Author: Anonymous

OK so imagine if you will a place where no one offends you. People are naturally just not butt faces. Everyone is friendly and they care more about your feelings than their own feelings. They don’t share any negative opinions about you because they think you are making the BEST decisions for your life. Ok now ……..WAKE UP! I had to learn the hard way, as I am sure most people have learned or are learning that this place does not exist. Even loved ones can and will become enemies. Years ago as my husband and I wanted to be parents (tried for 8 years before doing IVF) we had loved ones make assumptions about us and then spread terrible rumors. They turned us into outcasts. It felt really good. Many other things happened as well and the relationships became toxic resulting in a separation for a few years from some loved ones. Some of the relationships have gotten better, some are still hurt but hopefully recovering, there is fear going back in. Looking back I wish that my husband and I would have handled things differently in regards to these relationships. I wish that we would have chosen to not go down the rabbit hole that these people were digging. Everyone will have a different opinion of every detail of this, and your right is in fact your right. I will not go into great details, but I will share what I learned and how I am trying to apply this experience to dumb dumb church members. We have spent several years hurting at the hand of others, and for what? We suffered because of the opinions of others. We are so lame hahahahahaha. What I wish we would have done was to not engage. I for sure believe they were absolutely wrong in certain aspects. However our reaction to their wrongness makes us wrong too. We argued, we tried to explain our hearts to people whose opinions were set. You usually can never change someones opinion. You do not own them…….however YOU OWN YOU! I have spent so much time feeling betrayed, hurt, angry and so on. It is seriously one of the hardest things you will ever do, but it is oh so necessary for YOUR HAPPINESS. I am not totally great at it, but I am trying to not engage or worry about ANYONES opinion. So as much as people well intending or just full on butt faces will hurt you or make dumb comments about your testimony or lack there of (I fall into the lacking zone in areas with the church) you still own you. I have wrote so much on not being a Mormon jerk, but guess what, I will still FOR SURE encounter many. That is their weakness, but it does not HAVE to be mine as well.  I genuinely believe that they think I am lost, and I think that they are lost too. So if you can TRY to have compassion on them for their lack of understanding of your heart it will greatly help you to not go down that rabbit hole. There is nothing good about jumping in. I am trying to apply this concept in every area. When someone offends me I immediately want to take my filter off and use every possible naughty word to explain to them why they are ^%*^$$ AND $^$@&)^%*  AND THAT IF THEY COULD ONLY &%@!#* THAT WE WOULD NOT BE IN THIS *&^%) SITUATION right now. There you have it, that is true and honest what I WANT to do. But I don’t. You see being hurt by others can either make you an even bigger jerk or it can make you want to be nicer and not cause hurt to others. Everything my hubby and I went through with loved ones left me very weak. They ALL were “good Mormons” after all. So I went against my “natural abilities to tell one off” until this past year. I was trying to be “Christlike” when my world broke. I never wanted to hurt anyone the way I had felt hurt and I lost my true colors in doing this.

As I have tried to build back up I have come up with a few guidelines for myself when it comes to my reactions to unkindness. I do not give more information than needed to most humans, I have a few people who I will let into my world because I actually VALUE their ideas and opinions. Not over sharing gives less opportunity for judgement and opinions (get off of social media) I also recognize that my want to “&%$^ bomb” stupidity might make me feel good and a little empowered in the moment, SUPER immature and lame hahahaha and there is some hurt that cannot be undone. I just remind myself “YOU OWN YOU” and it has changed my desire to have the negative reaction. I simply refuse to engage. A testimony is an extremely personal thing and you do not owe anyone an explanation unless you want to and can do so free of negative feelings. Know your audience. When a judgy comment is made CHOOSE to feel sorrow for the judger. Be smarter than them, letting the offense and anger in WILL POLUTE you. I have seen this in someone I love dearly. The hurt haunts him. Negativity in any form and especially from someone you love will drag you down. Choose to own you. You can feel when a conversation is not going to go well, get out. If it is heated you can simply say “lets finish this when we are cooled down” or “I am happy to have a healthy conversation but this is not feeling healthy”. Just because someone throws a punch does not mean that you should. You will have pride in yourself when you don’t. You are not defending yourself when you allowed someone to pour gas on your fire.  A healthy discussion is ok, but excuse yourself when you feel those “yucko” feelings creeping in. I wish that my husband and I would have excused ourselves from conversations with loved ones over OUR FERTILITY AND FAMILY BUILDING and when comments were made that hurt, we should have kindly asked for respect. It lead to doubts on church and doubts on love. If we would have handled them differently we would have avoided some lifelong hurt. I can now unfortunately probably write a novel on what not to do with loved ones hahahahaha. Little by little GREAT things are built, but little by little GREAT things are destroyed. I was always solid in my beliefs and unfortunately “loved ones” is where a tiny thread began to unwind ( I never want to be a reason someones faith begins to fall). Its also where I should have learned to not put my faith in people, but in God. Learn from your own mistakes and from mine. If someone seems to be judging you a bit too much please don’t let them become an enemy. Give them the opportunity to stop and if that doesn’t work then give yourself the respect to not engage. You will thank yourself for it. Your faith is only between you and God, no one else. Thankfully His opinion of you is the only that matters. I am trying to remember this too.

-Much Love

Ok so you probably can see that I type in a large font, that is because I legit cannot see the regular font hahaha. I prob need reading glasses but I am only 37 and def in denial. Speaking of needing to see things bigger, lets chat about that. So I have come to start to prioritize my thoughts and worries on religion and life in general. I have given myself permission to let go of the dumb rules that I made up in order to be obedient and I promise anyone reading this that you have dumb rules too. For me some of my funnier yet dumber rules are that……crap I cannot believe I am going to admit to these. One, you must kneel down to pray in order for it to count more or be more respectful. Now I do think that the act of kneeling does show respect, but in the excess I was doing it I was feeling somewhat degraded and it was from my own doing- such a dumb dumb OCD move on my part. I think that there are some things church related that are heavier and hold more weight but a simple prayer as I am putting my makeup on or waking up is still very loving and respectful. I think of it like calling my mom to let her know I am thinking of her. She does not care that I am putting mascara on as I am letting her know that she is a priority in my life. She is just happy to hear her daughters voice and to know I thought of her. Not all prayers need to be an emotional deep plea. Sometimes when I call my mom it is a “hey mama whats up?” and other times it’s a “I need advice and a safe place to talk and let it all out”. That is now the way I pray and its not even every night or every morning thing and rarely do I kneel. Once upon a time I would wake up at 2 A.M in a total panic because I forgot to pray, so I would get out of bed, kneel down and pray. Did God expect THAT???????????????? DOUBTFUL!!!!! No wonder why a few days after I stopped doing anything religious that my hubby told me that those few days were the most relaxed days he had experienced in YEARS!!!!!!!!!!!! AHHHHH, what a pain in the booty I was to be married to!!! Don’t be a Mormon pain in the tooshi for your loved ones y’all!!! So glad I am figuring this out before I make my children hate the church. Speaking of the husband, here is a too much info for ya but gonna tell you anyway, excited? It is pretty juicy…………hahahaha. You wanna know what is NOT SEXY…when you are smoochin’ with your man and STOP to PRAY because it is getting late and just incase the smoochin’ leads to the good stuff you need to make sure you get your nightly prayer in FIRST. I am laughing so much writing this, like who does this???? I will tell ya, people who are afraid of God do these crazy things. If I swore I had to immediately kneel down and ask for forgiveness and some days there was no point to even stand up (life can be stressful, eek!). I also HAD to sing CHURCH songs at night to my babies, I mean that for sure sounds like a normal rule, wouldn’t want to ruin my kids with “Twinkle little star” or something from “Moana”.  My list actually goes on of my rules, rules that showed I was obedient but actually lead to misery.

All of this has brought me to ask myself WHY do we do these things? Why do I need to keep the sabbath holy? Why are we encouraged to read the scriptures? Why is it good to pray? So here is what I have come up with. Now these are my own thoughts and they feel right so I am just gonna run with them (and y’all can prob see why I needed to reassess my beliefs and expectations of myself). Keeping the sabbath holy is for…….wait for it…….ME. It does not rip God apart if I am cleaning my house on a Sunday, but He knows that I would benefit from relaxing. He knows that I am a total RED personality (start googling if you don’t know what that means, thank me later) and that is because I am a GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO GO like a million GOES all the time that I need to chill ONE day a week. I do not feel like I am doing God a favor by keeping the sabbath holy, I always believed that it showed obedience and that was the purpose (keep in mind that is coming from someone who had to pray before hanky panky) and I am sure that there is a level of obedience in it, however the BIGGER reason must be because He loves me and wants me to recharge and spirituality helps the soul recharge. So doing things on the sabbath that allow for my soul, mind and body to recharge is for ME more than God feeling good that I sat and did nothing because it was Sunday. Feel me?

Scripture reading…..here we go. I struggle. Like really really struggle with this. I have in fact read the Book of Mormon cover to cover more than once. Its nice. But it does not resignate with me. I have TRIED so many times to just love reading them, and I don’t. They cause me stress because I cannot figure out what they are saying (and no I do not want to get the study guide that I can read alongside them, I already am struggling to read them and making it homework will not make me love it more). And then I have to re read what I read (this English language, re read and read right next to each other-goodness). So it just becomes a place of boredom and stress for me and I am pretty darn sure that is not the purpose of them. But WHY are we asked to read? Again it is not for Gods benefit. It is for us to feel the spirit and to better understand our beliefs, right? Each person probably has a different answer for their “why” and that’s ok. You are for sure not wrong for reading them and you are not wrong if you don’t read them. I have a friend that said he was determined to read them every day to “check the box”. Well on vacation he forgot to pack his scriptures and therefore could not read them. He was so sad about this but realized that reading them solely to check the box was not benefiting him anyway.  What a huge thing for my friend to realize. You benefit almost ZERO from doing anything to just check a box. So I have found what works for me. I enjoy putting a conference talk on my phone as I clean my house a few times a week. I actually ENJOY that, so that is what I do. I have found the CUTEST people on YouTube who teach a lesson each week and that is our church (thank you covid), and my hubby does the sacrament for me and him. Our kiddos are too young to NEED to take it (before they were born my husband said he wanted them to remember the first time they take it and so they will start if they want when they get baptized). When we first began doing sacrament at home I felt like we HAD to use white cups and plates and HAD to be in church clothing. But THAT is not the point in my heart. Taking the sacrament from home has actually changed my feelings on it a bit. It is more purposeful from home and it means we remembered to do it from home even though it would be easy to not do it BECAUSE we don’t currently attend church. It is more deliberate and sweet for me now. We do it after the kids are in bed ,often I am in my pajamas. The plate is usually white but the cup is either pink, blue, orange etc. And its sweet and it is our way of telling Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ that we remembered them. And that is bigger than the color of the cups.

Until next time.

Wow all that was so good to get out. I am a huge fan of writing, not only does it help me personally but I truly believe it can help others. I want to start this post by saying that there is not another religion that I would want to be part of than be a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints. Like if I walked away it would not be to jump onto another ship. I also feel that I need to point out that I do not feel that any prophet or his apostles have taught things wrong, my understanding could have been wrong. I believe that I naturally have anxieties that are magnified with things I hear members say, it might be comments shared in or out of church or it might be a teacher who thinks they got it all right and love hearing themselves talk. We are all given agency and we all have the ability to decipher what we hear and apply it or not. Unfortunately I hung too strongly on the teachings and opinions of others to build my belief system. Not to say that what they did to feel close to God was not a great thing for them, but it was not a great thing for me. Example of this, I love animals. They are so precious to me. I can feel God through my sweet dogs stronger than other typical ways of feeling God. I made this comment to a loved one and was told that I was messed up. I wish I knew then what I do now, or had bigger cahonies to say something. We cannot choose how God speaks to our hearts sometimes. I spent awhile thinking I was wrong in feeling Gods presence through animals. But then through my own ponderings and logic I realized that these animals are precious and sacred to God. Why would they be on this earth if not to bring joy and understanding to his children (we just got 2 puppies for our children, and God gave His children pets too LOL)?  People search and search for deep teachings when in reality things can be much more simple. I consider it a gift I have to feel God through a creation that cannot even speak. How sad it is to me that some are too narrow minded and closed off and strict with a stick ……(you know where) to even comprehend that perhaps God is capable of speaking to each of us completely different from each other. I have 2 children, boy girl twins actually. I speak to them equal yet very different from the other. Dinosaurs are the way to my sons heart and how he knows I am interested in him and love him when I know the names of his fav dinosaurs. While on the other hand my daughter knows that I love her when I decorate her room with her or take the time to do her hair do requests. So you see, I am thinking that is how God talks to us, equal yet different. It is WHY I do not get that same warm and fuzzy feeling reading scriptures as I get when I am cuddling an animal. And that is ok. I love that my son gets so excited about dinosaurs and that they make him so happy. I love that my daughter loves to decorate her room and make it look beautiful at only 6 years old. Neither is wrong in what brings them joy. If we are meant to learn about God through being parents ourselves then may I suggest that we look closer at WHAT makes our children happy. We can then use this to help them understand their own gifts from God.

My love for animals is actually what lead to the baptism of a coworker. We bonded over talking about dogs, then several years later she called to tell me she was getting baptized and said it all started with me telling her that I believed animals have souls when she asked what I believed. She asked me what my faith was. She is someone I spoke to about twice a year. That’s it. So yes people are watching and listening and I choose to love them and not ask if they’re LDS just because they seem pure. Religion of an individual does not matter at all to me. Something that I am sure members mean no harm in, yet probably offends others is when they ask someone “are you LDS?” I have despised hearing this question for years now. If a person says “yes I am” then I guess it makes the person asking feel safer in the conversation? I have no idea. What do you think the person feels if they are not LDS when they are asked? I feel so bad for the individuals that say “whats that? Or no I am not.” I have never been asked if I was Baptist, or Catholic etc hahahaha and it would make me feel like I couldn’t join the party if someone asked me that. In my previous life before children I had the opportunity to meet a lot of people from all walks of life through my job. I loved meeting new individuals. I would often spend 2-3 days with them every 6 months. As they would get to know me and find out I was from Utah they would ask if I was Mormon. I would happily say “Yes” their response almost every single time was “Well you’re a cool Mormon” hahahaha. I would laugh each time not knowing exactly what they meant. I was even introduced to people they knew like this, “This is Char, she is Mormon, but don’t worry she is cool”. I knew from that moment on that I was going to be watched a little closer, but it did not change the way I did anything, I treat people well because I love them and I love laughing with them. Finally I asked someone who called me a cool Mormon what that actually meant. They told me that the Mormons they had met were judgy and they felt mistreated by them, that they did not feel that they fit in or were good enough, that the Mormons they met felt uptight. I assured the individual that that most definitely was not how Mormons have been taught to treat others and I apologized that that was their experience. Then I kinda wanted to hunt down those Mormons to tell them to stop making a bad name for us “cool Mormons” hahaha. People are precious and ALL of them matter. I know that I am still on a very long journey trying to figure all this church stuff out, but one thing that I DO have figured out and thankfully have for some time is that LOVE is what matters the most. Kindness, LOVE and RESPECT towards others regardless of their beliefs is WHAT matters the most and WHAT will bring them closer to GOD. It is more important that you show KINDNESS than tell your beliefs.

-Peace Out.

How to start this ginormous, all telling and self exposing adventure? For the sake of trying to avoid a forever long description of the history that brought me to this point (I hate reading those recipe blogs that have a story as to WHY they made cookies that day , like just tell me how to make the $%#@ cookies already) I am just going to say this. I am a Mormon who learned it all wrong. So wrong. Being a member of this church is a giant pain the way I have been doing it. It is DEPRESSING and ANXIETY INDUCING. I have felt constant GUILT and little to no peace. IT SUCKS. I have without realizing it been “righteously judging” others (also that is not a thing in my world anymore). I have felt like because of my obedience and faithfulness that I was so deserving of blessings and when those blessings did not come I absolutely knew it was because I swore here and there and I love my green tea (stop reading now and move onto something else if you have an issue that I drink green tea, or better yet go take a swig of your diet soda because that is SO much healthier). I am writing this all for my own self discovery because I really need it and I am positive that there are others out there who feel like I have felt. You follow the commandments out of fear and habit or guilt. You are afraid of God. You believe he is waiting to punish you. You feel guilty for the DUMBEST things, like running to the store on Sunday because you really wanted an ingredient (the “good Mormons” don’t do this). If you clean your house on the sabbath you have a sense of wrong doing. You know who you are, I know who you are…..and guess what, God knows exactly who you are and I actually believe that you are wired so wrong, been taught wrong or understood teachings wrong. You pray out of habit but not out of desire, then you feel bad that you don’t have a burning desire to pray. Also reading scriptures is something you will do if you MUST but they are boring and time consuming to you and then you feel bad even feeling that way. There is no way that you would actually admit any of this to certain people, and especially not in church. You really want to have that firm testimony that others say they have, so you kinda decide to fake it till you make it.

All of this in turn grows your guilt:

Do you love God?

You think so, but you are also afraid of Him because you have been taught about his judgement but then know He is Merciful (no idea how that works but I am happy that it does). So how on earth can you love someone who you are afraid of? You cant. How do you feel love from someone who is there to punish you? You cant. I am so sure that many that are reading this either completely understand what I am saying and can so relate. Or you are judging me for actually writing these things, if you feel judgment towards me then shame on you. You need to pray for understanding on others hearts not just understanding of the scriptures. Perhaps you are reading this feeling sorry for me and think I am lost, I will assure you that I am not lost, I feel very lucky that I have come to this point so I can find happiness in this faith.  I once believed that the only reason someone would leave the church was due to sin. How wrong I was. I almost walked away from the church less than a year ago, and there was no “big sin” going on in my life. I worthily held a temple recommend (I told the stake presidency member that I drink green tea at my renewal and never was told to stop) , I was keeping my covenants, attending church each week, was a Young Women’s advisor, paid a full tithe, no R rated movies etc etc etc. I was a “Good Mormon”. And to be honest NONE of that has changed, but my perspectives greatly have. I cannot quite say what specifically cracked me and threw me into a religious crisis, but for several years crap after crap happened, life had gotten tremendously hard for YEARS. I am not saying that I should have not had these things happen. But when I prayed I felt nothing. Nothing. I was fine that hard things kept hitting but I did feel that I at the very least, that a glimmer of comfort from the God who created me was ok to be expected.

I wandered for a long time just waiting to feel something. Then when I continued to feel nothing something else so traumatizing happened and I broke. The next day I was in bed in tears praying for ANYTHING, and still nothing. Why would a God that “loved me” just abandon me like this. Why didn’t I deserve to feel a sliver of comfort? I began answering this question, I swore sometimes, I did not enjoy scripture reading (I still don’t and that’s ok), I was not as “righteous” as I needed to be, therefore either I was not deserving, or God was not real. You see, the way I had been taught or understood things was that God blesses those who deserve it. So I stopped praying, I stopped believing. Believing my entire life had lead me to this, when I needed him most he was not there. I was tired of blaming myself, it was causing me so much depression thinking that I sucked at life. So I left it. I sat my husband down and told him to leave me now instead of later because I wanted nothing to do with this church of guilt and anxiety. I was finished. He was so kind and assured me that he was not going anywhere. He then told me something that I am telling you. “Let go of it all. Stop doing all of it………EXCEPT……..the 2 greatest commandments, You love God with all your heart, might, mind and strength. And you love your neighbor as yourself”. And that is what I have strived to do. Loving others has pretty much always come naturally to me but I realized that loving God has not…….because honestly I am trying to teach myself to not be afraid of him. I cannot love someone who I am scared of. So those of you who have judged others, do you realize the DAMAGE you are causing, people can feel your judgement. You do not have to say anything “judgy” for it to be felt. If someone falls to the natural man and you judge them for this, how is that any different than YOU falling to your natural man to judge? Sounds like both need Gods grace equally.

In the midst of my silent battle with all of this there have been some well meaning members say the DUMBEST things. If you know me then I am sure that you are in shock that I have thought heavily about leaving this church. When I was teaching my 11-14 year old girls one Sunday, I had Henna on me. My niece loves doing Henna at family parties and she always does some on me and my kiddos. My son gets a dinosaur every time hahahaha. Any way, the other woman who I served with (she knew my niece did henna on me) shared a comment that I know she felt was “being an example or standing for truth and righteousness” and out of nowhere said that her niece asked her at a family party if she could draw some henna on her, she said that she told her niece “my body is a temple so no I do not want you to  put henna on me.” My henna was visible, I sat there in disbelief. Why would she do that? I then moved passed it and continued to teach my sweet girls, then I noticed something on one of my girls (whose mother is not active), she had henna on her hands too. I am so thankful that SHE was not alone with henna on her. I tell this story because the DAMAGE that is being done in these comments can be lifelong. So what was worse in Gods eyes? The henna or that comment? I am not God, but if He loves me the way I am hoping he does, is he disappointed in me having henna on me? I don’t know. But I do know that nowhere has it been said that henna is a sin. This is where personal discretion comes in. This is also where YOUR opinions need to stay out. If you are trying to be Christlike and you think henna is wrong, then simply don’t get any, but at the same token do not take it upon yourself to share YOUR opinion. Our opinions are ours and you might be holding yourself to a standard that is healthy for you, but your standard is just that, YOURS. Before we speak we need to ask WHY we are saying it. Trying to guilt someone into “choosing the right” is actually mocking them. I used to as I call it “Jesus shame” my kids, “Jesus does not like it when you hit each other”. What the hello was I thinking????? The reality of it is that Jesus probably is not that worried about kids being kids. Why would I use Jesus Christ in a shameful way to try to get my point across? If I want my kids to know that Jesus loves them (especially when the difficult teen years come and that love will hopefully carry them through) then I need to be helping them build a healthy relationship with Him.

So much more that I want to share and will share as I figure this all out. My relationship with God completely crumbled but I am trying to have faith that He will take those pieces and build them up stronger. I am not letting myself feel ashamed for not praying out of habit, I am trying to focus my prayers now on only giving thanks. I do not pray as often as I once did, and you know what, when I do pray they mean something. I still swear sometimes and probably always will (not in front of my kids) but last time I was interviewed I was not asked if I swear. So simplifying my religious beliefs and loving others and really trying to see their hearts is the goal I am working on, because I do believe that has a better chance of getting me into heaven than saying I read the scriptures every day but don’t apply what they are really trying to say.

-Peace out for now