Today feels like spring! It's gorgeous, it's 50 degrees, and the tulips are poking out of the ground, and some of the trees have buds on them. I love it! I'm always amazed at how each season takes me by surprise. It's so silly, but I feel like that with every season. They all have their pros and cons, and ultimately I love fall and spring the best, but I'm thinking how amusing it is (to me at least) that I feel so child-like in my amazement each time the seasons change. Today I feel like skipping (but I won't because I don't want to frighten others). We've got the windows open, music playing (Colin Hay of course), and we're cleaning. It's delightful.
This morning I went to a visiting teaching conference at the church. It was a breakfast and we had a speaker. It was the perfect amount of time and was really a good meeting. There were about 40 women there, and I found myself sitting there thinking about the other 60 women in our ward who weren't there. I know it's Saturday, I know some people are sick or have sick kids, and that everyone is busy and tired and doesn't want to get up and get ready for an early Saturday church function, but I think that's a big mistake. I've talked myself out of meetings like that before because I've felt justified in how crazy my week was or how tired I felt, but it occured to me today that we're just cheating ourselves when we skip those things. It was so nice to be there with all those women. We have a lot of older women in our ward and they are so sweet, so friendly, and so welcoming. They hug you when they meet you and just beam as they talk to you. It's remarkable. It made me think that as younger women we are foolish to let our insecurities or prejudices guide our behavior. Why not be glad to see everyone? (even people we don't know), why not hug them? (I'm not really one to initiate hugs, but still), why not introduce ourselves to everyone?, even if they should already know who we are? I sometimes look forward to getting older because I want to be wise, and I desperately want to shed my insecurities and just love everybody (I have a long way to go). Meetings like this one today just reminded me of these things.
The lady who spoke was talking about visiting teaching and how it's a gift to be a woman. She said that the average man says only 3000 words a day, but that the average woman says 23,000! She said, "we know how to visit" and that we have the spirit of compassion. These things are gifts and we need to use them. I totally agree with her and felt so inspired and grateful to be a woman who has the opportunity and ability to reach out and to lift others.
**What do you think?**
P.S. This is a photo I took of a bush in our backyard last spring. This spring hasn't sprung that far yet, but I needed a photo for today.
{Happy 30th Birthday Amy!!}
8 comments:
This is my favorite blog that you have ever done. Maybe because i needed to hear it today as well.
The highlights of your post was.
*The insight you have to older women shedding their insecurity and loving all. That was eye opening to me.
*Your comments on going to a meeting when you don't want to. I love that you wrote that! i have learned that lesson hard and fast in my current ward. I was the YW president for 2 years and during that time i had two babies. Jeff was never home, never! I lugged my three kids everywhere and to everything. the first year i think i complained inside and then the second year i finally learned that i was the lucky one to have that experience and it gave me a better understanding of what the bishop goes through and how many meetings he goes to.
i could go on and on. love your blog today.
It's funny that you wrote about being older women in the Church. Our ward is pretty split up by age. Everybody's either really young (20s and 30s) and begining their families, or empty nesters. The ward is mostly younger people. At the ward book club this week the older ladies that were there commented about how the ward is so young. This morning I was thinking about it and I realized that I would much rather be in the older group. They have an easier time getting to know each other becasue they are not encumbered by the insecure knowledge that they are fighting to get into groups of already existing young girls in the ward. They are a small group, and the have each other. They all strike me as being comfortable in their own skins. The proof? All of the older ladies knew each other, while us younger girls didn't even know each other's names.
I love that picture! It's true, everything you said. I am a strange, strange girl. I am very outgoing, but also have a lot of social anxieties and insecurities. I can't figure myself out. I wonder when I will be able to, and it makes me frustrated because I think it might take my whole life. And then some. Just this morning I added to my list of things I want to do this year(per your assignment) that I will attend every church function, because I feel like I am missing out. I'll use you as inspiration!
We had our stake enrichment meeting this morning - we were able to attend two classes (chosen from six). VERY FABULOUS! I will blog about one of them - I am afraid of the potential length. I enjoyed your thoughts and you know I struggle with the same things. I feel like I should get a prize for making it to the temple (which I didn't today and I am very bugged about it!) and then I get there and the whole parking lot is full - I am amazed by how many good people there are! I also feel sad when you realize the potential number of people who could be at these meetings or at the temple and how much they are missing. I wonder how much further along I could be if I took advantage of all these things. And because I am a sixty year old woman stuck in a middle-aged man truck driver body I fit in much better with the older crowd!
Thanks for writing that. I feel like I have to psyche myself up to go to every meeting and I have no idea why, because I'm always glad once I get there. Must be my anti-social tendencies. Silly. I too look forward to being one of the older, wiser women. I should hug people more, too. Like Amie, I am amazed at how many good people there are. I have a long way to go.
So true! In my last ward I made a conscious decision to be more involved in my ward family. It is so much more enjoyable to go to church and serve them because you feel a bond. Unfortuately Adam and I were basically the only young people that ever attended activites and such (generally). The only thing it did for us was allow us to reach out to older, like you said, wiser individuals. People I would have probably been too afraid to talk to otherwise. It is to easy to hind in a group where things are familiar.
thanks for your insightful post.
I AM one of those older women at church, and I will tell you from my life's experiences that if you will go to every meeting you're invited to and if you will open yourself to talk to anyone, your bucket will not be large enough to hold the blessings that flow therefrom. And, oh, the person you will become!
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