This Is MY Story and I'm Sticking To It

I'm loving this bloggin stuff. This is the first time in my life that I have actually loved journaling. I love reading other peoples blogs--it inspires me to be better and to journal. It is pure genius. I have several journals throughout my life that I have started and then stopped. Six months later or maybe even a year, I will again start and stop. The best journal I ever kept was in high school when I had to keep one for a grade--guess what, I threw it away! How I wish I had it now.

I have always felt guilty about not journaling better, but never enough to cause me to keep it steady. I even remember a conference talk hearing President Hinckly reading from his journal from years ago and feeling good that as he read the dates of the entries, they were sporadic dates and then Mike reminded me, he probably has more than one journal. So much for trying to make myself feel better.

What really got me wanting to journal again was from what I heard in a R.S lesson about a year ago in Mike's mom's ward in MS. The lesson that day was being taught by this great woman (if I lived in that ward, I know she is someone I would want to make friends with--she seems so awesome.). The lesson was on journaling. It is the best lesson I have ever had on that subject. It has been a year or maybe more, but I would like to paraphrase as much as possible some key parts of her lesson (had I kept a Sunday Journal like Sis. Olsen taught the YW, while I was in there, I would remember better). She began the lesson by asking how do we know about people who have lived in the past, how do we know about history? She said, it was by what people chose to write down or record (usually TV and newspapers--and we know how bias they can be!). During a lesson, she made a poignant statement: If we don't keep a journal of our life, 1)We could end up not being remembered, or 2) we will be remembered only by how someone else saw us, whether it be good or bad. Then she said, "Don't you want people to know your side of the story". She said it much more eloquently, but it did give me food for thought. I thought, Oh yeah, because who knows what Mike is writing about me in his journal, and then I thought who knows what Ariel is saying about me (both are good at keeping journals). I want people to see me through MY eyes, not the mean mommy, or the wife who served leftovers again and didn't change the sheets on the bed etc...

So this is why, I'm journaling so everyone can hear my story. So here it is, and I'm stickin' to it!


For those of my friends who don't have a blog: Come on what are you waiting for? Let's here your stories!