Double-Dipping

A friend of mine recently gave me an interesting piece of advice. She encouraged me to look into Personal Progress. For those of you who don't know (assuming there are any non-Mormons or recent-converts among us, Hi!), Personal Progress is a set of activities young women in our church are encouraged to do to help them develop Christlike virtues that are fitting, and even essential, for a Christian young woman to have in order to better face the challenges of our day. The activities of Personal Progress are split into the following groups: Faith, Divine Nature, Individual Worth, Knowledge, Choice and Accountability, Good Works, Integrity, and Virtue. These are called the Young Women Values, but I challenge you to find anyone in our church who said that these values were meant only for young women!

When I heard my friend's advice, I laughed at first, just because the idea was so unexpected, but then I continued to chuckle because the idea is, to borrow a phrase, so crazy that it just might work. There are a lot of values on that list that I could use in greater abundance, and I've acknowledged in previous blog posts that I'm a little bit feminine compared to some guys, so actually, this idea makes perfect sense. I've had lots of experiences in our church's Young Men's meetings and Scouting activities to help me develop my masculine side. Maybe now I need this to help me develop my feminine side.

Now, some of what's in Personal Progress isn't going to translate perfectly to my life because, naturally, I'm not a Young Woman, so the parts of Personal Progress that apply exclusively to womanhood aren't going to apply to me, however, there's a lot of good stuff in there that isn't so gender-specific. For example, the "Young Women" Values would be good traits for just about anyone.

The same thing may apply for the Young Men's equivalent program, Duty to God. There are virtues and values taught in that program that would be good for women and men, both young and old. And since both programs have traits and teachings that can apply to people of either gender, I don't see anything wrong with double-dipping. I want to do a little bit of studying of Personal Progress to see what I can learn from it. The trouble is that I'm running out of time. I'll study up on it over the weekend, and maybe print a few things up, but early on Monday morning, I'm leaving for Scout Camp. I'm not entirely sure why, but I find this situation hilariously ironic.