Motivation

The weather has been so nice lately (And you know how rarely I can honestly say that here in Southern Nevada!)  that my son Matthew and I have been able to go on several long walks together. The best part about these walks is that they have facilitated some wonderful conversations. For example, the other day as we were walking, Matthew confided, "Mom, usually when people ask why I want to be in the military I say it's because I want to help protect our country, but it's really because I like to watch things explode."

I got a good laugh at that. Since then I've been thinking about the topic of Motivation. I believe that many people, myself included, deceive themselves about their true motives. They may tell others and even themselves that their intentions are pure, but the reality is quite different. For example, I've known people who have given their time and efforts to serve others but seem far more concerned with extolling their acts of service than they ever were with actually trying to help another person. Similarly, I've seen people give elaborate gifts and then be incredibly hurt and angry when the gift wasn't properly appreciated. Was the gift really to bless the other person or to enable them to receive the gift of praise and gratitude from the recipient?

Recently my home teacher mentioned that he and his wife had been discussing me and had both commented that I was a person without guile. I was appreciative of the comment, but also very uncomfortable with the high praise and unsure of its validity. As I thought about their compliment, I was reminded  of a wonderful book by Terry Warner entitled, "The Bonds That Make Us Free: Healing Our Relationships, Coming to Ourselves." I would highly recommend it!!  Dr. Warner discusses the importance of being honest with ourselves, rather than mentally justifying our choices and twisting our motives to stay in the right. It's a wonderful book!!

In response to my conversation with Matthew and my subsequent pondering of the topic, I am going to try to more critically examine my motives. Am I really making a choice for the reasons I think I am, or is there a deeper and less flattering motivation that I conceal from even myself?  I want to let down my guards and be totally honest with myself and see what I can discover about myself and my motives. I'll let you know if I make any great discoveries.

Passing It Down

Recently my son Matthew attended Astrocamp with some of his GATE classmates. He spent a wonderful weekend learning about the solar system, launching bottle rockets, swimming, and playing with lights and lasers. I couldn't wait for him to arrive home and share all the details of his exciting adventure. However, my enthusiasm dissipated when I learned that the mother of one of his classmates had died unexpectedly in her sleep while her son had been at Astrocamp. Although I was not acquainted with this mother, and in fact had seen her only once, I was deeply affected by her death and how it would be experienced by her young son. To make matters worse, the boy's father is suffering from cancer. As I thought about their family and heartache they must be experiencing, I couldn't help but wonder how my kids would fare if I were to leave them. And I wondered if I had been successful in passing down to my children those things which are of most value to me.

Although I have succeeded in passing down many of my values and interests, I haven't been very successful at passing down my love of reading. Don't get me wrong, my children are good readers and diligently complete their required reading. However none of them have a passion for reading, and that makes me very sad. I long for them to gain the education, insight, empathy, and experience they can gain from reading good literature.

One of my goals for the near future is pass down my love of reading. As I've pondered exactly how to do this, I've come to the conclusion that my kids need to spend more time reading, and as they do so they will learn to love it. Currently, I require my sons Matthew and Jonathon to each read for thirty minutes each morning, but I think I'm going to add some afternoon reading to that. I am also going to start giving Makenna a daily reading requirement. Kevin doesn't read yet, but I'm going to increase the amount of time I read with him. I'm also going to make an effort to read books with my older children as well. Hopefully, as I increase my efforts, I can help my kids to learn to love reading as much as I do.

My Recent Readings

I recently indulged my love of romantic suspense by reading these novels:

My New Favorite Song

Mascara Review

Maybelline One by One Volum' Express Mascara- I love this mascara!!! It makes my eyelashes look super long and full without getting clumpy or messy. Try it!! I think you'll like it!

The Story of the Human Language Part One

Just a note: My blogs haven't been letting me space paragraphs lately. Sorry!! I don't know what the problem is, but it's really bugging me. I just finished listening to the first 12 lectures on The Story of Human Language. I really enjoyed them!. They are great to listen to while I clean the house or chauffer the kids in the car. Here are a few random things I learned:

1. A human language is always slowly morphing into another one.


2. Sounds often change to become more like the ones before or after them. Vowels shift around in the mouth, consonants soften, and the ends of words tend to fall off.


3. The first language has now morphed into 6,000 languages worldwide.


4. In language an expression that began as a colorful one (peach keen!) dillutes into normality or disappears altogether and is replaced by a new colorful expression.


5. Semantics shift over time. For example, silly originally meant "blessed," but over centuries the meaning gradually drifted until it eventually came to mean "silly."


6. Languages of the Indo-European family are spoken throughout most of Europe, as well as in India and Iran. According to linguists, the language most likely began in the southern steppes of modern Russia in about 4,000 B.C. Linguists assume it did not begin in the Mediterranean because there are no common words for "palm tree" or "vine". They probably did not originate in Europe either because there is no common word for "oak".

So there are a few of the facts I learned about language. I just received an e-mail notification from the library, that Part Two has arrived and I am looking forward to learning more.

Reading with Kevin

I have a wide variety of interests, most of which I enjoy sharing either through conversation or blogging. However, one notable exception, is my religious insights, feelings, and experiences. Those are very private for me and I rarely discuss them with anyone unless I am teaching a lesson. However, recently I had an experience that gave me pause. A sister I was visiting teaching mentioned that she had read an article about how a lot of missionary work was being done through blogging. I've thought a lot about her words since and decided that I need to share more of my spiritual insights in my blog. Of course, I am still of the belief that many experiences and impressions are far too sacred to share. Those I will keep private. But I am going to try to be more open about others and write more posts of a spiritual nature. So here goes.... Each morning I have my kids do their daily reading before they go to school, and this morning was no exception. When I asked Kevin, my five-year-old to go choose a book, I expected him to bring back, "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you see?" his current favorite book, but instead he brought back this book: and this one I was pleasantly surprised. We first opened the "Tell Me the Stories of Jesus" book. Someone, my mom I think, had given it to us for Christmas, but we hadn't read it yet. Kevin really enjoyed it because it had pull-the-tab, lift-the-flap, and turn the wheel acitivities. What kid doesn't enjoy those?!! However, he also liked it because he loves learning about Jesus. He often tells me that he loves Jesus even more than he loves me, and that makes me happy. Next, we turned to the Book of Mormon. At our primary "Scripture Power" activity back in February we gave each primary child their own mini Book of Mormon. The primary children, including my own, all seem to love them. I asked Kevin what story he wanted to read in the Book of Mormon and he requested the story about Jesus and the children. So we turned to 3 Nephi:17 and read part of the account of Jesus and the children. To be honest, at that point Kevin was still pretty distracted by all the tabs, flaps, and wheels of the other book, but I still enjoyed having the experience with him. And yes, we do have family scripture study, so studying the scriptures with my children wasn't an unfamiliar activity, but studying one-on-one was and Kevin and I both really enjoyed it. I am so grateful that I am able to raise my kids with the knowledge of the Savior and His restored gospel.