It would be easier

I honestly have never been one to avoid a battle once it has started, I just avoid starting a battle at all. This battle has been started though and I my conscience dictates that I must be congruent in my thoughts and actions, but it would be so much easier to live like I am. A huge part of me knows this is not possible and that ultimately, I will be miserable,  unless I can manage to become truly ignorant.

I cannot rely on others to fix a problem that only I understand.

It is just very hard to believe that willfully jumping into hardship is what will bring me happiness. I know happiness is an intended goal. It would be easier to continue living a lie or at least try to believe the lie was truth. Maybe, understanding things is the key and it is just a matter of understanding greater things, but I just do not yet believe there are greater things available on this earth.

Ahhhh. Eureka! It is all about hope. Like a roller coaster going down, we must believe it is to get high again, or at least move forward, and complete (be perfect) it. The falling must end and with the atonement, we can be forgiven, and it was foreseen that we needed to fall to move forward, now we have to have hope that it is all possible.

Someplace only we know...

Now, I will practice my tact or ability to say what others want to hear but mean what I am thinking.

Imagine that you may make one deal, but to make the deal you must have a bargining chip, meaning something of value to the one you are dealing with. For example you want fame, 4 tokens, fortune, 4 tokens, etc. Yes, we are pretending. So, in pretend the other party is entirely able, no problem, except for one thing, they cannot alter another’s actions, like Aladin's genie. Maybe more like Cinderella's godmother, she can assist by helping you to the ball, but she cannot make the prince fall in love with you. That is not her job.

Ok, now, I used the word token. It will instantly bring games to mind. Keep in mind that you do not pay to win, you pay to play. But, you know, everytime I go to Chuck E Cheese I think, we would have been better off just buying a thing instead of trying to earn enough tickets. But, I guess the earning makes us feel more of a sense of value or ownership. So, I am saving up to earn something of an almost unimagineable cost in tickets, but it could just be bought taking another route. But  the converting of tokens to tickets is what I am really paying for and as a result...It is like Jane Eyre running away from her love because the situation was not right.

Although the people were right for one another. She had to do things by the set guidelines or laws, although techincally love is not governed by the laws of the land anyway. It was because she valued the love so much she wanted it to stay as hope instead of be fufilled and corrupted. She needed, like Rhett Butler did when he went to fight with the rebs, a good memory to take into battle.

The situation is a bargin and it is completely necessary for the actual desire to result. So the whole sacrifice would be for an enabling situation or tickets. The tickets are not the goal, but will earn something anyhow.

Truth

It just dawned on me how I am fiirming up my belief that other religions are true. Ionly know that by letting them openly share their interpretation of truth.

I thought of that Poem about the blind men and an elephant and although each is speaking the truth as far as they can, it is not the whole truth. Now. I almost said they were not seeing the big picture which, although accurate now, in my language and culture, I fear it might mean something other than what I mean, and seeing a bigger thing or more of a thing does not mean less of the truth is known, necessarily.

But, as others used the assertion that the Bible was God's word, I saw how necessary it was for a foundation of truth.
But, how just one part does not help as much as multiple sources. Enter the Book of Mormon.

We do not deny any bit what is true because we have what is called an "open canon". For Family Home Evening we listed the many things that are scripture. Hymns being one of them. And although somethings prophets say that are not prophetic, there are things I use as a conduit for truth, but the whole of it is not true. Often, I listen to a song or watch a movie and by so doing, I learn an important truth, but the thing is not a scripture, but for a thing to be a scripture it would have to have this trait.

Hope and Faith

Hope seems more relevant of a topic because it has been plainly and easily defined.

When you ask people what faith is they either give you blank stares or start spouting off religiously, both of which serve as catalysts to confusion. So, I  am going to share the plain and simple definition I have for faith. It is to hope for things. Faith is the evidence of things hoped for but not seen (verified by perception or empiricism)

Faith is not a topic of much, and it confuses,me a bit. It can move mountains! It seems like it would be a better thing to own and evaluate that proving things true of false, to who knows what end.

For example, I watched a show seeking to prove true or false the Exodus story. Nothing was found, and that is supposed to prove a being who knows all things and can do anything does not exist? What if the story was found completely verifiable? It seems to me that would change faith into fact, and man even more into a diety able to outsmart God. So, I said, why don't they instead prove Goldilocks never lived. Most scholars wouldn't care and the story would loose no value for the facts.

The kingdom of Heaven is a place for children, or those who become like them, no?

Ok, that was all fliff, random topical pontifications so I might fit this in:

A woman was being comforted after outward signs became visible of her loss of hope. She hoped to one day becreunited with her family, but that hope was ruined. To comfort her she was offered this advice, which ought to be shared. A friend said, hope is not lost when situations change. We just need to alter our hope. What is so ironic about it and spawned my topic head is that this girl is one who clearly stated that although many around had reasons to loose or give up faith, hers was only strengthened. Um, maybe the writters lacked a bit of the mastery of terms to even know what they meant by that. The girl immediately mentions her relgion as being Episcopalian. So, is that her faith or merely her religion?