{ finding joy }

So a friend at work is teaching a Young Women's class this Sunday about Finding Joy Now. Gotta love BYU. She asked me, along with other people, how we find joy in our lives. It really made me think. It was a good way to start out the day. To think of how I find joy in my life and remind me how good I have it, even on the bad days.

Think about it.

HOW DO YOU FIND JOY IN YOUR LIFE?

This was my response to her (via email) and I thought I'd share:

Finding Joy Now is something I think has to be learned individually. It seems like I tend to look to the past or to the future, but never enjoy today. Over the past year I have really learned to enjoy, appreciate and relish in “today.” I think the trials that I have gone through have made me be able to find joy in every circumstance. When I have felt like EVERYTHING has gone wrong and I have nothing good, I have to remember what is right in my life. The Lord loves me, my family loves me and I have a divine purpose on this earth. Every day counts. We can be happy no matter what. We can be happy with everything and we can be happy when we think we have nothing. It is good to have goals (and I am a huge advocate of working towards them), but it is also important not to have the grass is always greener mentality. The grass can be green here and now. I just need to remember the basics of what is important…the Lord loves me and I have a divine purpose here on earth.

There are two quotes that I love that go so good with this topic. The one by Thomas S. Monson really helped me when I was living at my friend’s house (I didn't really have a home), unemployes (no income people) and with no direction in my life. The statement made me realize that I need to live life and enjoy life now. There are opportunities to find joy every day and we sometimes pass them by and they are gone forever. It made me realize that I can be happy no matter how good or bad the circumstance.

“This is our one and only chance at mortal life—here and now. The longer we live, the greater is our realization that it is brief. Opportunities come, and then they are gone. I believe that among the greatest lessons we are to learn in this short sojourn upon the earth are lessons that help us distinguish between what is important and what is not. I plead with you not to let those most important things pass you by as you plan for that illusive and nonexistent future when you will have time to do all that you want to do. Instead, find joy in the journey—now.”
–Thomas S. Monson, Finding Joy in the Journey

“I plead with you not to dwell on days now gone, nor to yearn vainly for yesterdays, however good those yesterdays may have been. The past is to be learned from but not lived in. We look back to claim the embers from glowing experiences but not the ashes. And when we have learned what we need to learn and have brought with us the best that we have experienced, then we look ahead, we remember that faith is always pointed toward the future. Faith always has to do with blessings and truths and events that will yet be efficacious in our lives…To yearn to go back to a world that cannot be lived in now; to be perennially dissatisfied with present circumstances and have only dismal views of the future; to miss the here-and-now-and-tomorrow because we are so trapped in the there-and-then-and-yesterday.”
- Jeffery R. Holland, Remember Lot’s Wife

So...HOW DO YOU FIND JOY IN YOUR LIFE?