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1/10/13 10:04 P

Thank you so much for that post.

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Posts: 5,911
12/29/12 1:04 P

Thank you Louise.

Several years ago, I joined an LDS Women's community online and received much encouragement from a few 'sisters', to continue writing because they really liked my blogs. Not being in the habit of accepting compliments, I sort of dismissed, that indeed, I might have a talent for writing. I do love to write, so continued until the community online shut down. I felt sad when I lost all the blogs that I had written saved on word pad because my computer crashed.

Thank goodness I have a new laptop now. My bother-in-law had purchased an external hard drive (EHD) for me before my other computer crashed and became unfixable. He kept warning me I needed to back up my files. I was so foolish not to do that, simply because I was afraid I wouldn't be able to figure out how to do it so I kept putting it off. So out of fear of failure I lost my blogs. It won't happen again though. I got brave and figured out how to save my writing in the EHD after I plugged it into my laptop. Fear of failure keeps me from doing so much I would otherwise. I know perfect love casts out fear and I am praying for the gift of Charity (the pure love of Christ) that overcomes all fear so I can progress in all areas of my life.

I was so glad when I joined SP because I could continue to do what I loved and that was to delve into my 'inner man' and, even as I write, discover what makes me tick and find God's answers for me in overcoming the flesh. I always feel blessed and in the mean time, if it helps someone else it is a double blessing.

I have had the habit of comparing my talents with others and have often felt so inadequate, but I know I must not do that anymore, just because it stymies my own progress. It does not matter that someone else is better at writing than I. All that counts is that I write and improve with God's help. And the more I write, coupled with immersing myself in the scriptures, the more I will "hear" His answers and improve in my writing. And the more I improve, the better I will get at listening for and hearing God's word especially for me.


Edited by: CINDYCHARLENE at: 12/29/2012 (17:11)

current weight: 136.0

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12/29/12 12:53 A

Charlene, I love your writing! I can relate so much with what you are saying. I have to rely on Jesus for everything especially in controlling my eating.

Thank You again for sharing "War" with us!

GOD BLESS!
Louise

Posts: 5,911
12/29/12 12:24 A

Some of the best selling books, at least in my guesstimation, would have to be self help books and the leading ones in that area most likely 'How to lose weight and keep it off'.

I would like to see one written on 'How to overcome temptation when it is staring you right in the face with all the negative emotionally charged feelings right along side. Is it the sight of food that tempts me or is it something else? I am increasingly becoming aware of how my negative emotions trigger my cravings. Satan sure knows when to turn up the heat and just how to do it.

I got up this morning determined not to allow sweets to tempt me. I was making pancakes of course with syrup. I love pancakes and syrup but I knew I could pass up the delicacy even as began the process. I see clearly now, it is not the sight of sweets and junk food itself that triggers my cravings so much any more, but the negative reactions I have to negativity around me and more especially directed toward me for no good reason that I am aware of.

Irritated, cross and angry words feel like a slap in the face and most definitely does not feel like love and the way I would like and feel I deserve to be treated. I have in the past, depending upon the severity of my wounded pride (thinking I shouldn't have to endure disrespect from my own family members) hidden in sweets. Junk food and sweets somehow soothed the pain.
Oh, they know what they have done and do apologize. But by then the damage has been done. Satan's goal has been accomplished and I have gone on a binger.

I am aware that for no good reason, any of us can become negative at any given moment and it has nothing to do with anyone else. It all has to do with us as individuals. I need to remember not only are others human but I am also and when I appear to be cross and irritable I would like to be given the benefit of the doubt and forgiven as much as others would like that courtesy.

When I was a young girl, my elder brother would delight in walking by me on occasion and punching me in the arm. Of course I would cry and Mother finally got tired of it and told me if I wouldn't cry every time he did that, he probably would stop doing that. Most likely he enjoyed seeing my reaction when he popped me. Well I don't know if I stopped reacting, or mother talked to him or what happened but he didn't punch me any more that I remember.

Is it possible that since Satan enjoys making us miserable that if I just stopped reacting to others and just chalked up their negative behavior as something designed to get me to react a certain way, so I will be miserable, that the poor behavior of others would just go away? Gee, I would like to think so. Could I just immediately forgive and make peace with the fact that others have their own agenda, even as I, and stop taking responsibility for other's actions by reacting? At least I would have peace within myself believing I had done the right thing in face of opposition.

Jesus said in Matt 10:34-36 " Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household."

Why, oh why, would Jesus do that. There seems 'no rhyme nor reason'......except as I turn to other scriptures. Luke 6:32 reads, "For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them." Also 2 Nephi 2:11 reads "For it must needs be, that there is an opposition in all things. If not so, my first-born in the wilderness, righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad..."

Jesus came to bring the opposition of good, His good, against evil and of necessity it would not be a peaceful situation. There is a war going on if we haven't noticed between good and evil. But god always uses the bad for His purposes and His purpose in allowing opposition to good is to get us to turn to Him and be strengthened in our weakness. It is only in and through Jesus Christ that we are guaranteed victory over the flesh.

Eating wrong and too much, for me, is only a symptom of a deeper need and that is to give and receive love. Charity, the pure love of Christ, is a gift to be given not to be taken at will or something we just decide we are going to have and do. We can not love perfectly without the Lord's saving grace and mercy, quite simply because of the fact that we are human and need Him.

I finally understand why Paul said, When I am weak, then I am strong". That is because he knew that alone he could do nothing and when he humbly accepted that he was weak and relied wholly upon the merits of Jesus Christ to save him, he was then in a position to receive the strength he needed to overcome the natural tendencies of man. It is because Christ paid the price for our sins that we can come to the throne of grace boldly and receive help in time of need. Praise God.

By the way, with a Jesus mindset, I did not succumb to temptation to scarf down about four pancakes drenched in Syrup this morning.

current weight: 136.0

137 134.5 132 129.5

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