Resolutions: Motivation & Accountability

from Greg Olsen's Facebook page

My ears and eyes have been particularly sensitive lately to any story, quote or scripture that I hear or read which provides inspiration to help me on my quest to fulfill my new years resolutions. And it seems I have found so, so much! It all started when I listened to Elder Christofferson's message to the young adults that he gave last Sunday. What an amazing talk. So inspirational. What a loving Father in Heaven we have. How grateful I am for a Savior who made it possible to get up each day and try again, try harder, and to have hope to one day reach the potential Heavenly Father placed within me. All the quotes in blue come from Elder Christofferson's talk.

Today I am reflecting on my resolutions, and holding myself accountable...to myself. I love the quotes below because they inspire me to keep trying-- to never, ever give up. I hope they do the same for you.

“In reality, there aren’t very many things in a day that are totally without significance. Even the mundane, and repetitious can be tiny, but significant building blocks that in time, establish the discipline and character and order needed to realize our plans and dreams.

It is the accumulation of many days well-lived that adds up to a full life and a saintly person. It is day-by-day that we achieve our goals. It is one day at a time that we overcome imperfections." -Elder D. Todd Christofferson

"Therefore cheer up your hearts and remember that ye are free to act for yourselves-- to choose the way of everlasting death or the way of eternal life. Wherefore my beloved brethren, reconcile yourselves to the will of God, and not the will of the devil and the flesh; and remember, after ye are reconciled unto God, that it is only in and through the grace of God that ye are saved." -2 Nephi 10: 23 & 24

"Verily I say, men should be anxiously engaged in a good cause, and do many things of their own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness." -D & C 58:27

“Sincere prayer is the heart of a happy and productive life." -Elder H. Burke Peterson

"Never arise in the morning without dedicating yourself to Him for that day." -Joseph Smith

"Let us remind ourselves at the beginning of each day that we can keep a resolution just for that day. As we do this it gets easier and easier until it becomes a habit." -N. Eldon Tanner What is at least one thing you can do each day to take yourself out of the world and grow closer to the Lord?

"Provide an environment in your home where the Spirit can be felt daily."

"There is danger in the word someday."

Everything in green is from a stake Relief Society conference I attended last May.

The quotes below are from a stake conference broadcast I attended a year ago. I found these in my journal:

"Be still and know that I am God." - Psalm 46:10 "We need to be still long enough to hear the still, small voice. Satan tries to make your world as noisy as possible. Turn off your phone, your iPod, your computer." -Elaine S. Dalton

"Opposition and persecution puts you in the company of some of the best who have ever walked the earth." ("Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you." Matthew 5:12)

Facing a trial and coming through builds faith and confidence. Faith is a principle of action. When uncertain with the path ahead, we fill our hearts with faith, go forward, and pray again and again. If we're living worthily, he will not let us go very far without warning us to turn around if we're headed in the wrong direction." -Elder Larry W. Gibbons

"The key to success is humility." -President Eyring

To parents: "Live the gospel as conspicuously as you can. Keep the covenants your children know you have made. Give priesthood blessings. And bear your testimony! Don't just assume your children will somehow get the drift of your beliefs on their own.... Do our children know that we love the scriptures? Do they see us reading them and marking them and clinging to them in daily life? Have our children ever unexpectedly opened a closed door and found us on our kees in prayer? Have they heard us not only pray with them but also pray for them out of nothing more than sheer parental love? Do our children know that we believe in fasting as something more than an obligatory first-Sunday-of-the-month hardship? Do they know that we have fasted for them and for their future on days about which they knew nothing? Do they know we love being in the temple, not least because it provides a bond to them that neither death nor the legions of hell can break? Do they know we love and sustain local and general leaders, imperfect as they are, for their willingness to accept callings they did not seek in order to preserve a standard of righteousness they did not create? Do those children know that we love God with all our heart and that we long to see the face and fall at the feet - of His Only Begotten Son? I pray that they know this." (Jeffrey R. Holland, "A prayer for the children",April 2003 General Conference)

"The parent who allows their child to hear the Word of God when very young fortifies them before Satan has an opportunity to offer them counterfeit." -President Eyring

Image from Greg Olsen's Facebook page

“Give us this day our daily bread"...

I believe that we would all readily acknowledge that we have needs each day that we want our Heavenly Father’s help in dealing with. For some, on some days, it is quite literally bread! That is, the food needed to sustain life that day. It could also be spiritual and physical strength to deal with one more day of chronic illness, or a painfully slow rehabilitation. In other cases, it may be less tangible needs such as things related to ones’ obligations or activities that day: teaching a lesson or taking a test, for example.

Jesus is teaching us that we should look to God each day for the bread, the help and sustenance that we require that particular day.….that we would look to God that particular day.

This is consistent with the counsel to “Pray always and not faint…”

The Lord’s invitation to seek our daily bread at our Heavenly Father’s hand speaks of a loving God, aware of even the small, daily needs of his children, and anxious to assist them one by one. He’s saying that we can ask in faith of that being that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not, and it shall be given. That is of course, tremendously reassuring. But there is something at work here, that’s more significant than just help in getting by day to day. As we seek and receive divine bread daily, our faith and trust in God grow.

As you ask in prayer for your daily bread, consider thoughtfully your needs, both what you may lack and what you must protect against. As you retire to bed, think about the successes and failures of the day and what will make the next day a little better. Your [daily] reflections will increase your faith in Him as you see His hand helping you to endure some things and to change others. You will be able to rejoice in one more day, one more step toward eternal life.”

-Elder Christofferson

And how wonderful to know: “The Lord is pleased with every effort, even the tiny daily ones where we seek to be more like him.” –Ezra Taft Benson

I have decided to take the blog private at the end of this month. Hopefully that will give everyone who wants to be able to read this here blog time to shoot me an email by then. :) Just send your email to sirmanskimberly@yahoo.com or leave a comment here with your email address. :) This same message will appear at the end of each post until the end of the month.