After the trek this past year, I have to confess I was
covetous. I envied the learning opportunity that each of the participants had.
So I decided to pray for some learning opportunities of my own. I hadn’t felt
that I had done much personal growing for a long time. Yes, yes, I know, that’s
like praying for patience and we all know what happens when you do that! But
honestly, the situations that arose for me were rather amazing! I was presented
with opportunities to learn to listen to and follow the spirit. They really
weren’t such unusual situations. Perhaps
my perspective was a little different. At any rate, I continued thru this past 6 months to try to identify the
learning opportunities that came my way. Things had kind of slowed down in the
learning and growth department until this past ward conference. I don’t
remember what the actual catalyst was, whether it was Leena’s touching
testimony, even if it was her 3rd year to be a part of Ward
Conference! Or whether it was Carol Lee’s interesting talk on Relief Society in
our Lives, or President Smith’s talk on taking a Gospel Snow Day from the world.
But what I do know is that I had a very ‘AHA’ moment. I realized, with some
learning opportunity nudging from the Holy Spirit; that the root of so many of
my daily negative issues-frustration, anger, even hurt, has been my very own
PRIDE. I remember President Smith saying something about the pride that is
good, but that is not the pride I refer to. I am very prideful. I think I knew
that, but I didn’t realize how much that ‘pridefulness’ is the root of so many
of my personal problems, almost all of them are in regard to relationships. The
relationships with my family members, relationships with co-workers,
relationships with co-members of our ward have all been affected by my
pridefulness. As I recognize this and analyze it further it even affects my
attitudes toward other drivers on the road. Of course a little (or a lot) of
judging goes along with the pride. That’s a lesson for me to work on also! I don’t know that I will ever be able to rid
myself of pridefulness, but in this learning opportunity I have finally
discovered what it means to be humble. I was told a long time ago that to be
humble means “to be teachable”. I have discovered that it is also the opposite
of pride. For if you let go of the pride, it leaves you “teachable”. Love Cindy DeMill
