Of Personal Progress

Tonight I noticed that there's still a steady stream of page views for this blog, so I'm going to try to get it back up and running. :)

Tonight, I'd like to share my testimony of Personal Progress. I was called to Young Women's in February. It's the first time I've ever taught anyone over the age of 11! So I was overwhelmed at first, but now I can't imagine life without these girls in my life!

Part of the neat experience of Young Women is Personal Progress. I earned my medallion as a teenager, but now that I'm working on it again, I have a renewed love for it! As I go through the scriptures and the experiences set forth, I can feel the Spirit more easily in our home. And I can feel a deeper testimony within myself.

If you're not sure what you want to study, I suggest working through some of the Personal Progress goals. The combination of scriptures that they present are amazing. You'll learn lots about yourself and about the Savior!

New Book Coming Soon

I'm really proud of my brother-in-law for getting this book published! He's worked on it for about 10 years now, so it's quite the accomplishment. It will be available on January 8, 2011! For more info, go HERE.

Resources

I have to mention a brand new website/blog! It's called Latter-day Homeschooling, and they have some wonderful resources. It's not just a bunch of homeschooling articles - there's TONS of stuff for ALL Latter-day Saints.

One quick one I wanted to mention was their recent post with links for free resources on Nauvoo, Easter, and General Conference. The General Conference link is especially amazing! You'll find a little bit of everything for a wide range of ages. I was going to make my own General Conference packets for my kids, but now I don't think I will. There were several that I had never seen before that look perfect.

General Conference Ideas

Before each General Conference, I usually provide a list of resources - mostly, activities for children. We'll be going out of town next week, so this time it's a little early, but here are a few of the pages I plan on using.

I found these on sugardoodle.net:
- Conference Coloring Activity

- LDS Coloring Pages - this is a list of the coloring pages from several years' worth of the Friend - if you would like to create your own coloring packet for your children. (I'm definitely going to do this!)

And most of the links I've provided in the past would also work this time around. Click HERE for my April 2009 list (which is missing Elder Andersen - but the non-Apostle activities would still work), and HERE for a link to some great resources from October 2009.

Gospel Principles

The new manual for the next two years for the Priesthood and for Relief Society is Gospel Principles. I just wanted to bear my testimony of this book! I remember reading it growing up - sometimes on my own, sometimes as part of family scripture study. It was definitely one of those books that I would go to if I had a question.

And now as a mother, I've begun to read it with my oldest daughter. We homeschool, and a few months ago, I was trying to decide on a "reader" to use (something for her to read out loud to me, to practice enunciation, etc.), and as I was thinking about it, I had a very distinct thought that I should use Gospel Principles. I'm not one to get very distinct thoughts like that very often, so I definitely listened to it! And now, I love that she reads it on her own, and I love hearing her say things like, "Mom, I'm on Chapter 4, and we're only on Chapter 2!"

As we study from this book for the next two years, I know my testimony of the basic Gospel principles will be strengthened. And I know yours can, too, as you read it!

Things As They Really Are

If you didn't catch the CES Broadcast tonight with Elder Bednar, I would definitely watch it or read it, as soon as it's up on the Church Institute website! It was a very interesting talk, based on Jacob 4:13, specifically the line, "things as they really are." Go back and read his talk when it's available, because my notes do not do it justice! However, here are some of the things I wrote down as he was speaking:

~The devil only has power over us if we permit him to.
~Lucifer = confusion and unhappiness
~Satan can't progress, so he seeks to frustrate our progression by enticing us to use our bodies improperly.
~The adversary has us minimize the importance of our bodies.
~We shouldn't put our bodies (gifts from God) at risk just to experience a thrill or to boost our ego. It truly minimizes the importance of our bodies.
~If the adversary cannot entice us to misuse our physical bodies, he can employ some aspects of modern technology to achieve his purpose.
~We should seek things with high fidelity and good purposes. (Fidelity = accurate to real life)
~We need to experience REAL LIFE - not a high fidelity fantasy life (specifically those with bad purposes). They disconnect things from how they really are.
~We also need to have personal fidelity. We need to be the same person online as we are in person.
~Don't destroy real relationships by having fake relationships on the computer.
~You can be anonymous on the Internet, but deceitful acts are always deceitful. The Lord knows who we really are, what we really do.
~Apostasy is apostasy, whether it's in real life or on a computer.
~Study more diligently the doctrines of the gospel.
~Ask ourselves: Does my use of the Internet invite or impede the Holy Ghost? Does my time spent on the computer enlarge or restrict my capacity to live and love?

Again, his actual words are MUCH more powerful than my meager notes. The basic theme I got from it is that we need to focus on living real, fulfilling lives, rather than attempting to simulate sincere relationships through modern technology. He specifically mentioned video games and online gaming, naming Second Life as an example. (I don't even know what that is, but it sounds awful...)

When a prophet of God asks us to do something, we need to do it. Hopefully, you're all living your own lives - not trying to imitate real life and real relationships through video games or the Internet. :)

General Conference Highlights

I love that the Church is so technological! As President Monson said in General Conference, the Church "has a wonderful Web site, filled with valuable and uplifting information and priceless resources." I've just discovered one of those resources - the Videos section of the Gospel Library. Here is one of those videos, containing highlights from each of the talks given at Conference.

(I chose to find it on YouTube, since the only option on the Church's website is to download, then upload it here, which sometimes doesn't work with large files.)

As a sidenote, this video only shows clips from the talks of the Apostles. There were many other wonderful talks, so make sure you read and re-read ALL of the Conference talks!

New Resource

I've just discovered a great new website. It's called Mormons Made Simple.com. It has a few simple videos that explain such things as what to expect when coming to an LDS church on Sunday, or what is The Book of Mormon. They're already planning on more videos, as well. It seems to be a great resource, so go check it out!