365 days for you

     I am a hopeless romantic, it's a true story. I love cheesy, but sincere lines, and old couples holding hands, happy endings and slow kisses in the rain. Once when I was about 14 years old my bishop called me up in fireside (probably about dating and relationships) and asked me to tell everybody what my ideal evening with my future spouse would be; he knew I was a hopeless romantic and for some reason thought I would give the perfect answer. I don't know if my answer really was that different than what any other girls would have been, but I do remember my answer.     I said my dream evening with my spouse would be going on a walk while holding hands. The years have changed me: I'm older, my priorities have changed, I'm a little less shallow, my perspective has changed, my faith has grown deeper, my heart has changed. This one thing about me has never changed, I am still a hopeless romantic. I have been warned to be careful and protect my heart, and to be wa...

     What is in the search? What do we find in a search that we do not find in a search engine? The moments of stumbling across a truth you have needed for sometime yet have not known where to look. When you look something up you may find exactly what you wanted, but in not having to search you may never find what you needed. What do you gain in searching? Patience, truth, knowledge and excitement for finding more. In searching for truth in life you find an exuberance, an excitement for life that you may never find if you are just handed the truth; you may never see the beauty that can be found in the journey.

    "These are the times that try men's souls. Tyranny like hell is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain to cheap, we esteem to lightly: it is dearness only that gives everything its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price on it's goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated."     -Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, 1776     Years ago a series of events played out in my life, not all pleasant; but required, I am convinced in the making of the person I am today.     About two and a half years ago, I was hanging out with some of my girl friends after a broadcast fireside one night. They were talking about men, as woman usually do, and their physical interactions with men; probably not with the respect that should be remembered in conversations with others. I was the innocent one in the ...

    I recently saw the new movie Cinderella, a friend of mine had suggested a night out and really wanted to see it. I had seen the trailer and while I remember thinking I would be okay with going and seeing it, another part of me also thought, really do we not have enough Cinderella movies yet? Clearly not because this one had something I somehow had missed.     I cried, when I watched Cinderella for the first time, and in the week since it has been released I have gone back to see it again. Both times I cried, not because it was sad or because I am the type of girl to just bawl through chic flick romances. It was because in this telling of Cinderella I felt more personal understanding to the story than I had ever before felt in my life. Growing up people had always said out of all the Disney princesses I was most like Cinderella, which sadly was my least favorite Disney princess. There's nothing wrong with the original telling, I just never cared for it either, I ...

    I want to start off with a story, once upon a time there was a man and a woman in a specific doctors waiting room, they had each been there several times before and many times with the same complaints and struggles. This time the doctor came out to the waiting room evaluated the two patients and looked them in the eyes. "Are you two still struggling with the same health challenges?" He asked in a calm but direct manner. They both nodded and he brought them both back to his room, he gave them both an identical bottle, with vitamin supplements meant for hormone balance.     "You both have come back several times complaining that I am not treating my patients equally, you are angry that I give different treatments to different patients although they sometimes appear to have quite similar problems. You two specifically struggle with similar problems and have been rather upset over my means of treatment."     "You have in your hands identical bottles of ho...

    "So wake me up when it's all over, when I am wiser and I'm older. All this time I was finding myself, and I didn't know I was lost." Avicii     Life has an interesting way of waking us up, waking us up to reality, up to better things, up to life, waking us up to a dream we never knew we had. Sometimes we live our lives in a fog, or mist of acceptance without ever stopping to wonder what else there is out there.     Lately my eyes have started opening to things I didn't know I was missing, I've started realizing that I am where I am in life right now because I'm afraid of most of the things I want. I've be running from things and wondering why things don't work out at the same time. Standing back looking at it, there is a lot that I have been running from, Gods plan for me, my capabilities, loving people, and believing in the power that my life (and living a righteous life) can have on those around me.     It's a big deal, realizing...

    Well it has been a week and a half since I made the goal to redefine the way I look at myself and redefine the way I see beauty in people. The biggest perspective I wanted to change was the way I see myself.     What I have found is that in being more compassionate with yourself, you find more compassion for others. In trying to be more understanding of yourself you find more patience with others.      The way you view yourself is often reflected in the way you treat other people. When I have bad days and am filled with anger or frustration most of it can be boiled down to something I have done to make myself mad. Very little of the negative emotion that I feel really ever has to do with someone else, it usually is me.     We are the root and core to our own problems, that is consistent with every person to walk this earth, I feel very strongly that, that much is true. We decide whether the things surrounding us in life are problems or...