Nancy's Musings

"Individual Worth" is the most paradoxical of all of the values taught in the Young Women program. It's the church's version of self-esteem, except that if you notice, it doesn't say "your worth" or "my worth." The wording of it does not allow us to stop at recognizing our own worth: we must also recognize the worth of every other individual, for exactly the same reasons. Individual Worth is not earned. Like God's love, it is something we learn to accept regardless of our situation or decisions. When we can accept that we are inherently valuable, and when we believe it and are confident in it, it's easier to accept the value of others: their value does not threaten our own. It's why, even when I am uncertain of the movement or organization, I do not hesitate to agree with the sentiment that black lives matter. Because they do. Without caveats or divisions or exceptions. If my life matters, so do theirs. The language of "wor...

The church has always taught that we are literally children of God, of heavenly parents, although I would hesitate to speculate about the nature of divine conception or childbirth. These subjects are sacred, and I am not qualified to give an opinion. I haven't even formed one. But we teach our young women that every human literally contains divine "DNA" - whatever that means. Our bodies are mortal, and born to mortal parents, but we believe our spirits existed before our bodies. I don't know what "spirit" is. I don't know its exact relationship to matter. Joseph Smith writes that it is finer than matter, but that our spirit bodies look like our physical bodies. Mormons use the word "soul" differently that other religions, because we teach that the soul is the spirit and body together, and that our body's death is temporary - our eternal soul is both spirit AND body, although it goes through stages where the spirit is more or less naked of...

As a teenager, I did not earn my Young Women's program medallion because the tasks required were not meaningful or helpful to me. But I do still have the (new) YW theme memorized, including the list of values. And I still believe in them. These are core values of the gospel of Jesus Christ, as taught by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They are: Faith, Divine Nature, Individual Worth, Knowledge, Choice and Accountability, Good works, Integrity, and Virtue. I don't know how these values are taught anymore, since I've been in Relief Society for nearly twenty years (probably taught with lots of kitch from Deseret Book - because nothing says "meaningful" like commercialism). But the values themselves are still in my thoughts, and are relevant to cultural concerns every day. Our Sacrament Meeting speakers today gave some wonderful thoughts on Faith. Because I was in the choir, I didn't get a program and so I don't know the sister's n...

I read an article this morning about different kinds of friendships. I tried to tell one of my brothers about it, but he changed the subject, because he refuses to talk about certain things. And yet he can still make fun of me for being so incompetent that I can kill a spider plant. [it's not dead yet, and the reason it's struggling is that it won't root, and I don't think it's funny. I worry about it]. My family have finally learned to say "I love you," but they can't prove it. The bad patch started months ago when I began to feel alien - like Gregor Samsa, turned into a bug, everybody looking at me like I was disgusting. Then a few weeks ago my brothers ganged up on me in a family chat, and I had to leave the conversation semi-permanently (also, I cried myself sick and nearly tried to kill myself. I'm such a drama queen *annoyed face*). It had been my only daily link to them. Things were a bit strained. Then there was Ikea. Except there ...

I just submitted a draft of a dissertation chapter to one of my more intimidating readers. The chapter was written very quickly and will probably need dramatic editing. As dictated by my personality, I'm much more afraid that he'll be offended at how rough it is, and how quickly I was able to write it. There's no way to explain to him that I nearly killed myself doing this and if I had medical and dental insurance, would certainly be seeking professional services. I have been told by reliable sources that I'm too quick to discard writing that doesn't seem to fit, and that I should fight harder to keep the good work that I've done. My answer to this was to try and explain that I literally don't recognize what is good and what isn't. I'm the worst editor of my own stuff. I've a pretty good instinct for other people's writing, but my own is a mystery to me. And why should I get attached to something that somebody else doesn't value? Thes...

In Sunday School today we learned about Abinadi (prounounced in my head as the Germans say it, AH-bin-AH-dee), and his return to the city (don't ask me which city, the reading starts in Mosiah 12, and that information came earlier) to face King Noah and the wicked priests. For Mormons, this is pretty standard fare. In a pattern that existed since the early books of the Old Testament, prophets have been standing up and getting shot at, so I imagine Christians of all sorts recognize the pattern. But Noah's priests have some interesting rhetoric. So Abinadi calls the people to repentance, smite-style.  2. Thus saith the Lord, it shall come to pass that this generation, because of their iniquities, shall be brought into  bondage , and shall be smitten on the  cheek ; yea, and shall be driven by men, and shall be slain; and the vultures of the air, and the dogs, yea, and the wild beasts, shall devour their  flesh . So of course they're mad, and tell Noah. They thr...

I am wondering if a bit more humility would give me a bit more confidence. There are lots of kinds of confidence, and if they come from the wrong place, they are actually arrogance in a creepy mustache. I don't want a mustache. But I also don't want to get walked on. "Knowing who we are" is the key to both humility and confidence, but "who we are" is really, really complicated - like, we're lots of things, and how are we to know what bit of ourselves is relevant in any particular situation? We are divine offspring. We are fallen, and imperfect, and consistently short-sighted. We are tired, broken versions of the cheerful, perfect little children we used to be. We are growing into our inheritance. We possess agency in vast amounts. We must surrender our will. We are physical beings, full of exciting passions and drives. We are finite beings functioning in a maze of eternal and temporal laws with persistent consequences. If you need confidence, remem...