The Truth About Emotional Dependency

Emotional dependency is something I’ve struggled a lot with in my life. 

For a long time I didn’t know I was becoming emotionally dependent on people—I just thought I was loving them. Untangling what was healthy love from what was unhealthy emotional dependency was a long, painful process. It took years of hard work and lots and lots of tears.

Even now (I’m embarrassed to admit), I find myself tempted sometimes to walk the emotional dependency road. Sometimes I feel a lot of shame about that. Ashamed to be struggling again with the same thing I worked so hard to overcome. 

Every time this temptation comes up for me though, I learn something new and gain a little more insight into myself and why this is a problematic way to relate to others. 

The hardest part is convincing my brain that emotional dependency really is a bad thing. My brain is pretty convinced that becoming less emotionally dependent on someone means becoming less invested in that person and my relationship with them. When I really like someone, becoming less invested feels like the wrong thing to do. It’s harder to break a habit when your brain is so convinced that what you’re trying to do to help your relationships is actually hurting them.

This time around in my battle with emotional dependency, the new thing I’ve realized that has helped me is that when I’m in that emotional dependency place, I’m not really loving the person I’m emotionally dependent on; I’m trying to get them to love me. Realizing that helps my brain understand that emotional dependency is not love. I’m trying to get something from someone, not give to them (all my giving is ultimately an effort to extract love and validation from this person, and when they don’t give it in the way I hope or expect, I experience a lot of negative emotions). 

I realized that when I’m not in that emotional dependency place, my overall experience of the relationship is much more positive. I find myself more grateful for the opportunities I do have to spend time with this person. I trade in the heavy and complicated emotions I feel about them when I’m in a dependent place for a more simple enjoyment of their company. When I am in an emotionally dependent place, I experience a lot more anxiety and feelings of lack in the relationship. Being able to go back and forth and see the good fruit of healthy love and the bad fruit of emotional dependency helps me gain my own testimony that emotional dependency is hurting me and my relationships, not helping them. 

Emotional dependency is not about loving people in a selfless way; it’s about taking from people in a self-centered way. And the fruit it yields is an increase in negative emotions and a decrease in gratitude for the goodness that is being offered to me. That’s the truth I’ve learned about emotional dependency.

There Is No Peace to the Wicked

During my scripture reading this week, I came across Isaiah 57:21, which says,

“There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.”

I would like to testify of the truthfulness of these words.

I think sometimes we use the terms “wicked” and “righteous” in an us versus them kind of way. We, the righteous followers of Christ, versus them, the wicked people of the world. I think that’s a very simplistic view. Every child of God on the earth does some things that are righteous and some things that are wicked. All disciples of Christ act in wickedness at least some of the time, and all people who don’t consider themselves followers of Christ act righteously in plenty of areas of their lives. It’s not as simple as righteous people versus wicked people—we are all a messy mix of both. And for all of us, our wickedness often comes not from a desire to do wickedness, but from good intentions that result in wickedness due to a lack of knowledge. Whether we realize we’re acting in wickedness or not, our acts of wickedness cannot bring peace, no matter how well-intentioned or justified we may feel those actions are.

For the purposes of our discussion today, we’re going to assume that the term “wicked” or “wickedness” simply means not in line with God and His love. I don’t want people getting hung up on the strong negative connotation of the word and using that to justify the small ways that they are not acting righteously. Thinking, what I do isn’t that bad compared to someone who murders people, for example. Such comparisons and trivializing of your own wicked acts is not going to serve you. Any level of wickedness, of not being in line with God and His love, is going to interfere with your peace. And I don’t know about you, but I’m always looking for more peace in my life.

I’ve noticed in my own life that when my peace is replaced by negative emotions such as fear or anxiety, it’s usually because I’m trying to control things that are outside of my control. And often what I’m trying to control is other people and their choices. That’s the wickedness that is stealing my peace. God gave all of His children agency—the ability to choose for themselves and to learn and grow through the act of making their own choices. When I try to control other people and their choices to make myself feel better, I am trying to implement Satan’s plan instead of God’s, and it doesn’t feel good. It hurts me, and it hurts my relationships with others. I’m operating from a place of fear and judgment instead of from a place of love and trust, and this is not God’s way. And it does not bring peace, no matter how well-intentioned my efforts to manipulate others into making the choices I want them to make are.

Back when I was emotionally dependent on other people, I dedicated a lot of time and effort to loving and serving others—especially those that I was emotionally dependent on. 1 John 4:18 claims, “There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.” I knew something was up, because I was full of fear. I kept trying to figure out how to achieve this perfect love that was without fear, without torment, but I couldn’t figure it out. All my good intentions of loving and serving others weren’t producing the desired results because I lacked knowledge. I couldn’t see the wickedness I was doing that was keeping me from perfect love and peace. How could loving and serving other people have any wickedness in it?

But mine did. What I was calling love was all mixed up with things that weren’t love at all. I read a description of someone who serves with strings attached, trying to earn love, acceptance, a sense of security, etc. through their service, and I knew it was me. I couldn’t find any peace in my relationships because I was trying to control how other people felt about me instead of just loving me and loving them and letting them make their own choices about how they wanted to feel about me and how much time/effort they felt good about investing in our relationship. I wasn’t truly seeing and loving them as they were and caring about what was best for them; I was trying to get them to love and take care of me so I could feel good about myself and my life. I was trying to get them to create purpose for me, rather than creating purpose for myself. And it wasn’t working. They were feeling suffocated by my neediness, and no matter how much love and attention they gave me, I was still a bottomless pit of need that could never be filled. They couldn’t save me, no matter how much they or I wanted them to be able to, and the wickedness of trusting in the arm of flesh to do that for me instead of the Savior was robbing me of peace.

When I could finally see what I was doing that was hurting me and my relationships, I could finally take steps towards abandoning my wicked practices and replacing them with that perfect love that casteth out fear. It really did require a whole new understanding of what true Christlike love is, built up arduously line upon line, precept upon precept, over many months and years. The process of changing an entire erroneous mindset and pattern of relating to others is brutal. At least it was for me. So many tears. Feeling like the emotional pain I was experiencing would never go away.

But then one day it did. One day I realized that I could remember the negative emotions I used to feel in certain situations, but I didn’t feel them anymore. I had been healed. My heart had been changed. My torment had been replaced with peace. The knowledge I had gained had finally allowed me to replace my wicked practices with more righteous ones, and I was reaping the benefits of thinking and acting in ways that were more in line with God and His love. And I felt so much more peace. And joy. It was always there for me, but I was blocking it by living in ways that were incompatible with joy and peace. I had learned for myself that “there is no peace…to the wicked,” even when you’re sinning in ignorance. That’s why we can’t be saved in ignorance. It’s becoming a person capable of understanding and living in line with divine love and truth that makes the incredible joy and peace of exaltation possible. God wants to give us all the blessings He has, but He can only give us as much as we are able and willing to receive. What we are able to receive is limited by our ability to apply righteous principles in our lives and abandon wicked ones that lead to misery rather than peace.

Do you need more peace in your life? Pray. Study the scriptures. Study the words of other wise men and women who can help you see where you might be getting tripped up with wicked practices that you can’t see yet. Ask the question, “Lord, is it I?”, and listen for His answer. In what ways are you blocking your own peace? It takes a lot of courage to face our own sins and weaknesses, but I can testify that that is the path to peace. It’s in changing ourselves, not others, that we will find the peace we seek. I testify of these things, in the name of my Savior, Jesus Christ, amen.

God Rested

This year at church we are studying the Old Testament. As I was reading Genesis chapter 2 this morning, verses 2 and 3 jumped out at me:

2 And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.

3 And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.

I always knew that the Creation story ended with God resting on the seventh day, but what stood out to me today was that it was His day of rest that God blessed and sanctified. He had all those days of productivity, but which day did He bless and sanctify? His day of rest. Do you think it’s possible that God actually values rest too—not just productivity? 

I don’t know about you, but I often fall into the trap of “hustling for my worthiness” (Brene Brown quote) and believing that if I’m not being productive then I’m doing something wrong and God is not pleased with me. But God Himself took the time to rest. He worked hard and accomplished some pretty important things first, but then He rested. And He blessed and sanctified that day of rest. This seems really significant to me. I want to remember to value my days of rest as much as my days of productivity—to intentionally and deliberately plan times of rest into my life as well as times of productivity—and I think in the Creation story God gives me permission to do so.

Another thing I thought about as I was pondering these verses is what had to be true in order for God to truly rest on the seventh day. First, God had to be confident that the work He had done was good and sufficient. He had to be content with the effort that He had put in. He couldn’t be worrying about whether He had really done enough or if His work was good enough. 

Second, God had to be clear on what was His responsibility and what wasn’t. I think something a lot of us might do at that point if we were God is start worrying about whether our kids were going to make the right choices while on earth and be able to come back to us. What if they didn’t make good choices? What if they didn’t repent? 

God had to be clear that His responsibility was to provide an earth, physical bodies, and a Savior for us. Our job was to use our agency to choose what we wanted to do with those gifts and who we wanted to become. God fulfilled His commitments to us, and He didn’t worry about things outside of His scope of responsibility and control, like what choices we would make with the agency He had given us. 

Fulfilling His commitment to us, recognizing that His efforts were good and sufficient, and not worrying about things that were outside of His control and responsibility are what allowed God to truly rest on the seventh day. And He believed that day of rest was important enough to bless and sanctify it. These are some of the important lessons I learned from the Creation story in Genesis this morning.

Love and Service Redefined

When encouraged to list their strengths, I have often heard women say things like “I am selfless to a fault” or “I would do anything for anybody.” I also used to think being willing to make huge sacrifices to help others at any moment with any need they had was a virtue. 

Statements like this make me cringe a little now though. What I hear in them is an inability/unwillingness to set healthy boundaries—a problem I definitely used to struggle with in certain relationships. I really thought my unwillingness to set boundaries around what I was willing to sacrifice to help these friends and family members was a positive thing about me that made me an especially good friend. In reality, it was a method I was using to try to control these relationships and ensure that those friends/family members would keep loving me and be willing to help me when I was in need. Subconsciously, I was trying to control their opinions of me and obligate their love and service, rather than allowing them to make their own choices about how much love and service they wanted or were able to offer me. 

The problem with over-sacrificing and not setting healthy boundaries is it sets us up to have a victim mentality and actually breeds resentment that hurts our relationships. The person over-sacrificing feels resentful that others don’t seem to be willing to make the same level of sacrifice to help them. Those they are sacrificing to help can feel the underlying expectation that if they are a good person/friend they will also drop everything in their life to meet the other person’s needs, even when that may not be in their best interest. This implied obligation to prove their love in a similar way can also create resentment. 

The idea of sacrificing all our own needs to meet others’ needs is often held up as a standard of excellence in our society, perhaps especially in religious circles. After all, didn’t Christ sacrifice everything for us? And aren’t we supposed to follow His example? 

Perhaps the distinction here is that we’re supposed to be willing to sacrifice everything to follow God’s will. He’s the one we’re commanded to give all our heart, might, mind and strength to. Why? Because He knows what sacrifices will bless us. 

The commandment regarding other people is to love other people as ourselves. Not more than ourselves, and not less than ourselves. As ourselves. Our needs are just as valid as the needs of any other person. We should be very wise about the love and service we offer to ensure we are not undermining our own needs in the process, because in the long run that will neither bless us nor the person we are serving. Other people are not God—they do not know what sacrifices will bless us and what sacrifices will overburden us and make us unable to care for ourselves and our own stewardships. We are responsible for using our agency to make those calls, and we should not give that responsibility away to others. 

Those are just some thoughts I was having today that I wanted to share. May we all be wise in how we choose to love and serve that our love and service might truly be a blessing to us and to those we serve.

God's Goodness

I just wanted to share today about the goodness of God that I have seen in my life. I know many people who question whether God is good or if it is important or worthwhile to follow Him and heed His words that He has given us through His prophets, both in ancient times and now. I must say, based on my own experiences with God, that the answer is unequivocally, yes.

There have been so many times in my life when I have prayed and God has answered my prayers. What is even more amazing to me is all the times that I haven’t prayed, have not known I needed something, but God knew I needed it, and because He loves me He has helped guide me to things that will benefit me and prepared me to receive blessings He wanted to give me. His generosity in giving me gifts I wasn’t looking for or didn’t know were possible lets me know how much He cares for me and how much He really is on my side and wants me to succeed in achieving my divine potential. He hasn’t just left me on my own to blindly flounder about trying to become like Him and guess what He wants me to do, frowning down upon me when I make mistakes. He has taken great care to lead me over and over to the actions and experiences that will bless my life and the lives of those that are within my sphere of influence. He guides me to greater things than I would think to seek for myself.

I could give you so many examples from my life of what I’m talking about, but I wanted to share a recent experience with you. A couple weeks ago I was studying the lesson from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ Sunday School manual, “Come Follow Me.” The lesson for the week was on Mosiah 18-24 in the Book of Mormon. One section in the manual about the reading for the week talked about how “God’s people should be united.” As I read that section of the manual and a related sermon by Henry B. Eyring, one of the current apostles of Christ’s Church, I was prompted by the Spirit to focus on having more unity in my family.

As I pondered what more unity in our family would look like, I thought about us all being united in working towards shared family goals, as well as supporting one another in our individual challenges and achievements. Additional pondering led to me creating four common goals we could work towards as a family, as well as coming up with practical, concrete ways for us to work towards those goals on a daily and weekly basis.

I counseled first with my husband about my inspiration and ideas. Then he and I held a family council with our children. We presented our new family goals and discussed our plans for carrying them out, allowing the children to share their own thoughts on each goal and how we could accomplish it. I also created some visual reminders of our goals and what we were going to do to work towards them each day/week, as you can see below.

Our first week of implementing our new system of working together to accomplish our family goals was a great success. The kids were excited and on board with doing their part to achieve our goals each day. They found pleasure in tracking their progress towards each daily goal. These new goals and system for tracking our efforts have been a huge blessing to our family, especially as we have made the transition from the school year to summer break.

Before studying from the “Come Follow Me” manual that day, I had not thought at all about the necessity of having some sort of plan to help us use our time wisely during the summer and had no intention of coming up with such a plan. However, my Heavenly Father knew that such a plan would benefit me and my family, so He took the opportunity during my gospel study to send a gentle prompting about focusing on unity in our family. This prompting led me to the pondering I needed to do to come up with plans to bring more goodness into our lives and give me new opportunities to teach my children important lessons on working together to accomplish good things as a family.

I’m so grateful for my Heavenly Father’s support in helping me find ways to create learning opportunities for my children as I so imperfectly try to accomplish this incredibly challenging task called parenting. I’m so grateful I don’t have to rely solely on my own wisdom to figure out what will be a blessing to my family. I’m so grateful to have a Heavenly Father who also loves my children and wants what’s best for them and is willing to give me inspiration for our mutual benefit. I know He wants me to succeed in being a blessing to my children, and that He will continue to inspire me to know how to do so. I find this knowledge so comforting. I am not alone, and I am not on trial. I am in partnership with a Divine Being, working together with Him to bring about my own salvation and the salvation of those who are dear to both of us. What an incredible blessing and privilege.

God is good, and as we seek Him and strive to know and follow Him, He will guide us to the things that will benefit both us and our loved ones, both when we ask and when we don’t know enough to know what we should be asking for. Following the Lord leads to a bounty of blessings from a loving and generous Heavenly Father. I know and testify of these things in the name of my Savior, Jesus Christ, amen.

Doubt Not, But Be Believing

A while back I was reading in Mormon chapter 9 in the Book of Mormon. I was struck by how many times in that chapter we are exhorted to believe in Christ, “doubting nothing” and promised miracles when we do so. It became very clear to me that God places a high value on faith and belief.

I think this stood out to me so much because it is such a contrast to how we tend to think in our current society. I feel like our current society values skepticism over belief. If you’re skeptical of everything, then you’ll never be tricked into believing something that’s not true. You’ll never risk looking like a fool. It’s interesting to me that this is not God’s approach. He encourages us to believe. To exercise faith and hope in the face of uncertainty. That is what makes miracles possible.

More recently I was reading in chapter 63 of the Doctrine and Covenants. Verses 7-12 discuss people who seek signs before they will believe. It seemed very relevant to this discussion of doubt vs belief:

7 And he that seeketh signs shall see signs, but not unto salvation.
8 Verily, I say unto you, there are those among you who seek signs, and there have been such even from the beginning;
9 But, behold, faith cometh not by signs, but signs follow those that believe.
10 Yea, signs come by faith, not by the will of men, nor as they please, but by the will of God.
11 Yea, signs come by faith, unto mighty works, for without faith no man pleaseth God; and with whom God is angry he is not well pleased; wherefore, unto such he showeth no signs, only in wrath unto their condemnation.
12 Wherefore, I, the Lord, am not pleased with those among you who have sought after signs and wonders for faith, and not for the good of men unto my glory.

What I found most interesting in these verses is God’s discussion of what signs are for. He seems most frustrated with those whose focus is on themselves and their need for a sign from God before they will heed His words, rather than on seeking miracles from God to bless others.

I can think of a couple stories that illustrate the concept that “faith cometh not by signs, but signs follow those that believe.”

I met a man during my full-time missionary service in France who experienced the truth that “signs follow those that believe.” His father was gravely injured and in critical condition. This man prayed and told God that he would quit smoking and not seek revenge on those who had injured his father if God would spare his father’s life. His father lived, and this man kept the commitments he had made to God. This experience of acting in faith to secure blessings from God for another resulted in the miracle of his father’s healing and increased this man’s own faith in God, eventually leading him to the waters of baptism to make further covenants with the Lord.

The story of Laman and Lemuel from the Book of Mormon, however, supports the statement that “faith cometh not by signs.” The prophet Lehi’s two eldest sons saw many signs that God is real, even being visited by an angel at one point, but these signs did not create faith in them. They continued to doubt God and His power. Their brother Nephi asks them at one point, “ye also know that an angel hath spoken unto you; wherefore can ye doubt?” And yet, despite all the signs, somehow they manage it. Faith truly cometh not by signs.

You may wonder if I am promoting the idea of “blind faith” here. Let me respond to that by first telling you part of my own story.

Far from promoting “blind faith,” all my youth leaders at church when I was growing up kept emphasizing the importance of getting your own testimony and finding out for yourself that the teachings of the church were true. The point was brought up so often, that I felt a lot of pressure to find out if my church was the true church of God, not because I needed a sign to continue to live its teachings, but because everyone else seemed so convinced that I needed a sign. So I dutifully prayed and asked God to tell me if the church’s teachings were true. If the Book of Mormon was true. I felt a lot of anxiety over my ability to receive a sign from God that would convince all these other people that I had a real testimony of the gospel.

Not surprisingly, my people-pleasing prayers went largely unanswered. One night, after a particularly poignant lesson on the topic, I prayed even more earnestly, sharing with God my anxiety on the topic. This time I received an answer. The answer I received from God through the Spirit was that it was okay for me to just keep living the gospel like I was doing for now. I didn’t need a sign. I could just keep believing and following the commandments. Relief washed through me. I didn’t need to prove anything to anybody. I could just keep living the gospel like I wanted to.

About fifteen years after this experience, I came to a point in my life where I needed to know for myself that God was there and that I could rely on Him. I needed Him to show me the path to the peace, joy and fulfillment He promises the faithful in the scriptures because my own methods for obtaining those things were failing me. This time when I went to Him in prayer, I was not seeking knowledge from Him that other people thought I needed; I was seeking answers to my own questions and concerns. And when I came to Him with my own questions and concerns, He answered me with a steady stream of personal revelation, teaching me truth after truth after truth. The scriptures had indeed become a feast for me, and I learned for myself that I could rely on the Lord to fill me and help me find joy even in the midst of tribulation.

Looking back over my life, do I feel like all those years I spent believing in God and living the gospel without really knowing 100% it was true foolish? A waste? Not at all. I’m actually super grateful that before I had gained enough knowledge and experience to know for myself what types of choices would be of benefit to me, I was taught to live by many values and form many healthy habits that have blessed my life immeasurably. I see those many years of what some might call “blind faith” more a period of maturation of my faith, of laying a foundation of knowledge of God and His words and His ways that I could draw on when it came time for me to finally put my faith to the test.

There are many stories in the scriptures that follow a similar pattern. Nephi was taught about God by his parents growing up. When his father Lehi had a dream in which God told him to take his family and go on a long journey into the wilderness because Jerusalem was going to be destroyed, it was a crisis moment for Nephi. Suddenly he had to know for himself if these things his father had taught him about God were true because the answer was going to have a significant impact on his life. He prayed, and the Lord visited him and softened his heart, letting him know all the things his father had taught him were true (1 Nephi 2:16, Book of Mormon).

Enos had a similar experience when he was out hunting and pondering on all the things his father had taught him and had a strong desire to know that the atonement was real and that he could be forgiven of his sins. He prayed earnestly “all the day long,” until he finally heard a voice saying, “Enos, thy sins are forgiven thee, and thou shalt be blessed,” and his “guilt was swept away” (Enos 1:3-6, Book of Mormon). He then continued to pray on behalf of his people, the Nephites, and then on behalf of his people’s enemies, the Lamanites, and continued to receive further knowledge from the Lord. Like Nephi, he now had his own testimony of the truth of the gospel, separate from his parents’.

There is another point of insight I think we can glean from Enos’s story as well. In verse 1 Enos says, “I, Enos, knowing my father that he was a just man…” We talk about “blind faith,” but I wonder how “blind” faith that is based on the beliefs of one’s parents or on the words of prophets in the scriptures or in our day actually is. Enos took the words of his father seriously because he knew his father to be “a just man.” Nephi also talks about how he was born “of goodly parents” (1 Nephi 1:1). Both these sons could track the goodness of the people who raised them and the strength and goodness that came into their lives through their beliefs.

Even Alma the Younger, who chose to rebel against his father and his father’s gospel teachings, when he finally came to a recognition of the harm the choices he was making were causing himself and others, remembered his father’s testimony in his hour of need and put it to the test, experiencing, like Enos, the miracle of forgiveness, and coming to know His Savior personally through that experience (Alma 36:8-20, Book of Mormon).

Usually the sincere testimony of other good people who have exercised faith and received their own personal evidence of God’s existence, power and mercy is where our own faith begins. This is why God went to such great lengths to have His prophets write down their revelations and experiences, to preserve those writings, and to inspire people to translate those ancient writings into modern languages. The scriptures provide us the knowledge and evidence we need to kindle our own small flame of faith that can then grow larger as we exercise that faith and have our own personal experiences with God. To see His hand in our personal lives though, we first must be willing to believe.

I can personally testify that “signs follow those that believe.” I have experienced God’s hand in my own life on countless occasions. I know He lives and that He knows and loves each of us personally. I invite each of you to exercise enough faith to seek Him and find out for yourselves. He promises throughout the scriptures, “seek me diligently and ye shall find me; ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you” (Matt 7:7, Luke 11:9, D&C 88:63). I know God’s promises are true, and that when you sincerely seek Him, you will find Him, for “he hath all power unto the fulfilling of all his words” (1 Nephi 9:6) and “proveth all his words” (2 Nephi 11:3). I bear my personal witness of this, in the name of my Savior, Jesus Christ, amen.

Stay Close to the Lord

I was at a high school graduation party for my nephew tonight where we were asked to write down our advice for the new graduate. For some reason there was a general consensus amongst several family members that the advice I had to share would be especially wise and worthwhile. When I said the advice I had given my nephew could be applied to anyone in any situation, I was encouraged to share that advice with a broader audience. So, I thought, what the heck, I’ll write a blog post about it. After all, who doesn’t like a generous helping of unsolicited advice from time to time 😜

In a nutshell, my advice to my nephew was this: stay close to the Lord. I don’t know of any better advice one could give or receive than that. Other lessons I have learned in my life may or may not be applicable to other people, but drawing close to the Source of All Truth who loves you perfectly and does know exactly what you personally need to learn and do to progress and find joy and peace—that is something that would be of great benefit to everyone in every situation.

I have learned from my own personal experience that God lives, that He knows and loves each of His children intimately, and that He can be trusted and relied on. When I have chosen to turn to Him and seek comfort and guidance from His hand, I have been blessed immeasurably. Everything that I most value in my life has come from Him, and I am eternally grateful for those blessings, particularly blessings of knowledge that allow me to see my life more clearly and truthfully, which has led to a huge increase in the joy and peace I experience in my life and in my capacity to bless the lives of others.

Jesus says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). If you are wondering where to go in your life, seek Jesus. He will show you the way to go, teach you the truths you need to know, and help you create the best and most worthwhile life possible. Trust Him, seek Him, stay close to Him—there is no better way to find joy and peace in your life and to reach your divine potential than that. I bear witness of these truths, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.