The Spirit

Sometimes. Okay scratch that... all the time. I listen to John Bytheway CD's in my car. It is great, and it keeps the spirit with me from point A to point B. Speaking of my car, my great friend Justin at work had a tech change my oil for me today, no charge. It was fantastic. Thanks Justy. Anyways, back to my story. If you aren't LDS this might be really confusing, but if you have any questions feel free to ask, or go to MORMON.ORG and chat with a missionary online!

So, for me the spirit has never been that complete transformation of heart, or that deep burning sensation. I mean, it's kind of unrealistic to me for people to have these awe inspiring moments that are totally life shattering, and amazing. Of course, it happens but it's rare. Just sayin'. So when I got my John Bytheway CD's out from the depths of my night stand drawer, I knew that I was doing the right thing. You see, John Bytheway is my favorite speaker of all time. He is amazing, and he is funny. (I was lucky enough to see him live once!) But that's besides the point. The point is, that his messages always seem to be built for me. I understand now that they aren't necessarily for ME because he doesn't know me, but they do carry the SPIRIT and the SPIRIT is what speaks to me.

Recently I have had some thoughts come to me. Some of you might call this your conscience, which is really the spirit, for me anyways. I hear my own voice making this decisions, like hearing myself speak out loud, it is clear as day. It says, "You should pray more. You should stop watching TV for a while. You should cut back on facebook. You should blog about your feelings. You should get a running coach, and make something of yourself." You know, just thoughts. These thoughts however, are special. Because I have a problem with thoughts. I have a lot of negative, violent, and depressing thoughts. So when good and clean thoughts come into my mind, I know that they are from God. Because God is good, and God is clean.

This might be weird, but I had this long trailing thought a week ago. I was recalling a story about someone's Dad and how they admired him so much because without fail, everyday he woke up 30 minutes to an hour early and studied his scriptures. I want to be like that, I told myself. I could definitely do that. Because in the future, I want my children to tell awesome stories like that about me. Oh, and because I love the scriptures. So, this entire week I started to wake up a half hour before I actually had to be awake and I read my scriptures. I can't even express to you how much I have learned in these past four days. After thinking about this, and resolving to do it I had another thought. I thought about my prayers, and how they seem to trail and have no purpose. How I sometimes pray for a minute or less, and how on occasion, I fall asleep while praying. So, I decided to set the timer on my phone for 5 minutes each time I pray. When the time goes off I can either close my prayer, or I can keep going. Either way, I know I took time to talk to God. I'm not going to lie somedays those five minutes feel like an eternity. But I am training my mind to focus on prayer, so that I can really talk to God. (I have the attention span of a Gold Fish.) It's working, and I am not ashamed of it.

I have learned a lot this past week. A LOT. If there is one thing that I know for sure, it's that the spirit speaks to me daily. I am so lucky to have that knowledge in my life. SO LUCKY.