Elder Karl D. Hirst gave a beautiful talk at the October 2024 General Conference. During the talk he included hints as to how we can feel love from our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ, and when and where we can feel it. Here are some of the hints, scattered throughout his talk. I love these thoughts:

His arms are not shortened. They are always long enough to "[reach our] reaching" and embrace each one of us.

I really enjoy the symbolism of mountains being evidence of the certainty of God's love.

The house of the Lord is the home of our most precious covenants and a place for us all to retreat and sink deeply into the evidence of our Father's love for us.

I have also enjoyed the comfort that comes to my soul when I wrap myself more tightly in my baptismal covenant and find someone who is mourning a loss or grieving a disappointment and I try to help them hold and process their feelings.

Birdsong, feeling the sun or a breeze or rain on my skin, and times when nature puts my senses in awe of God--each has had a part in providing me with heavenly connection.

Perhaps the comfort of faithful friends.

General Conference.

Music.

Serving.

A journal.

Your unique place of personal suffering. I wonder, if Jesus were to choose a place where you and He could meet, a private place where you would be able to have a singular focus on Him, might He choose your unique place of personal suffering, the place of your deepest need, where no one else can go? Somewhere you feel so lonely that you must truly be all alone but you aren't quite, a place to which perhaps only He has travelled but actually has already prepared to meet you there when you arrive? If you are waiting for Him to come, might He already be there and within reach?

Quotes from Virginia Woolf (1882-1941)

Someone has to die in order that the rest of us should value life more.

To enjoy freedom we have to control ourselves.

You cannot find peace by avoiding life.

Arrange whatever pieces come your way.

Each has his past shut in him like the leaves of the book known to him by his heart, and his friends can only read the title.

Nothing has really happened until it has been recorded.

 

Today I needed some wisdom from Brene Brown:

Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity (pg. 155).

Writing helps us focus and organize the experience (pg. 87).

The brokenhearted are the bravest among us—they dared to love (pg. 143).

In the rising strong process, we can’t chart a brave new course until we recognize exactly where we are, get curious about how we got there, and decide where we want to go. Ours is an emotional reckoning (pg. 46).

Get totally clear on the people whose opinions actually matter. On a one-inch-by-one-inch square of paper, I want you to write down the names of the people who really matter. This is a sacred little space. If you have more names than can fit on a square this size, you need to edit. These should be the people who love you not despite your imperfections and vulnerabilities, but because of them. You should also include the people who are brave enough to say “I disagree” or “I think you’re wrong,” and who will question you when they see you acting outside your values. I carry my square in my wallet. (When someone leaves a hurtful review) I can catch myself. Yes, this hurts. But he’s not on my list (pg. 246).

I continue to sort through the boxes of keepsakes that I brought home from my parent's home.  There are pictures, cards, letters, family group sheets, etc., and it is an adventure every time I face it. I like the work.  I like what I am learning about my ancestors.  I have both a "bird's eye view" of my place in a large family with hundreds of relatives and my place in it, and I have a "frog's eye view" through letters telling what a person was thinking about and dealing with on a certain day. Both views have enlarged my life and made me feel gratitude. Here are a few things I have been happy to learn this month:

--My grandma loved my grandpa.  Well that sounds funny, doesn't it? It's just that in their later years, grandma did not demonstrate her love to him in the usual ways, so I wondered. As I have read the letters my grandma wrote to my mother over the course of many years, I hear in her words the expression of her love for her husband.  She is concerned when he has health problems. She supports him in his callings. She comments on all of his work in the yard and around the house.  I hear appreciation and love as I read her letters.

--My father was generous, even before he had a lot of money.  I read a letter from him in the 50's and learned of a contribution he made to someone that I had not known about. Of course I had not known about it, because this was before I was born.  He and my mom were renting a place in California at the time. They were both working and he had decided to change careers and go back to school. This was the time period during which the contribution(s) was made. I was touched by his generosity.

--Write feelings along with facts.  It is interesting to hear the daily routines of life in journals and letters, but I prize the feelings shared. Once in a while, someone writes a paragraph of testimony, or pens a few sentences about the meaning of life or a lesson learned, and those lines are gold!

--Each of us has our turn on earth, and then we depart. I know we all know this, but it has recently hit home to me. We each have one turn and we are given a "package" to deal with, and we have a chance to live and breathe, learn and reach out, and then we depart to another place. I am inspired to make the most of this estate, to not waste away my days but to make something of them.

I read these suggestions from Steve Hitz this morning. Mr. Hitz is a co-founder of Launching Leaders Worlwide, a nonprofit organization that provides young adults with tools for personal leadership and faith. He is also an author.

• Be intentional: Don’t just go through the motions of life. Take some risk.
• Give yourself permission to be alone, with your thoughts, away from the electronic devices.
• Find your sacred space and enter your own desert. Don’t let all your time be consumed by what others are imposing on you.
• Don’t spend time worrying about things over which you have zero control. Remember, anxiety is largely a fear of the future. Live in the present.
• Do something that makes a difference even if you aren’t feeling like it, such as spending a morning texting gratitude to those you love.
• Understand time is not just your own. Listen for the bell.
• Find the rituals and rhythms that move you toward peace and purpose. Like our stone mason, carefully select the stones and apply them to our pillars of peace to customize our path and inculcate the lessons learned from our personal desert.
• Read good books often and broadly. Enlarge your space. These could be a part of the stones that make up our pillars.
• Create your own questions and record your insights.

Enjoy your desert as you enter this space of discovery which leads to empowerment, purpose and peace. The inspiration you find in your own desert will shape the foundation and beauty of the pillars of peace you are building. These pillars support your newfound peace and freedom and serve as a wall of sorts to keep that which is not sacred out of your personal desert; anything that would distract from the beauty of the space.

What writing in a gratitude journal every night of the year 2020 has done for me:

Well I chose an awesome year to write in a gratitude journal daily, didn't I? Little did I know that the year would have so many ups and downs. Let me begin by sharing a quote from President Henry B. Eyring that inspired me to keep a daily gratitude journal:

When our children were very small, I started to write down a few things about what happened every day...I went inside. I didn’t go to bed. Although I was tired, I took out some paper and began to write. And as I did, I understood the message I had heard in my mind. I was supposed to record for my children to read, someday in the future, how I had seen the hand of God blessing our family.

I wrote down a few lines every day for years. I never missed a day no matter how tired I was or how early I would have to start the next day. Before I would write, I would ponder this question: “Have I seen the hand of God reaching out to touch us or our children or our family today?” As I kept at it, something began to happen. As I would cast my mind over the day, I would see evidence of what God had done for one of us that I had not recognized in the busy moments of the day. As that happened, and it happened often, I realized that trying to remember had allowed God to show me what He had done.

More than gratitude began to grow in my heart. Testimony grew. I became ever more certain that our Heavenly Father hears and answers prayers. I felt more gratitude for the softening and refining that come because of the Atonement of the Savior Jesus Christ. And I grew more confident that the Holy Ghost can bring all things to our remembrance—even things we did not notice or pay attention to when they happened. My point is to urge you to find ways to recognize and remember God’s kindness. (October 2007 General Conference)

Every night this year I have recorded ways that God has touched my life, or written down highlights of the day, or happy moments, or beautiful scenes, and so on. I have begun this exercise before but have never made it through the entire year. This exercise has definitely changed my perspective and helped me to see that there is good in every single day. As President Eyring testifies, these few moments each night have softened me and helped me to pay attention and take notice of all the ways that I am blessed. My entries were usually no longer than a half page,and though the entries may be of no interest to posterity (in that there were numerous small or inconsequential moments/things listed), the cumulative effect of pondering and writing has influenced me, and for that I am grateful.