Book excerpts- exceedingly LONG

I'm loving these two books! (I bolded the words)

From: Tuesdays With Morrie, By Mitch Albom

Have you found someone to share your heart with?" he asked.
"Are you giving to your community?"
"Are you at peace with yourself?"
"Are you trying to be as human as you can possibly be?"

. . . I did not have long discussion over egg salad sandwiches about the meaning of life. My days were full, yet I remained, much of the time, unsatisfied.
What happened to me?

... "Dying," Morrie suddenly said, is only one thing to be sad over, Mitch. Living unhappily is something else. So many of the people who come to visit me are unhappy." p. 34-35


"So many people walk around with a meaningless life. They seem half-asleep, even when they're busy doing things they think are important. This is because they're chasing the wrong things. The way you get meaning into your life is to devote yourself to loving others, devote yourself to your community around you, and devote yourself to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning." p. 43


"The most important thing in life is to learn how to give out love, and to let it come in."
His voice dropped to a whisper. "Let it come in. We think we don't deserve love, we think that if we let it in we'll become too soft. But a wise man named Levine said it right. He said, "Love is the only rational act.' " p. 52

"If you hold back on the emotions- if you don't allow yourself to go all the way through them- you can never get to being detached, you're too busy being afraid. You're afraid of the pain, you're afraid of the grief. You're afraid of the vulnerability that loving entails.
But by throwing yourself into these emotions, by allowing yourself to dive in, all the way, over your head even, you experience them fully and completely. You know what pain is, you know what love is. You know what grief is. And only then can you say, 'all right. I have experienced that emotion. I recognize that emotion. Now I need to detach from that emotion for a moment.' "... "When you learn how to die, you learn how to live." pg. 104

I thought about how often this was needed in every-day life. How we feel lonely, sometimes to the point of tears, but we don't let those tears come because we are not supposed to cry. Or how we feel a surge of love for a partner but we don't say anything because we're frozen with the fear of what those words might do to the relationship.

Morrie's approach was exactly the opposite. Turn on the faucet. Wash yourself with the emotion. It won't hurt you. It will only help. If you let the fear inside, if you pull it on like a familiar shirt, then you can say to yourself, "All right, it's just fear, I don't have to let it control me. I see it for what it is."

Same for loneliness: you let go, let the teas flow, feel it completely- but eventually be able to say, "All right that was my moment with loneliness. I'm not afraid of feeling lonely, but now I'm going to put that loneliness aside and know that there are other emotions in the world, and I'm going to experience them as well." p. 105


Why are we embarrassed by silence? What comfort do we find in all the noise? p. 53


"We've got a form of brainwashing going on in our country," Morrie sighed. "Do you know how they brainwash people? They repeat something over and over. And that's what we do in this country. Owning things is good. More money is good. More property is good. More commercialism is good. More is good. More is good. We repeat it-and have it repeated to us- over and over until nobody bothers to even think otherwise. The average person is so fogged up by all this, he has no perspective on what's really important anymore."

... "You know how I always interpreted that? These were people so hungry for love that they were accepting substitutes. They were embracing material things and expecting a sort of hug back. But it never works. You can't substitute material things for love[,] or for gentleness [,] or for tenderness [,] or for a sense of comradeship." p. 124-125

"Do the kinds of things that come from the heart. When you do, you won't be dissatisfied, you won't be envious, you won't be longing for somebody else's things. On the contrary, you'll be overwhelmed with what comes back." p. 128


The fact is, there is no foundation, no secure ground, upon which people may stand today if it isn't the family. It's become clear to me as I've been sick. If you don't have the support and love and caring concern that you get from a family, you don't have much at all. Love is so supremely important. As our great poet Auden said, "Love each other or perish."
Without love we are birds with broken wings. p. 91-92


What if you had one day[,] perfectly healthy, I asked? What would you do?

"... Let's see... I'd get up in the morning, do my exercises, have a lovely breakfast of sweet rolls and tea, go for a swim, then have my friends come over for a nice lunch. I'd have them come one or two at a time so we could talk about their families, their issues, talk about how much we mean to each other.

Then I'd like to go for a walk, in a garden with some tress, watch their colors, watch the birds, take in the nature that I haven't seen in so long now.

In the evening, we'd all go together to a restaurant with some great pasta, maybe some duck-I love duck- and then we'd dance the rest of the night. I'd dance with all the wonderful dance partners out there, until I was exhausted. And then I'd go home and have a deep wonderful sleep."
That's it?
"That's it."

It was so simple. So average. I was actually a little disappointed. I figured he'd fly to Italy or have lunch with the President or romp on the seashore or try every exotic thing he could think of. After all these months, lying there, unable to move a leg or a foot- how could he find perfection in such an average day?

Then I realized this was the whole point. p. 176



The Peacegiver
by James L. Ferrell, Deseret Book. (2004).

~"... when the Savior comes to you with the sins of others upon him, he offers you a view of others that only he knows. He begs you to see as he sees-- as One how knows every pain, insecurity, aspiration, and infirmity because he has taken them upon himself. He will show you others as he sees and loves them, and he will help you to see and love them that way as well, for he begs you not merely to un-gird your sword but to un-gird your heart. If you do, the miracle of his atonement will flow freely, and you, like David will put down war and take up bread and drink and sheep and figs."


... if we grant this forgiveness in full, he atones in full for the pain and burdens that have come at others' hands. He blesses us with his own love, his own appreciation, his own companionship, his own strength to endure. And if we have these, what do we lack? P. 70-71

The Lord's Atonement and Mercy
1. We are all of us sinners, entitled to nothing but hell and therefore utterly and equally depending on the mercies of the Lord. (Jonah)
2. I can receive of the Lord's mercy-and the happiness, healing, and peace that attend it--only to the extent I extend the same to others. (Jonah)
3. The Lord mercifully removes any justification for failing to extend mercy to others. (Abigail)
a. For the Lord has taken the sins of others upon his own head and personally atoned for them. (Abigail)
b. What possible justification could there be for demanding more for others' sins than the Lord has given? (Abigail)
4. I can recover mercy by remembering (a)Abigail's offering, (b) the Lord's question to Jonah, and (c) my own sins, the memory of which brings me to the Lord and invites me to rediscover his mercy and peace.
5. If I repent of failing to extend mercy, the Lord will supply me with everything I need and more--he will grant me his love, his companionship, his understanding, his support. He will make my burdens light. (Abigail) pg. 128-129


[I've never read such a great description of how Satan gets us to follow him!]}

~~He leadeth them by the neck with a flaxen cord until he bindeth them with his strong cords forever. 2Nephi 26:22

Rick suddenly plunged into the darkness beneath him. He found himself on the earth among throngs of people in a great mist of darkness. Some were laughing, others crying, still others walked in grim silence. All, however, were moving, even those who thought they were not. The mist was moving, and all within were moving as it moved. It was all very curious, as if the people were embedded within the mist--part of it, as it were--and so moved in unison with it.

Why don't they struggle against it! Rick wondered. Why do they simply follow?

Rick looked intently at the throng. Here and there he noticed the soft fluttering of the flaxen cord he had seen a few moments earlier, lighting on the people before him like the line of a master fly fisherman. The people never flinched under the cord's touch. They appeared to be unaware of its presence.

Rick focused more intently and noticed, to his astonishment, that the mist of darkness was made up entirely of this cord as it swirled in and around the children of men. Above his head, the fluttering, gray mists darkened steadily until they gathered as one into a funnel of metallic darkness in the skies overhead, ending finally in the grip of the great hand he had seen earlier.

And Satan looked up and laughed, and his angels rejoiced. Moses 7:26 pgs. 141-143

~~Consider the terrible irony,"..."We fought a battle in the heavens in order to protect this precious commodity of agency... and then as if we were central characters in a Greek tragedy, we come to this earth and exercise that agency in a way that effectively gives it away. pg. 153


... he became subject to the devil ...because he yielded unto temptation. (D&C 29:40) pg.157

... "One transgression, one choice away from the Lord, and what happens? The transgressor becomes blinded to his responsibility for sin, and he begins to fall into the captivity of the devil, which are the chains--the chains of sin-- that keep him from feeling the need or desire to return to the Savior. This is how we become subject to the will of the devil when we yield to temptation." pg. 160


Satan leads captive at his will those who do not hearken unto the Lord's voice. (see Moses 4:4)

We ARE subject to his will. Think about it. Do we always do what we know we should? Do we love, or forgive, or pray like we know we should?" ... so you see...we ARE subject to his will. Even in the face of knowledge, we choose away from the Lord. We find ourselves falling away from the diligent living of his commandments, and from the DESIRE to fully live them.
pg. 159-161

~~Losing sight of our sinfulness, we lose sight of our need for the One who has come to heal the sinner.

Precisely when we are most sinful and therefore most in need of repentance we least feel the desire or need to repent. This is the predicament of sin. And this is why the Lord himself declared, "I require the hearts of the children of men (D&C 64:22)." and why the prophets have uniformly declared that what is required is not just a cessation of sinful 'acts", but a mighty change in our heats. Only this mighty change of heart can loose us from the chains of hell." see Alma 5:10-14.

Knowledge for the mind is never by itself enough to break from the chains of sin. Such knowledge can be helpful, to be sure, but only if it leads you to him who is powerful to save. Salvation is not in a sentence... however profound. It is rather in a person--in the Messiah, come to earth, to deliver man from his sins.




..."in order to redeem us from the chains of sin, the Savior had to take upon himself all the chains that bind us to sin (Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation pg. 1954-6)[.] ... He had to shoulder the burden of the combined weight of the sins of the world- our sinful desires, our predispositions and addictions toward sin, our darkened hearts. The scriptures declare that he suffered as well everything that might lead us to sin-our pains and afflictions and temptations of every kind (Alma 7:11)."
...
With all of this sinfulness heaped upon him, he then had to withstand the unimaginable onslaught of the entire power and fury of the forces of hell, and do so, as Paul described further, "yet remaining without sin (Alma 7:13)." For Satan knew that if he could wield the power of his captivity--the chains of our sinfulness that lay ready to bind the Savior - and entice the Savior to sin, he would bring the Savior into captivity as well. Then the destruction of agency would be complete, and mankind would be left without a way for their hearts to be purified and cleansed. There would therefore be no way for any of us to return to the Father, where only the clean and pure can dwell. pg. 176-7

The Lord [overcame] all... and [will forge] you a new heart--clean , pure, undefiled, free. pg. 178


"The captivity of sin has been broken! The Lord God Almighty has risen with "healing in his wings(Isiah )." He stretches forth his arms to the world, feeling after them with his Holy Spirit. He comes to each of us posing the questions he posed to Jonah [should I not save Nineveh?], pleading with us, as Abifgail did, to forgive, and literally dying to give us his Spirit and the new heat he has forged that will free us from the chains of our sins. "pg. 178-9



"When you tore your rotator cuff in college, Ricky, did you afterwards abuse your shoulder? By that I mean, did you get angry at it and treat it roughly?"
"Of course not."
Why not? It was causing you pain."
Becaus it was my own shoulder. What good would it do to hurt it further? I'd only be hurting myself."

"We are one with our bodies, and for that reason, we don't react to a pain in a member of the body by inflicting that member with more pain. On the contrarty, we dress it, succor it, and nurse it back to health. If anything, we love most those parts of us that bring us the most pain. For they need us the most, and we, them." pg. 181

Here is how you will know whether you are one with [them] when, as you would for a limb or a joint, you cheristh and nourish [them] when [they are] hurting. Do so, and you will feel nourished and cherished yourself." pg. 183

"It was given to me to know that we all shine forth a portion of the Lord's glory, and that we shine more brightly when we are living closest to him. Usually we do not perceive this light with our eyes, but you have felt it at times when you have been in the presence of saintly men and women ... this is because they live in tune with the Master. I noticed as I observed our lives that my light was growing dimmer. Something else that astonished me was that your grandmother's light was nearly always brighter than mine. ... Her light, too, was growing dimmer, however, with each succeeding year of our marriage, and at that moment, for the first time I started to feel sorry. I broke down and cried as I hadn't in years."
. . .
"It's not your marriage that needs saving, ... it's your love."
Learn to love [them] with my love, and then, whether your marriage continues or not, you will have gained a companion." Love [them] even if [they] choose to divorce you. Then you will be married indeed." pg. 186

I know the joy that was forged in Gethsemane. I know the Savior's mercy and love. I have felt it, I have bathed in it, I have been saved by it. And I continue to be saved by it every day. ... If I stand before you worthy, it is only because of the merits of the Son of God. pg 187.