unless a line goes down or a switch gets turned off somewhere. If that’s the light that we share together when we feast on the scriptures and learn of Christ, then it is a light that dispels the darkness in our lives.
One of the inevitable effects of true spirituality is light-heartedness, a generosity in happiness.
Jesus is our yokemate. When we take his yoke upon us, he’s pulling on the other half of the yoke. There aren’t many loads that are too heavy to pull if Jesus is pulling beside us.
(Paraphrase of Matthew 7:9-10) “What Relief Society president is there among you, who, if a sister ask for comfort, will give her a lecture? Or, if she ask for more spiritually nourishing lessons, will give her guilt instead?
To have faith in his identity is only half the principle. To have faith in his ability and in his power to cleanse and to save, that is the other half.
We must have faith in Christ – not only that he is the Savior, but that he is our Savior.
Stephen Robinson told another story that impressed me. His seven-year-old daughter Sarah asked for a bicycle. She was the only child on the block without one. Brother Robinson didn’t have enough money to buy her a bicycle at the time, so he sidestepped the issue by telling her, “You save all your pennies, and pretty soon you’ll have enough for a bike.” A couple of weeks later, he saw her do a job for Janet, then add the two pennies she earned to some others in a little jar with a slit in the lid. She showed him the pennies in the bottom and said, “You promised me that if I saved all my pennies, pretty soon I’d have enough for a bike. And, Daddy, I’ve saved every single one of them.”
“My heart melted,” he says. “She was doing everything in her power to follow my instructions.” She didn’t know – though he did – that she would eventually have enough pennies for a bicycle, but by then she would be in high school. So he took her shopping and they spent all afternoon looking at bicycles:
Finally we found it – the perfect bicycle, the one she new in the premortal existence. She got up on that bike, and she was thrilled. She then saw the price tag, reached down, and turned it over. When she saw how much it cost, her face fell and she started to cry. She said, “Oh, Dad, I’ll never have enough for a bicycle.”
So I said, “Sarah, how much do you have?”
She answered, “Sixty-one cents.”
“I’ll tell you what,” I said. “You give me everything you’ve got and a hug and a kiss, and the bike is yours.” Well, she’s never been stupid. She gave me a hug and a kiss. She gave me the sixty-one cents. Then I had to drive home very slowly because she wouldn’t get off the bike. She rode home on the sidewalk, and…I drove along slowly beside her.
We all want something desperately – but it isn’t a bicycle. We want the celestial kingdom. We want to be with our Father in Heaven. And no matter how hard we try, we come up short. The Savior proposes, “I’ll tell you what. All right, you’re not perfect. How much do you have? What can you do? Where are you now? Give me all you’ve got, and I’ll pay the rest. Give me a hug and a kiss; that is enter into a personal relationship with me, and I will do what remains undone.”
There is good news and bad news here. The bad news is that he still requires our best effort. We must try, we must work – we must do all that we can. But the good news is that having done all we can, it is enough (“Believing Christ,” pp 51-52.)
I watched a video recently. You can watch it here:
In the video, some surfers are complaining about a barrier in the ocean. They’d travelled for a once in a lifetime surf trip and a barrier was keeping them from being able to surf the big waves.
As they were complaining, an older surfer walked up and let them use his binoculars. Through the binoculars, just beyond the barrier, the young surfers could see a feeding frenzy. Sharks were just beyond the barrier.
What seemed like the worst thing in the world quickly turned into a great protection and a great blessing.
How often do we look at life as though through a murky glass? If we only had binoculars, or could see and understand the bigger picture, the way God sees things, how differently this world would look.
11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.
I think back on my teenage years. I wasn’t the most rebellious teenager. I was far from the most obedient. I pushed boundaries. I experimented with what I thought would bring me joy.
As I’m now in my 30s, I realize just how stubborn and rebellious I am. This life is an opportunity for my spirit to prove whether or not I will choose God. I try my best. I realize that I am still just a child. Thinking I know best while God watches and lets me stumble around, making all the mistakes I need to so I eventually develop the humility, faith, and trust He knows I need.
As I consider teenagers today, my heart fears for them. I remember when I thought I needed to drink, try drugs, do all the worldly things or else I would miss out. Or just to feel like I belonged.
I think back on how lucky I was to try these things and escape with my free-will intact. Many are not so lucky.
We look at so many destructive habits and activities from the perspective that they are fun and exciting. They are the big wave. But beneath the big wave are dangers we don’t perceive. Beer commercials always show the party. There is always a picture of abject excitement, freedom, liberation, and joy. What is never shown is what is lurking underneath: addiction, sadness, loneliness, emptiness, fear, doubt, dependance, despair, danger, suffering.
The products of a worldly life are these things. I’ve seen it. We all have. And yet we think we want to be a part of these things, a part of this world.
Thrilling and tantalizing waves.
A feeding frenzy underneath.
Some quotes from that video –
“The Lord’s commands do not constitute some grueling underwater barriers that we must learn to grudgingly endure in this life so that we might be exalted in the next.”
“The Lord’s commandments are given out of love and caring. They are intended for our joy in this life just as much as they are intended for our joy and exaltation in the next.”
There is this worldly perspective that restrictions and the commandments of God take away our freedom. Let me be free! Let me party! Let me eat, drink, and be merry!
“Seek freedom and become captive of your desires. Seek discipline and find your liberty.”
-Frank Herbert, Chapterhouse: Dune
We think real freedom is drinking what we want to drink, not realizing we become a slave to that drink.
Real freedom is eating what we want to eat, not realizing we become a slave to our appetites.
Real freedom is going to the party, not realizing we are a slave to the fear of missing out.
We are commanded to avoid things because those things take away our freedom, they do not liberate us.
Real freedom is not being dependent on any substance, food, drug, or activity. Real freedom is discipline.
Why does God give us commandments? Not to restrict us but to protect us. Not to hold us back but to let us fly to our highest potential.
There is a great responsibility for firstborns to love.
Think about it.
I was thinking about Sage. For her whole existence up to a point she will have shared, to some extent, the love and affection she receives with Ivy. Does this mean Sage is loved any less? No, absolutely not. She is endlessly loved.
That said, she has shared her love with Ivy.
It made me think, yet again, of all the singular love poured out on Ivy in her first 21 months.
It made me reflect on the love I received in the 45 months before Adie joined our family.
How did that shape me?
Given the measure of love and affection I received from two loving parents, singularly focused attention and love for 45 months, does that increase my responsibility to love?
Given this theory, I think firstborns have a higher responsibility to love. With great power comes great responsibility. There is no greater power in the world than love.
Maybe this is why the firstborn gets the birthright (wink face).
Thos of us who have experienced love, been given love, have felt love, it’s important for us to share that. There are so many in the world that don’t grow up in a loving household. If you’re reading this and you did grow up in a loving household, you’ve been given an advantage in life worth more than a huge inheritance. You’ve been given a huge leg up in this life if you were born into a loving home.
Share it.
Don’t waste the gift you’ve been given.
Now, here’s some food for thought to counter my “firstborn love theory” (Trademark pending) –
Other ideas to consider, did my love actually expand with the arrival of Adie (my little sister) because I had experienced love and now I got to share it with my little sister? Did my first learning experience of giving love outside of my parents who already loved me so much grow my capacity to love even more? Did getting to love somebody who couldn’t do anything for me help my capacity to love, learning at a young age to love somebody without getting anything in return? Does that add to my responsibility as the firstborn?
Or is Adie’s capacity to love greater than mine because she was born into loving a 3 person family, unlike myself? Does that make Easton’s (youngest of 6) capacity to love 3x mine since he was born into a family 3 times bigger than the one I was born into? How does this balance with my personal capacity to love expanding every time a new baby joined our family?
Love.
We need to think about it more.
Which leads to the ultimate, and powerful question: is love in limited supply?
We all have an infinite capacity to love. I don’t believe there is any limit on how we can love. I think God is our example in this. Think about how much He loves you. Whether you come from a loving household or not, whether you’re the firstborn of 10, an only child, an orphan, the youngest of 2, and all examples in between, you have a divine capacity to love. Divine. Your Father is God. He loves you. Your capacity to love is infinite. Use it. Share it.
Epilogue
The above post was written in May of 2023. I kid you not, as I opened it to review and post in 2026, Beth sent me a video with a text attached.
The text read: “Wren kept asking, “Where Ivy?” Then Ivy came down and Wren waved and said, “Good morning Ivy!” And gave her a hug. But Ivy was still waking up a bit so when she sat down to eat, Wren came over, gave her another gentle hug, and started gently rubbing Ivy’s back. It’s like Wren is teaching them how to love.”
I replied, “Reminding them.”
And Beth said, “Blog post!”
She knows me too well. But I didn’t realize I was about to post this!
We’ve been struggling a little with Ivy and Sage being gentle and loving with Wren as they get older. They are the older sisters, a lot more rambunctious and a lot more physical. Sometimes Wren messes up their “set ups” (toys they’ve setup). Wren wants to be with them and play with them but she’s very destructive. They struggle sharing with Wren. Wren is still little. So they’ve had a hard time.
But I know that Ivy was sent here to be an example as the oldest sister. I know that Sage was sent here to be a peacekeeping, independent, strong second daughter to keep everyone connected. Maybe Wren was sent to remind us all how to love. Maybe she’s meant to teach us to be a little more patient with one another.
I looked back, confused by what I was seeing. I considered a response. All that came was, “Who are you?”
“I’m all that you could have been,” he replied.
He looked just like me. I guess I couldn’t have been a bodybuilder. “What do you mean I wasted it?” I asked.
“You were given so much. So much opportunity. So much of a head start. You were raised to know God. You were raised to know Jesus Christ. You were raised to know why you were here and where you were going. And look what you did with it.”
I stared back dumbly. Ok, that was unfair. I got married late. Had one kid. Got divorced. Held down a decent job for most of my life. Maybe I drank a bit too much and I had a propensity to gamble. But my son loved me, despite my faults. My life wasn’t perfect by any means but a waste? This seemed over the top.
“I didn’t waste it. My life? It wasn’t wasted,” I finally said. I had no other defense than to repeatedly say it wasn’t a waste.
“I’ve come to tell you that you did. I’m sorry,” the other me seemed to say with real compassion. Would I have been equally compassionate in his shoes?
“What did you do differently?” I asked.
A vision opened up to me. This must have been what so many near-death-experiencers describe as a life review, but this wasn’t my life. It was me I was seeing, but it wasn’t my life. It was my life for stretches. But then something changed. In a miraculous way I saw it all. The thoughts, the struggle, the fear, the doubt, and the triumph. I saw the grappling with faith.
In my life, I’d never come back to God. It was too painful to feel like I’d let Him down. The focus of this vision was one critical moment. A prayer to God begging Him to take this alternate version of me back. I’d never done that.
The vision flew through other minor and major events. The major events: Marriage, but not at the venue I got married at, this was performed at a beautiful white building. A temple. A wife he (the alternate version) was faithful to. Children that didn’t just “love” him but admired and adored him. Children that had their own faith that strengthened and guided them in a fallen world. A wife that appreciated him and stuck with him through it all.
Then seemingly minor but apparently important events: Service, church callings, prayers, books read, time spent studying, time spent writing, small discussions, small moments shared, smiles, gratitude, forgiveness, sharing, giving. I had to admit it was a much different life than the one I had lived. It sure had a lot less football on Sundays.
Did I waste it?
In 2021 when I wrote the above, I had heard the question, “If on the last day of your life you met the person you could have been, what would you say to each other?”
That inspired me to write the brief dialogue above. It’s what I thought that interaction could look like if I never turned back to God and reminded myself what is truly important about this life.
No Coincidences 