Practical Repentance - the Problem, the Plan, and the Promise

I'm falling behind in blogging about Conference. Even if I blogged about a Conference talk tonight, which I'm not doing, I'd still be falling a few days behind schedule.

But at least I know why.

I'm not blogging about a Conference talk tonight because it's late and I'm tired. I no longer have the mental energy needed to listen to a Conference talk and expect to gain any spiritual insights from it. I'm not in a good state for blogging about Conference, or even blogging at all, really.

So, how did I get here, and what can I do about it? Well, it got late and I got tired because I was doing other things first, things which, in hindsight, should have been bumped to later, since the don't require as much mental energy and aren't actually high priorities in the first place. In the future, I should endeavor to blog earlier, perhaps starting at 10, or immediately after Family Prayer, instead of leaving it to 11, only 1 hour before my deadline. Better yet, blogging during the day would yield the best results, assuming that my scheduling works out.

So, I know the problem, and I have a plan. Now what I should to is commit myself to execute my plan. Tomorrow, I will begin blogging earlier than I began blogging today. Tomorrow, I will begin blogging by 10pm, at the latest, and I will begin by watching and reading the next Conference talk and concurrently consulting my notes. I don't intend to make promises beyond tomorrow because, if there's one thing this blog has taught me, it's that open-ended promises can get out of hand. However, I can promise to blog earlier tomorrow, and I can declare my intention to make a habit of beginning to blog by 10pm at the latest regularly. That's not a promise; it's a goal.

And this, I have learned, is repentance, practical repentance. This isn't just "I did badly; I'll try do better next time." This is considering exactly what went wrong or is going wrong, what can be done different, and what promises I can both willing to make and able to keep. This is identifying a problem, formulating a plan, and making a promise.

This works. I have gained practical experience with this method of repentance with regards to a matter to personal to relate in detail. Suffice it to say that, since I applied practical repentance to the problem, I have been doing fairly well.

I don't want to go back to the way I used to repent. I used to just beat myself up for failing and try to bring myself to promise to "try harder," without any clear idea of what I was actually going to do differently. This time, I have an actionable plan specifically designed to counteract the specific problem I've run into, and I've willingly made a commitment to follow through on my plan. It's a simple, yet sufficiently sophisticated system, and so far, it has gotten me results.

I like practical repentance, and I plan (though don't quite promise) to continue implementing it going forward.

Actions, Attitudes, Motives, and Methods

I recently watched a video about anti-heroes, and and the video essayist attempted to identify heroes, villains, and anti-heroes by dividing them into quadrants based on the axes of actions by attitudes and motives by methods. It got complicated pretty quickly, and I'm sure I didn't catch all of it, but the general jist with which I walked away from the video was: the more of those things are heroic, the more heroic one is.

Good people generally have good attitudes most of the time, but if a person isn't performing good actions, it really doesn't matter how good their attitudes are. And even if their actions are objectively good somehow, it's still important for them to make sure that their motives are good and that their methods are at least acceptable.

It's a lot to keep track of, but thankfully, as long as we're trying to be good, a lot of this happens subconsciously. We'll naturally want to do the right thing, the right way, for the right reason, with the right attitude, so long as we're continually striving to do what's right. But even so, deliberate effort can help. I know that I've occasionally struggled with one or more of these four elements, but now that I've identified them, perhaps I'll be able to identify which one I most need to work on next. Organic growth is possible, but deliberate development is better.

I usually try to make sure that my actions are good, but now I'll try to make sure that my attitude, motives, and methods are good, too.

A Good Day

Today was a good day. It was tiring, but I was able to do good and productive things, and I was able to help other people. I am very ready for this day to be over and to get some much-needed rest, but I'm glad that I was able to get my work done and help other people as well. It was tring, and almost stressful, but it was still a very good day.

Help others if/when you can, and let others help you. Helping others is tiring, but usually richly rewarding, and it's well worth doing, when possible.

Talking with Friends, Talking to God

I am fortunate to have people I can talk to. I have people in my life with whom I can have long, deep conversations on virtually any topic under the sun. I'm lucky. Not everyone has people they can really open up to. At least, not in person.

One of the fortunate things about God's omniscience is that we don't have to feel embarrassed about anything we want to tell Him. He already knows. And He still loves us and wants to talk with us whenever we want to, even if the conversation tends to seem fairly one-sided.

Through prayer, we can all talk to our loving Heavenly Father about literally anything. He may not talk much, at least not loudly or clearly, but He's a great listener, and He always wants to hear whatever we have to say.

I'm lucky that I have people I can talk to on earth, and we're all blessed to have someone we can talk to in heaven.

What We Can and Can't Control

President Jan E. Newman's talk, Teaching in the Savior's Way, touches on an important point that goes far beyond the concept of teaching. President Newman said that parents can't force their children to gain testimonies any more than we can force seeds to grow. All we can do is try to foster a nurturing environment.

Similarly, there are countless other things that lie either inside or outside of our control, and it's important to learn the difference. We can and should take control of and responsibility for the things that lie within our control, but at the same time, we should learn to accept the fact that some things are outside of our control, and we shouldn't spend too much time or energy trying to control them. It's like the Serenity Prayer says, "God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference."

We all need the wisdom to know what does and does not lie within our spheres of influence, and we need to learn to accept the things we cannot forcibly change. It's important for us to do what we can, but we also shouldn't frustrate ourselves or burn ourselves out trying to do more than we can. We can only do so much. God expects us to do what we can, but no more, so it's important for us to figure out what we can and can't control.

Faith Talk - If Ye Are Prepared...

Despite the days I spent preparing for this talk, I didn't really feel prepared when the time came to give it. That was probably mostly because I didn't actually devote that much time to preparing my talk, nor to practicing it. I didn't have a clear idea of exactly what I was going to say, nor did I have plans for what to include or leave out, based on the amount of time I had. Because of my lack of preparation, and particularly because I didn't feel prepared, I felt nervous, and during and after my talk, I felt certain that I had done a terrible job. Thankfully, no one said anything negative about my talk, and I learned some valuable lessons from it. Next time I have an opportunity to give a talk, I'll hopefully remember to start preparing my talk sooner, to make more specific plans about what I might include or cut, and to take more time to practice giving the talk. Doing so would have made me far less nervous about giving this talk, and it would have helped me fill the time I had been given. According to the feedback I've gotten, my talk was alright, but I know that if I had prepared better, my talk could have been much better than I felt it was.

Faith Talk - Final Preparations

I have a plan. It took me all day to get around to actually compiling it, but I've put all my most critical notes into a concise document that should be easy to follow. Tomorrow morning, I'll print it up, so I'll have a good, simple outline to follow. Time, energy, and motivation permitting, I might do a few practice runs to see how long my talk is in terms of time and whether I'll need to adjust it to make good use of the time I've been allotted. In the meantime, I've made my preparations. All that's left to do now is move forward and act in faith that God will bless my efforts and help me give a good talk tomorrow.