It's okay to be imperfect.

It's okay not to be perfect. In fact, it's okay to be IMperfect. Our Heavenly Father loves us as we are right now. Imperfections and all. But He also wants us to improve ourselves. We all have weaknesses. Some of them we can't fix by ourselves. We need His help. He has given us all the tools we need to be able to improve ourselves and work to be better people. One of the things that He has given us is His Son, Jesus Christ–our Savior. Our Savior knows what we are going through. He knows what we have gone through. He knows how to help us get through our trials. 

According to the Topical Guide, weakness is "the condition of being mortal and lacking ability, strength, or skill. Weakness is a state of being. All people are weak, and it is only by God's grace that they receive power to do righteous acts." In Ether 12:27, we are told that God gives us weakness to become humble, and if we humble ourselves and have faith, He will take our weaknesses and make them strengths. If we take our weaknesses to Him, and tell Him that we need help overcoming it, He will help us. He will help us make it into a strength. It might not always be what we were expecting, but it will be what we need, and sometimes it will be what others need from us. 

You might be asking, "How does this work? How does He use our weaknesses and turn them into strengths?" Well, I found an article that helps discuss just that! You can find it here, and I will share a few quotes and things from it for those of you who don't want to read it. ;)

"At first blush, it seems counterintuitive that the Lord would call upon the weak things of the earth to accomplish a mighty work. To appreciate why the Lord calls the weak, remember that the Lord says his work must be accomplished in His own way and by the power of His Spirit: His ways, in other words, not our ways. Those who perceive themselves to be “strong” do not turn wholeheartedly to the Lord for guidance. Instead, they rely on their own wisdom and their own understanding, “the arm of the flesh.” As a consequence, they are left to their own strength; and they will find in the end—to their dismay—that their strength is insufficient."

I love this! Sometimes I think the Lord uses our weaknesses, and other weak things, in order to prove that He is God–to prove that He can do all things. In Judges, God takes Gideon's army and downsizes it from 32,000 men to 300–and they won against an army of 135,000!! If that doesn't show the power and strength of obeying God, and the power and strength of something that appears weak but God has made strong, I don't know what does.

In the Book of Mormon, when the Nephites go to war against the Lamanites with the strength of the Lord, they always prevail. When they boast of their strengths, and forget the Lord, they fail.

There is a difference between humbly accepting your weaknesses...and just plain old tearing yourself down because you think you're not enough or you've just done things wrong. Stop tearing yourself down! I, too, am guilty of this, I am not going to lie. I have a problem with it. That is one of my weaknesses (and personally, I think it is one that everyone struggles with but I am not going to judge). When you get on your knees, and tell the Lord, honestly, and full of hope and faith, "I struggle with this. Will you help me?" He will help you. He loves when we turn to Him because that means that we are being humble! Knowing that we cannot do things on our own, and turning to Him for help is being humble! It's accepting that you can't do it by yourself, and you need the Lord's help.

God has a work for us to do...and He uses us in our weakness to strengthen those around us.

I have a new goal for myself. I am trying to focus on being worthy to go through the temple. I'm not sure when I will be ready to go through, but I am wanting to at least be worthy to go through for awhile before I actually go through. I have been thinking about it for awhile, but haven't really focused on it yet, and now I want to focus on it. I think that one thing that has been stressing me out about the future is that the only 'goal' I have so far to look forward to is one that I don't really have opportunities for right now. So, if I have this goal to work on, I have something to look forward to. I have something to work towards.

I'm going back to Bear Lake today! I'm so excited! I've had a great week spending time with my family. It's been good to relax, and I'm excited to go back to work! The rest of the summer is going to be so fun!!

I hope you have a wonderful week!! And I hope that you know that God loves you so much and He wants what's best for you!!

Xoxo
Mattie

Learning to trust God in spite of our weaknesses and trials.

My friend and I were talking the other day about a lot of things but one of the last things that we talked about really stood out to me and I've been thinking about it since then. We were talking about weaknesses and strengths, and she named a whole bunch of things I consider weaknesses and she also named how they got turned into strengths. And it was a really special, kind of spiritual experience that I had with her. I have been thinking about how the way I view my weaknesses affects me. If I think of them as just weaknesses, it breaks me, and tears me down. But if I think of them as ways to be stronger, or things that led me to be strong, it builds me up. I see what I've overcome, and I know that I am strong and capable. But when I doubt myself, and let my weaknesses take over me, I feel weak, incapable, depressed, and uncertain of my worthiness and capabilities to be loved or looked up to. It's hard to remember to look at your strengths in a world that is so focused on weaknesses and imperfections in such a negative way, but focusing on your strengths, and how your weaknesses lead you to strengths, is beautiful and empowering, especially when you have God on your side.

I shared this on Facebook yesterday, after thinking about what my friend and I talked about earlier:

"I am my strengths...and I am my weaknesses. Together, they make me who I am. I have my strengths because of my weaknesses. 

My weaknesses do not define me. 

My weaknesses do not make me any less than I am.
My weaknesses make me human.
My strengths do not define me. My strengths do not make me more than I am. My strengths make me human. 

But one cannot have strengths without weaknesses. One cannot have weaknesses without strengths. You must have one to have the other. Together, they make you unstoppable. Indestructible. Powerful. 

God can turn any weakness into a strength. I've seen that in my own life, and a friend recently brought to my attention just how many weaknesses I have that He's helped me turn into strengths. I'm not perfect at them, but I'm trying my best. And that's all we can do."

Humility is having self-compassion.

I'm grateful for the rain! Yeah, it's cold, and wet, but it's peaceful and means it's time for sweater weather! Ready to read some thoughts I've been having lately? Sweet–let's go!

So grateful for the opportunity to listen to/watch the General Women's Session of Conference last night! It was a wonderfully uplifting session! SO excited for General Conference next weekend! I'm also grateful for the weekend that I've had, alone though I was. My roommates all went to a Relief Society overnight trip our ward was having. I wanted to go but couldn't get anyone to cover for me. Anyway, I did have fun, and I learned some things. For example, I learned there is a medicine that sufficiently helps me feel better when I've had a headache all week and its intensity worsened on Saturday (grateful my coworker had some!). I also learned a lot from the conference session last night. While I was listening to Sister Eubank's talk on the way home from work, I had an amazing and profound thought that has been growing for a few weeks now: "Being humble doesn't mean you can degrade yourself or believe you have a negative self worth." Something she said just sparked that thought, and I'm so grateful it did because it was something I've needed to hear for awhile. I'm also grateful for my Savior, who blessed me this week and weekend, and for the fact that, as I've followed my new therapist's advice to be more self-compassionate, and as I've been reading my scriptures and praying more consistently, my week has just been so much better! Despite the headaches, and the crazy week, overall it was just better than last week. I was less stressed, and less anxious, and less depressed. I'm grateful for that experience. It gives me hope for the future. :)

I went to Gospel Principles today, and today we talked about Jesus Christ. There were honestly just a lot of really great things that were said about Him, so I'm just going to list them:
-Jesus should be relatable. Someone we trust to talk to.
-God has never asked for anything but faith from us.
-Christ loves us for who we are right now. He'll turn our weaknesses to strengths. He takes what we already are and turns us into a better version of ourselves.
-You are ENOUGH.
-Heavenly Father loves you and wants you to be happy.

Relief Society was awesome! My roommates were teaching today :)
-One thing that Dahlia said that I really liked was that, "Only a perfect person can really see all our imperfections." She said something about how you know how much you've grown or learned when you look back, and see how little you knew way back when. And only Jesus Christ can really see all our imperfections. Sure, we know we're imperfect. But we don't know just how imperfect we are because we ourselves are not perfect.
-God wants us to be happy was repeated again, but also it's just such a true statement. God wants us to be happy, no matter who we are, or where we are in life.

I was bearing my testimony after the lesson, and I said, "Humility is having self-compassion." Humility is learning to love yourself as you are. Humility isn't, as I've said, 'degrad[ing] yourself or believ[ing] you have a negative self worth.' Humility is learning to love and accept yourself–flaws and all. It is something that I have been struggling with, but I have been working on it, and it has made me happier. Praying and reading my scriptures daily, or more daily, has also really helped. Together, working on these little things has made me happier, and brought more peace into my life. I challenge you to do the same. You don't have to work on them all at the same time, like I am, but I promise you that you will be blessed in your efforts.

Xoxo
Mattie