Gem 5-30-13 Mistakes and Pearls

Mistakes and Pearls

Turning Bad into Good

by Pennie Rumsey

Coated Mistakes

My daughter had a pearl necklace, and last week it broke. This morning while I was exercising I found one of the pearls on the ground. As I picked it up and looked at it, the thought struck me: This is a mistake. Yes, the necklace breaking was a mistake. But also the very pearl being created was also a mistake. A grain of sand went into an oyster where it didn’t necessarily belong. It accidentally got in there because the oyster lives on the ocean floor where opposition of dirt and pressure abound. But an All-Wise Creator, knowing that mistakes would happen, provided a way ahead of time for that mistake to turn into a precious pearl. The oyster itself was created to coat it’s mistakes in a fine smooth shimmering glaze. After a long while of rolling around in the oyster shell, when that mistake came out, it was a pearl.

Have you ever become aware of your actions and they caused you pain? We might say, “It was a mistake. I didn’t mean to do it. I didn’t know what I was doing.” It is painful when we become aware of how our uncontrolled reactions have hurt other people, especially our children.

This week’s Gem is part of Nicholeen’s answer to one such mother who was in pain, who had recently become aware of her past action. If you haven’t made your calm plan, now is a great time to go back and start over. As Nicholeen said, “It’s never too late.” You can always start over. Rewind and redo. It’s okay.

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Challenge Assignment

Your challenge assignment this week, should you choose to accept it, is to add one thing to your list of one way that you get calm or to add one thing to your calm plan, and then use it every chance you get. What is your trigger? What else could you do? Pick a new trigger. Stop. Push pause. Get calm. Moving ahead when you’re not calm will only move you ahead in the wrong direction. The way we do what we need to do is more important that what we get done.

One Way to Apply

The thing that I added to my “Get Calm” plan last week was doing a Z-Model analysis asking myself “What principle am I missing here? What do I need to be focusing on?” For me, now that I have those foundational principles, it has added to the strength of my ‘getting calm’ muscle. Writing was already on my list, but this exercise added another layer of strength for me. I also visualized myself using my chosen new trigger.

I wrote this in my journal:

I feel angry. I want to use my hands to grab and force my children to do what they are told. I am authoritarian and I hate it.

My body feels hot; my face feels like it’s on fire. My eyes feel like knifes shooting out lava. What principles am I forgetting?

Left side: Force Anger Agent of Satan Make them obey

Right Side: Agency Love Servant of God Gardener Teach them the right way

What is my role?

It is not my job to make them obey. It is my job to teach them the right way, to live it, and invite them to obey. I will do right thing, even if I am the only one doing it- At least for now.

If you have committed to change your future, then it’s time to forgive yourself for your past. Move forward, look up, and you’ll go up. Each choice you make gives a higher or lower ground for the next choice to be harder or easier.

Each of us are the pearl inside of the oyster of life. We live in a world of pressure and opposition. As you continue to practice your Self-Government, when you come out of this life, you will have mastered yourself.

Your life is given to you to choose what you will do with it. Choose to find a way to turn your mistakes into pearls.

To The Victory of Your Family,

Pennie Rumsey

Student Inspirer