Tag Archives: loss

Families, Traditions, and Choices

Parents have always wanted the best for their children. We want them to be beautiful, healthy, and prosperous. We’d like them to be more successful than us. Children want to be more prosperous than their parents. They desire greater success than their parents found. Sometimes it works, other times it doesn’t.

Throughout history parents have also been saddened when children have left the values held dear. Children become enthralled by foreign ideas, becoming lost to family ways of life and culture. A glance at the past century will illustrate the point.

Cities enticed young people away from the farms and mores of families from the country. A desire for easy living seduced them from the solid values parents believed in from their childhood. Later, things like cars, alcohol, and women beguiled children from standards parents felt were important.

Of course, parents do not begrudge a child’s success. Long ago, children were tied to the land, or required to continue the occupation of their fathers, regardless of the desires or talents of the young. These parents were cheered by any growth and improvement beyond their own. Great stories rarely come from a son continuing in his father’s livelihood. It is when the son or daughter break away and try new things that wonderful tales are shared.

Sometimes, the breaking away from childhood ethics and teachings cause parents great sorrow. The beliefs of a parent are deeply held, not given up because the world changes around them. Through time, a child leaving the religion of their parents has been a time of grief.

Eve felt heartache when her children chose to leave the faith she and Adam learned from their God in the Garden of Eden. Many children chose the darkness of the destroyer rather than the light of the gospel. Since then, this has been a source of sorrow for believing parents of all sects.

When I wrote Eve Remembers, I imagined the following conversation between Eve and her beloved Adam:

  “How did we lose them? We taught them.” I stood and began to pace.

“We taught them,” Adam said, his voice soothing. “Remember, they must have agency to choose, or we will be giving in to Lucifer’s plan. He wants us to force them to obey. We cannot. We must trust that they will return to the light.”

“I know.” I stopped pacing and stood in front of him, looking into his brilliant blue eyes. “I thought the sorrow of children would be in giving birth. Now I find that it comes as they make choices we would rather they would not. It is so much harder now, just watching, not able do anything.”

Today, parents continue to struggle with the sorrow of a child’s rejection of long held beliefs and traditions. Some manage to stay close, glad the child has found joy in the new found religion. Others become estranged, refusing to speak to each other.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could find common ground, building trust and love amongst loved ones?

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Live Honorably and Plan for the Future

We never know which moment will be our last. It could be this one, or any one of the next hundred years. Honor comes from standing tall, living each moment strong, as though it is your last. All the while, we must plan for life to continue.

I remember the days my sweetheart had responsibility for national safety in his job with the United States Navy. He was gone from our family frequently, and at odd hours of the day and night. Life for him was not easy. Though no active battle was fought, he participated in the cold war, protecting us from very real possible attack. For many long hours, he was found at his assigned post. In his 21 years, we could count on one hand the years we had Christmas or New Year’s Day together for the whole day.

I, too, was at my post, maintaining our home and nurturing our children. There were many lonely days and nights, days when the children attempted to be quiet because “daddy’s sleeping.” Special days were spent without daddy. I took the children to the zoo and birthday parties, and church, and many other places, alone. He was working or sleeping to go back to work. I nurtured, I waited, and welcomed the time we were together.

Through it all, we had plans for the future—retire, get new jobs, learn to live a civilian life, watch our children grow, and grow old together. Of course, there were other goals, other dreams, other plans. Some, we managed to achieve. Some we decided were not worth pursuing, and new goals and dreams were set.

Life is never easy. Some moments seem to be wonderful and smooth, but those moments don’t last. On days and years when life is less than wonderful, one is tempted to bury the head in the pillow and stay in bed. But life continues, and we must claw out of bed and depression into the bright light of day and responsibilities.

Some give up, stop planning, stop dreaming, stop trying. The next years, even decades of their lives are sad, undirected. Each of us is responsible for our own lives. Often, we are responsible for much more than that. We have families, religion, neighbors, and work. These responsibilities call to us.

I like the quote by CS Lewis: “Be found at one’s post, living each day as though it were our last, but planning as though our world might last 100 years.” Regardless of our station in life, we have responsibilities, a “post to man.” Giving up is not a choice. We live our best, never knowing if Father in Heaven will call us home. We attempt to live honorably, with hope and trust.

We are created with the desire to live; we do all we can to hang onto this dear life. We may fear the change brought by our moving to the next life, or may look forward to it. Either way, we find ourselves doing all we can to continue breathing. I have seen older folks struggle to breathe, to maintain life even when that life had little “quality,” supported by intense mechanical means.

As I have been considering the life of Eve and Adam I have wondered that they could maintain a zest for life over their hundreds of years. Events that would drag a lesser person to the depths of sorrow and depression were overcome; loss became stepping stones to greater life. These noble parents did more than just survive; they lived life joyfully, embracing new situations, welcoming opportunities to learn. Eve stood at her post, her home, whether working beside Adam to subdue the earth, or wait for him as he traveled to preach the Gospel of the Savior to their children. Together they lived life with verve, to the fullest, planning to live many years, making goals, loving family.

Can we do any less? Stand firm at the post we have been assigned. Live life fully as though it may be our last. And through it all, plan to live a long and happy life. Sounds easy? Maybe, but it is possible. It can be done. Live honorably. Love your neighbor and yourself. Plan for the future. Move forward always doing your very best. In this, we can hope for a better life in the next world with our Father.

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