In my ward I am the young women’s first counselor. I absolutely love working with the youth and love my sweet girls in my ward so much. This Saturday we got to hang out and listen to President Eyring and Elder Holland speak live and answer questions from youth from all over the world. The entire 90 minutes was so spiritual and uplifting.
If you weren’t able to watch it, I highly recommend it and you can watch it here.
One question that was asked by a youth was What can I do to stay positive and know that I am enough?
And I loved the answer that Pres. Eyring gave. He said, “when you review your life, just before taking the sacrament,
in addition to thinking of what you’ve done wrong, and you won’t have to much trouble finding things you’ve done not perfectly, try reviewing things that you’ve done that were right. Where you actually felt that Heavenly Father and the Savior were pleased. And if you will do that, you’ll notice something. Not only will you be repentant, because there are things you need to change, but you’ll have hope that you really are getting better, you really are. And that’s real. You are children of God. You are His son’s and His daughters and you have come from royal heritage, whatever your circumstances are in this life, let me tell you what they were in the world before. You were one of the valiant ones. A lot of people didn’t make it here, you made it here. You found the gospel of Jesus Christ, you’re very special. Heavenly Father and the Savior have confidence in you and you need to have confidence in yourself as well.”
I love that Pres. Eyring told the youth to focus on what they have done good. On what they have done that has made Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ PLEASED with them.
It is so easy to focus on only what we are doing wrong, or our mistakes, or things we aren’t good at. And we have always been taught that we need to think about the things we need to repent of especially during the sacrament. And yes, that is important so that we can learn and grow. But how often do we forget to think about what we are doing right and the talents that we have and the things we have done well.
It is so easy to get overwhelmed and have constant feelings of guilt while trying to live the gospel. But that is not what Heavenly Father wants for us. That is Satan giving us these thoughts. Heavenly Father wants us to be happy while we are living on the Earth and going through this experience. He doesn’t give us commandments to make us feel guilty when we fail. He already knows we will. He just gives us guidelines to help us stay safe and keep us happy. That is what commandments are for. Yes we need to repent when we do fail but we don’t need to spend time feeling unhappy with ourselves or guilty.
I want all my girls in my young women’s and every youth out there that ever has self doubt or feels like they are not good enough to make it back to Heavenly Father to stop and think about all the things you have done in the last day or two that have pleased your Heavenly Father. Even if at first you think there is nothing, don’t let Satan trick you. Think harder because I know there are multiple things you have done that are so good. I know that what Pres. Eyring said is true and that if we do this we will have hope and happiness in our lives. And that is exactly what we are supposed to feel in this gospel.
You can watch the entire video by clicking here.
