A few weeks ago I was in a funk and I was in deep. Every day was a struggle to be happy. And the worst part about funks is that often you feel like you haven't changed anything in your life, and yet something is just not right. I was still reading my scriptures every day, I was still praying often, I was still looking for people to love and serve everywhere I went. And yet I was unhappy. Every day was a struggle. And every night I went to bed feeling pretty defeated. "I didn't love that person like I could have. Remember when you got back from your mission and you were so good at loving everybody all the time? Remember when your morning scripture studies and prayers were so good? Remember when you would walk around every day and felt so strongly and distinctly that God was guiding you? Remember when...remember when...remember when..."
Every day I walked around, comparing myself to who I was right after I returned from my mission. I thought that I had it all figured out back then. Back when life was practically perfect and I was on top of the world. But recently, I must have lost it. I wasn't doing something right. And this non-stop comparison was beating me into the ground.
One night, I broke down to my fiance and told him how I had been feeling. I explained that I thought the problem was that I was living in the past, comparing my every move to a better way I had once lived. I also expressed that I thought gratitude had something to do with it, but i just couldn't figure out what. I felt pretty stuck. I couldn't figure out how to just stop comparing myself to who I used to be. Where to even begin?
A few days later, I was sitting in church thinking about this when I felt like God reached down and whispered in my ear "It's gratitude. Look for quotes about gratitude." I pulled out my phone and googled gratitude quotes and stumbled across the most beautiful thing:
"The real gift of gratitude is that the more grateful you are, the more present you become." Robert Holden
There it was. THE MORE GRATEFUL YOU ARE THE MORE PRESENT YOU BECOME. The more you look around your life and see the good and things to love, the easier it is to stay in the present and not fantasize the past. Because that's just the thing, I was completely fantasizing. When I look back more honestly on those months right after my mission, life was HARD. I didn't have it all figured out, not even close. I struggled. I still had times every day when I wasn't as kind as I could have been. I still struggled to be happy sometimes. I didn't always feel like God was there, intently directing my life. I was just a human. And I was just trying. The same way I am now.
I stopped comparing myself to who I thought I used to be right then, and I began being grateful for what is happening in my life right now. And even being grateful for who I am right now, even when I feel so weak and like I am making a mess of things. I stopped thinking about how I was failing, and instead have been trying to focus on how kind and patient God and other humans are with me.
As gratitude began to permeate my life, I realized something huge for me: Gratitude is a choice. A choice to love things as they are, and not wish them any other way. And this is where getting engaged was the biggest lesson on gratitude I have ever experienced.
For a whole year after my mission, I was terrified of getting too serious with a boy. Commitment scared me, and every time a boy would get close, I would run run run. Then in September of last year I met a boy who was wonderful but didn't seem at all like the type of boy I would normally date. But the fact was, I was pretty swiftly smitten. Things were complicated in the beginning and we were both interested in other people when Matt and I met. But we felt so good about each other, so we made a faith-filled choice. Matt chose me. And I chose him. And that has made all the difference.
Because I chose him, I had more responsibility for the state of our relationship. If it crumbled, it was on me. If it thrived, it was on me. The choice was mine. I chose Matt and I chose to love him again and again every single day. (But let's be honest, Matt is the most wonderful human being on the planet and pretty easy to love. This is why it took me 6 months of dating him to realize all of this stuff about gratitude.)
When Matt and I decided to get engaged, I was amazed at how calm I felt. But I think I felt so calm because I knew it was my choice. God had made that abundantly clear every single time I had asked. And as I prayed to be sure, I remembered something that a girl had said once when I was helping her choose a wedding dress.
You see, I work in a bridal shop and help girls pick their dream dress. It's a big choice, and often I see girls who are stressed out of their minds deciding which dress is absolutely perfect. But one day a girl came in who was so wise and so calm. Her Mom kept asking her if the dress she had on was "really the one." She asked her about a hundred times if she was sure she didn't want to keep looking. Finally the daughter turned to her mother and said "Mom, I could keep looking. But choosing a dress is like choosing your husband. I could technically keep looking forever. BUT I LOVE THIS ONE. So I choose this one." That girl changed my life.
Now, I don't want you to think of this is settling. Anything but. I am talking about choosing something you love and then choosing to be happy with it and not wish it was something else. I am talking about gratitude in its purest and noblest form. This is love.Theoretically, there is ALWAYS something better just around the corner. But the thing is, there will always be something better than that. And something better than that. And something better than that. (And when I say better I actually mean "better.") You could keep looking forever. But what a sad way to live. To be so terrified of your own choices that you can't be happy with anything. Instead of just making good choices and then choosing to keep on loving them.
I use this every single day. I am in the midst of planning a wedding, and when wedding planning I think gratitude is a must if you don't want to lose your mind. It is SCARY EASY to fall into the ingratitude trap when planning a wedding. To become so paralyzed by perfectionism and every little thing needing to be absolutely "the best" that all the joy is sucked out of the planning. It is so easy to have anxiety about these things that are supposed to make you happy when you are so focused on the fear of choosing something not perfect. But when you are grateful, planning a wedding is the most beautiful and happy and wonderful experience in the world.
It is so easy to look at a beautiful wedding dress and be super nit-picky and choose a million little things that are just slightly wrong. But that is a choice. And it is also a choice to look at a wedding dress and decide you feel stunning in it and choose it. And then choose to love it and stop second-guessing and looking at other wedding dresses. It is so easy to get your 500 engagement pictures back from your photographer and find something wrong with every single one and decide that none of them are perfect enough to send in your wedding announcement. But that is a choice. And it is also a choice to realize that these pictures are all ridiculously beautiful and pick one! Nobody is going to notice that the sun wasn't in the exact position you had hoped or that the flowers in the background were yellow instead of white. Make decisions. Make choices. And then choose to keep on loving them.
Well, I think this is the end of my soul chat for the day. Everything I write here are things that I am struggling with. I have not mastered this at all. I have to wake up every day and choose to love everything about my life and my fiance and my wedding all over again. But I can tell you one thing. The trying still works. You don't have to master this to have the benefits. The minute you start seeing life through the lens of "What can I love?" everything changes. And you will be filled to bursting with so much joy you can hardly contain it.
Choose your love. Love your choice. It will change your life.
xoxo Autumn
I love this insight. Works when you are engaged and works when you have been married 20 years. So glad to see you writing again. I adored your mission blog.
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