Crayons

Why is there a rush of excitement upon opening a new box of crayons?

Fast Age

Elder Franklin D. Richards in 1873 said:

"It is no vain, untrue or humorous saying that we are living in a fast age. In matters of intelligence and business transactions we live weeks in a day, if we wisely direct our time and energy, when compared with those who have preceded us."
Journal of Discourses 16:60

It's so relative!

Bursting Bubbles

Every now and then we gain a more profound sense of something that we have already known to some degree. It seems like a bubble of understanding we have been in suddenly bursts and we find ourselves in a larger bubble with a deeper, more expansive understanding of the same idea.

Sunday I had a bubble suddenly expand with regards to the Savior and the Atonement. A realization that the individual who experienced the Atonement was something quite beyond just a very, very good man, that the capacity of that Being was tested in some enormous way but that the capacity of the individual was enormous as well. That Being and His capacity is beyond our ability to comprehend, just as the experience is beyond what we can comprehend. My sense of awe and gratitude increased!

That isn't a very precise description of my experience but perhaps you can get a sense of what I mean. These bubble bursting moments are exhilarating and very important to my greater sense of and appreciation for Life.

Investing Resources

One of the often lamentable conditions of mortality is that we have a limited amount of resources in time, energy and means. We cannot do everything we would/should/could do for others or ourselves. Spending our resources in one place means they are not spent in another. Time spent doing something reduces the time spent on other possibilities. Energy spent in one pursuit means it cannot be spent in another.

The relentless challenge or opportunity of life is to choose when and how to expend, or invest, those resources. And each investment has some type of return. Some of those returns are life giving and sustaining, others carry the seeds of death; perhaps for us, perhaps for others, perhaps for things, perhaps for relationships, perhaps for opportunities. Therefore investments should be thoughtfully made.

Rarely, if ever, do we see a very high percentage of the implications of our expenditures.

Q's

Balance. Proper balance is one of the keys to a life filled with life. It seems that the never ending search for a wise balance generally has us weighing quality and quantity. What should I eat? how much? How much should I read? What should I read? Time thinking, time conversing? How much sleep? What kind of sleep?

More on this when I have a greater quantity of time I feel I can devote to this quality subject!

Your time has expired!

Recently the following notice has been showing up on our computer screen: Your time has expired! Press OK if you would like more time

How odd and intriguing would that be if the time referred to was our time in mortality. We would get a notice that our time was up, but there would be an option to have more time if we desired. At what point would we choose to accept that our time was up and what things would motivate us to ask for more?

There is one account in the Bible that parallels this possibility: In 2 Kings 20 the prophet Isaiah told Hezekiah "Set thine house in order; for thou shalt die, and not live."

Hezekiah plead for more time, recounting that he had walked in truth. The Lord granted him 15 more years of life.

I, for one, would like more time to get my house in order! And to enjoy the blessings of this life - So, for the time being, I would definitely press OK!

Response for Red Clover

"Daffodils" (1804)

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretch'd in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed -- and gazed -- but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

By William Wordsworth (1770-1850).