Helaman 16
16:1-8 - Samuel’s message was heard by many people and their reactions were varied. Some believed his words and those who did “went forth and sought for Nephi; and when they had come forth and found him they confessed unto him their sins and denied not, desiring that they might be baptized unto the Lord.” I had never considered this fact, but Hugh Nibley reminds us that they sought out Nephi because “he was the one who had authority to do it. So they didn’t go to Samuel; they went to Nephi after they heard the preaching o Samuel.” It’s interesting because I had never considered this as being a significant point, but when I heard this it made me think about those who are saying that the contribution of women in the church isn’t significant because they don’t hold the priesthood, and I was thinking, Samuel taught them amazing things, and Nephi had the authority to baptize them, it was a team effort they were both needed to accomplish the works of the Lord, so in the end, who’s better? Samuel or Nephi? The answer is that they are both equally loved and cherished by God, they are both critical in the effort to help people repent, anyone who doesn’t believe that might also believe that the call to be a Stake President is just as important as a call to be the nursery leader, and as the nursery leader, I don’t feel any less important than anyone else. To me, this was a great example of how authority doesn’t make you less able to use God’s power; it doesn’t make you inferior in the receiving of personal revelation. Those feelings might stem from a personal insecurity that the Lord will help heal you from, He did it for me. Some people believed Samuel but the vast majority did not, and they were furious with him “and they cast stones at him upon the wall, and also many shot arrows at him as he stood upon the wall; but the Spirit of the Lord was with him, insomuch that they could not hit him with their stones neither with their arrows.” This might be one of the reasons that Hugh Nibley (HN from now on, this is getting ridiculous,) says that the one painting that we have is incredibly inaccurate. From that high on the wall, if the people didn’t hit him, it wouldn’t be that unlikely, but with a lower wall, if nothing hit him, from a closer range that would be an incredible miracle. The IM says that “the protection Samuel received while he delivered his message of repentance is not unusual. The scriptures include several examples of prophets who were threatened but whose lives were miraculously guarded so they could complete their missions. Consider the following examples and recall how they were able to present the Lord’s words while under the threat of injury or death; Noah, Abraham, Lehi, Nephi, and Abinadi. Sometimes the Lord’s servants eventually lose their lives, but not until, as Abinadi declared, they have ‘delivered the message which the Lord sent (them) to deliver. Elder Robert D. Hales of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles reminds us: “Prophets of all dispensations have willingly put their lives on the line and, with courage, have done the will and proclaimed the word of God… Let us follow the example of our Lord Jesus Christ and His prophets, past and present. It may not be required of us to give our lives as martyrs, as did many of the prophets. What is required is our obedience to the Lord’s commandments and our faithfulness to the covenants we have mode with Him.’” This miracle astonished some people “when they saw that they could not hit him, there were many more who did believe on his words, insomuch that they went away unto Nephi to be baptized.” We are not converted by miracles, and I wish I could find it but I just heard a really good talk about how testimonies cannot be built on miracles, and like I learned last week, when they say that faith precedes the miracle, one of those meanings is not that God withholds miracles until we have sufficient faith, but that when a miracle does happen it is not enough to convert us to the gospel and give us a testimony. Case in point here is that the people who witness this miracle are not all convinced, because their hearts are so hardened that “the more part of them did not believe in the words of Samuel; therefore when they saw that they could not hit him with their stones and their arrows, they cried unto their captains, saying: Take this fellow and bind him, for behold he hath a devil; and because of the power of the devil which is in him we cannot hit him with our stones and our arrows; therefore take him and bind him, and away with him.” Gratefully, he was able to escape before he was captured, “and did flee out of their lands, yea, even unto his own country, and began to preach and to prophesy among his own people.” The IM quotes President Ezra Taft Benson as teaching “The prophet will not necessarily be popular with the world or the worldly. As a prophet reveals the truth is divides the people. The honest in heart heed his words, but the unrighteous either ignore the prophet or fight him. When the prophet points out the sins of the world, the worldly either want to close the mouth of the prophet or else act as if the prophet didn’t exist, rather than repent of their sins. Popularity is never a test of truth. Many a prophet has been killed or cast out. As we came closer to the Lord’s second coming, you can expect that as the people of the world become more wicked, the prophet will be less popular with them.” Truth will always be opposed by Satan and those who are influenced by him will fight against it with all they have to preserve their lifestyle.
16:9-21 - Over the next several years the people degenerate as “people began to be more hardened in iniquity, and do more and more of that which was contrary to the commandments of God.” The downward spiral into craziness, but there was still a righteous minority. Finally, in the 90th year “there were great signs given unto the people, and wonders; and the words of the prophets began to be fulfilled. And angels did appear unto men, wise men, and did declare unto them glad tidings of great joy; thus in this year the scriptures began to be fulfilled.” I know that angels appeared, but I would be interested to know what other signs and wonders and prophesies were being fulfilled, and I wonder if they were left out of the record on purpose. But all these things were explained away by the vast majority who did not believe who “began to depend upon their own strength and upon their own wisdom.” The IM quotes Elder Dallin H. Oaks as teaching “The Book of Mormon describes (an) attitude among a people who depended solely ‘upon their own strength and upon their own wisdom’ and upon what they could ‘witness with (their) own eyes.’ Upon the basis of reason, these persons rejected the prophecies, saying, ‘It is not reasonable that such a being as Christ shall come.’ Applying that same attitude, a prominent professor dismissed the Book of Mormon with the assertion, ‘You don’t get books from angels. It is just that simple.’ Those who seek gospel knowledge only by study and reason are particularly susceptible to the self-sufficiency and self-importance that sometimes characterize academic pursuits. As the apostle Paul observed in his day, ‘Knowledge puffeth up.’ He cautioned the learned: ‘Take heed lest by any means this liberty (knowledge) of your become a stumbling block to them that are weak… And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died?’ When deciding logically if the church is true or if Christ is real, there are always going to be conflicting points of view, conflicting perspectives, and conflicting evidence, I have a very strong logical testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel, however, I’m sure that there are questions of points of view that I can’t defend on a logical level, it is then that I must rely on my spiritual testimony to say “I don’t know everything, I don’t have all the answers, but I know deep within my soul that this truly is the gospel of Jesus Christ.” It’s like Joseph Smith said, I can’t find the exact quote, but he said something like “if someone relies solely on the logical testimony, they miss out on the greatness of the spiritual testimony,” or something like that. But it’s amazingly true, there is so much more out there if you allow your mind and spirit to work together instead of letting one over power the other. Some of the Nephites believed in the gospel and I’m sure were encouraged by the signs and wonders and this was “the most believing part of them, both of the Nephites and also of the Lamanites.” But of those who did not believe and began to become even harder hearted, they explained away all these things by saying:
1: “Some things they may have guessed right” – HN taught “the intellectuals began to explain everything, and there were commentators and panels and everything else to explain it all. Some things they may have guessed right, among so many.’ Statistically they may have guessed some things right and explained them. That’s true; that could happen that way. After all, so many things are happening, like great and marvelous words (they reasoned.)” I can see that depending on what the prophecy or wonder was that it might be easier to explain away. I always think this whenever I see a “How it really happened,” show on tv, I saw one once where they were dissecting the plagues of Egypt and said things like “well, there was a mud slide that caused all this red mud from 500 miles away to spill into the Nile, then it eventually drifted into where Moses was and it just so happened that he was cursing Egypt at the very same time.” Then they went on to say things like “well, there were always a lot of bugs in the area and at that time of year there was a lot of them, so that’s why that ‘plague’ happened.” And after a few roundabouts I was like “really? It’s easier for you to believe all those things just happened to come together at the very time Moses needed them? Really, that’s what’s easier for you to believe?” To me, most of the “explanations” of the miracles are more difficult to believe than the actual miracle itself.
2. “It is not reasonable that such a being as a Christ shall come” – HN reminds us that “this was Korihor’s line- it’s not logical.” If we are going to dispute the logical purpose of a Christ, then we need to start all the way at the beginning. I think we’ve done this enough times that I can skip the whole “why I believe, logically, that there is a God,” and just establish the fact that I know there is a God and I believe that he’s made a plan and that that plan is consistent with what’s been taught as Church doctrine. But the rest of the complaint of the people is that if “he be the Son of God, the Father of heaven and of earth, as it has been spoke, why will he not show himself unto us as well as unto them who shall be at Jerusalem?” Now I think that this is a significant and reasonable question, “if he’s made himself known unto us through prophets over the hundreds of years that we’ve been in this land, if he cares enough about us to make sure we know about him, why won’t he come show himself to us when he’s alive and in the flesh?” Fair question and I could see how I could have asked that same question if I had lived at that time. It was when I read this verse that I realized that we are hugely benefitted from the perspective of the future, because for some reason I had assumed that they knew that he was coming to visit them this whole time, and I know that he does because I’ve read the book before, however looking back on this most current reading, I don’t remember hearing about the prophesy that he will be showing himself to them. I wonder why that is, he knows that he’s going to visit, and probably the prophets do too but what is the purpose of withholding that information at this point? I don’t understand and I might guess that this is one of the issues that is going to be a faith building exercise, they have to rely on the other signs and wonders to serve as indicating markers that the prophets were right and that they should probably repent as a people.
3. “They can keep us in ignorance (by the teachings of Christ)” – Here they are disputing that the only reason that the prophets are teaching about Christ is because they want to keep the people under their power “therefore they can keep us in ignorance, for we cannot witness with our own eyes that they are true...for we depend upon them to teach us the word; and thus will they keep us in ignorance if we will yield ourselves unto them, all the days of our lives.” Ok fair enough, and after reflecting on the lack of prophesy concerning Jesus showing himself to the people after his resurrection, I have a new appreciation for this point of view, even though it’s wrong. So they can’t verifying with their eyes at that very second that what the prophets have said is true, but in what other ways can they know of the truth? They could feel it in their hearts, they could be sensitive to the Holy Ghost, they could pray and think and try the experimental seed that Alma talked about and after following the commandments see if their lives have improved or not. But that all requires a willingness to try and a heart soft enough to receive the answers and teachings, but clearly the people don’t have those because then they wouldn’t even be in this situation in the first place, trying to kill the prophets and run wild.
16:22-25 – Just in case there was any question about who was teaching these lies to the people, Mormon goes ahead and tells us here, “and they were much disturbed, for Satan did stir them up to do iniquity continually; yea, he did go about spreading rumors and contentions upon all the face of the land, that he might harden the hearts of the people against that which was good and against that which should come.” Hmmm…. Satan is at it again, and let’s just think for a moment and go back to the conversation, how do we know if what we are doing is beneficial? It’s the other half of the seed experiment, if what we are doing improves our lives, then it’s good, if what we are doing makes our lives worse or unhappy, then it is bad. If the society in which you live has is obsessed with rumors, contention, hard hearts, hatred, murder, etc. then it is probably founded on evil principles. If the society in which you live is loving, helpful, kind, compassionate, charitable, etc. then it is probably founded on righteous principles, this is how you know the difference, this is how we can tell what’s right or wrong if we are confused. Contention brings up hurt and anger and fear and hatred, it seethes negativity and obsession, which cannot come from God. On the other hand, love brings up happiness, fulfillment, comfort, purpose, and joy which cannot come from the devil. The IM quotes Elder Russell M. Nelson as teaching that “Satan Spreads Contention,” by saying “To understand why the Lord has commanded us not to ‘contend one with another,’ we must know the true source of contention. A Book of Mormon prophet revealed this important knowledge even before the birth of Christ… Contention existed before the earth was formed. When God’s plan for creation and mortal life on the earth was first announced, sons and daughters of God shouted for joy. The plan was dependent on man’s agency, his subsequent fall from the presence of God, and the merciful provision of a Savior to redeem mankind. Scriptures reveal that Lucifer sought vigorously to ament the plan by destroying the agency of man… Satan’s selfish efforts to alter the plan of God resulted in great contention in heaven… This war in heaven was not a war of bloodshed. It was a war of conflicting ideas- the beginning of contention. Scriptures repeatedly warn that the father of contention opposes the plan of our Heavenly Father. Satan’s method relies on the infectious canker of contention. Satan’s motive: to gain personal acclaim even over God Himself.” The phrase “canker of contention,” is an interesting one, because it conjures up images on like a mouth canker, and those things are terribly painful. They are open, festering, sometimes crippling wounds, and contention is the same way. It feeds off of itself, feeds off of other people’s negativity, negativity is highly contagious , unfortunately positivity isn’t as contagious, but makes the you feel good. Let’s try and be positive and happy and helpful and see how it makes us feel. Let’s try to make others feel good about themselves. It’s really interesting because I try to live by a few different mottos, like “treat people in a way that when the conversation is over they come away feeling better about themselves.” I am still working on this one, because I’m a very confrontational person but that is not good to be like that all the time, it has to be measured, meekness. When I first started to try to implement this saying in my life I started trying to be encouraging to people, positive, tell them that they’re doing a good job, be supportive. It’s made a difference in not only how people see me and how I see myself, but also how I see the people, because I try to see them in what they are doing right and then helping them to see that too, if they are willing to. I also have started using phrases or give advice in a manner that lets people know what I’m not assuming that what they did was wrong, or that they are at fault. For instance instead of saying “well you’re getting defensive,” I would say something like “well it’s natural for people in your situation to get defensive,” that seems to go over better, it allows the person to see another point of view without feeling attacked. Or I’ll say “can I play devil’s advocate here? Is it possible that when you say that to your mom she hears you say…..” Or instead of saying “he’s treating you bad because you allow him to, you need to break up with him or give him boundaries,” I’ll saying something like “I notice that when people I care about treat me poorly it’s because I don’t have any boundaries established and once I set them up we get along much better.” The first step is recognizing that what you say has the power to effect the other person, that they are a human being who deserves respect, and seeing them as an equal. There’s a book that really helped me learn this principle called “Leadership and Self-Deception,” the author has a very unique writing style, but it’s an excellent read. Learning how to treat others properly is a process, there is definitely a learning curve, and I’m not perfect in it yet for sure, but it’s changed me and changed the way that people feel once our conversation is finished, because there’s nothing worse than walking away knowing that you just made someone feel like crap about themselves. Another motto that I try to live by has to do with what I tell others and that is “if I tell this person this information, how will they view the person or situation that I’m talking about?” For instance, by telling people something like “my gardener mowed over my flowers,” that would make the other people think that the gardener is an idiot, is he? No, he’s a human being. By keeping that little tidbit of information to myself I don’t negatively sway their opinion of the gardener. Or if people are complaining at work about the schedule, if I jump in there with my two cents and tell about sometime when I feel like I was mistreated, it helps maintain an attitude of negativity about the workplace, the manager who makes the schedule, the conditions, when it would be much more helpful if we all had an attitude of gratitude about the amazingness of our jobs. It’s not easy and I’m definitely not perfect at this one either, but it’s definitely been an excellent guide post and I’m really happy with the results as far as how I feel about myself and how I get along with others.
16:9-21 - Over the next several years the people degenerate as “people began to be more hardened in iniquity, and do more and more of that which was contrary to the commandments of God.” The downward spiral into craziness, but there was still a righteous minority. Finally, in the 90th year “there were great signs given unto the people, and wonders; and the words of the prophets began to be fulfilled. And angels did appear unto men, wise men, and did declare unto them glad tidings of great joy; thus in this year the scriptures began to be fulfilled.” I know that angels appeared, but I would be interested to know what other signs and wonders and prophesies were being fulfilled, and I wonder if they were left out of the record on purpose. But all these things were explained away by the vast majority who did not believe who “began to depend upon their own strength and upon their own wisdom.” The IM quotes Elder Dallin H. Oaks as teaching “The Book of Mormon describes (an) attitude among a people who depended solely ‘upon their own strength and upon their own wisdom’ and upon what they could ‘witness with (their) own eyes.’ Upon the basis of reason, these persons rejected the prophecies, saying, ‘It is not reasonable that such a being as Christ shall come.’ Applying that same attitude, a prominent professor dismissed the Book of Mormon with the assertion, ‘You don’t get books from angels. It is just that simple.’ Those who seek gospel knowledge only by study and reason are particularly susceptible to the self-sufficiency and self-importance that sometimes characterize academic pursuits. As the apostle Paul observed in his day, ‘Knowledge puffeth up.’ He cautioned the learned: ‘Take heed lest by any means this liberty (knowledge) of your become a stumbling block to them that are weak… And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died?’ When deciding logically if the church is true or if Christ is real, there are always going to be conflicting points of view, conflicting perspectives, and conflicting evidence, I have a very strong logical testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel, however, I’m sure that there are questions of points of view that I can’t defend on a logical level, it is then that I must rely on my spiritual testimony to say “I don’t know everything, I don’t have all the answers, but I know deep within my soul that this truly is the gospel of Jesus Christ.” It’s like Joseph Smith said, I can’t find the exact quote, but he said something like “if someone relies solely on the logical testimony, they miss out on the greatness of the spiritual testimony,” or something like that. But it’s amazingly true, there is so much more out there if you allow your mind and spirit to work together instead of letting one over power the other. Some of the Nephites believed in the gospel and I’m sure were encouraged by the signs and wonders and this was “the most believing part of them, both of the Nephites and also of the Lamanites.” But of those who did not believe and began to become even harder hearted, they explained away all these things by saying:
1: “Some things they may have guessed right” – HN taught “the intellectuals began to explain everything, and there were commentators and panels and everything else to explain it all. Some things they may have guessed right, among so many.’ Statistically they may have guessed some things right and explained them. That’s true; that could happen that way. After all, so many things are happening, like great and marvelous words (they reasoned.)” I can see that depending on what the prophecy or wonder was that it might be easier to explain away. I always think this whenever I see a “How it really happened,” show on tv, I saw one once where they were dissecting the plagues of Egypt and said things like “well, there was a mud slide that caused all this red mud from 500 miles away to spill into the Nile, then it eventually drifted into where Moses was and it just so happened that he was cursing Egypt at the very same time.” Then they went on to say things like “well, there were always a lot of bugs in the area and at that time of year there was a lot of them, so that’s why that ‘plague’ happened.” And after a few roundabouts I was like “really? It’s easier for you to believe all those things just happened to come together at the very time Moses needed them? Really, that’s what’s easier for you to believe?” To me, most of the “explanations” of the miracles are more difficult to believe than the actual miracle itself.
2. “It is not reasonable that such a being as a Christ shall come” – HN reminds us that “this was Korihor’s line- it’s not logical.” If we are going to dispute the logical purpose of a Christ, then we need to start all the way at the beginning. I think we’ve done this enough times that I can skip the whole “why I believe, logically, that there is a God,” and just establish the fact that I know there is a God and I believe that he’s made a plan and that that plan is consistent with what’s been taught as Church doctrine. But the rest of the complaint of the people is that if “he be the Son of God, the Father of heaven and of earth, as it has been spoke, why will he not show himself unto us as well as unto them who shall be at Jerusalem?” Now I think that this is a significant and reasonable question, “if he’s made himself known unto us through prophets over the hundreds of years that we’ve been in this land, if he cares enough about us to make sure we know about him, why won’t he come show himself to us when he’s alive and in the flesh?” Fair question and I could see how I could have asked that same question if I had lived at that time. It was when I read this verse that I realized that we are hugely benefitted from the perspective of the future, because for some reason I had assumed that they knew that he was coming to visit them this whole time, and I know that he does because I’ve read the book before, however looking back on this most current reading, I don’t remember hearing about the prophesy that he will be showing himself to them. I wonder why that is, he knows that he’s going to visit, and probably the prophets do too but what is the purpose of withholding that information at this point? I don’t understand and I might guess that this is one of the issues that is going to be a faith building exercise, they have to rely on the other signs and wonders to serve as indicating markers that the prophets were right and that they should probably repent as a people.
3. “They can keep us in ignorance (by the teachings of Christ)” – Here they are disputing that the only reason that the prophets are teaching about Christ is because they want to keep the people under their power “therefore they can keep us in ignorance, for we cannot witness with our own eyes that they are true...for we depend upon them to teach us the word; and thus will they keep us in ignorance if we will yield ourselves unto them, all the days of our lives.” Ok fair enough, and after reflecting on the lack of prophesy concerning Jesus showing himself to the people after his resurrection, I have a new appreciation for this point of view, even though it’s wrong. So they can’t verifying with their eyes at that very second that what the prophets have said is true, but in what other ways can they know of the truth? They could feel it in their hearts, they could be sensitive to the Holy Ghost, they could pray and think and try the experimental seed that Alma talked about and after following the commandments see if their lives have improved or not. But that all requires a willingness to try and a heart soft enough to receive the answers and teachings, but clearly the people don’t have those because then they wouldn’t even be in this situation in the first place, trying to kill the prophets and run wild.
16:22-25 – Just in case there was any question about who was teaching these lies to the people, Mormon goes ahead and tells us here, “and they were much disturbed, for Satan did stir them up to do iniquity continually; yea, he did go about spreading rumors and contentions upon all the face of the land, that he might harden the hearts of the people against that which was good and against that which should come.” Hmmm…. Satan is at it again, and let’s just think for a moment and go back to the conversation, how do we know if what we are doing is beneficial? It’s the other half of the seed experiment, if what we are doing improves our lives, then it’s good, if what we are doing makes our lives worse or unhappy, then it is bad. If the society in which you live has is obsessed with rumors, contention, hard hearts, hatred, murder, etc. then it is probably founded on evil principles. If the society in which you live is loving, helpful, kind, compassionate, charitable, etc. then it is probably founded on righteous principles, this is how you know the difference, this is how we can tell what’s right or wrong if we are confused. Contention brings up hurt and anger and fear and hatred, it seethes negativity and obsession, which cannot come from God. On the other hand, love brings up happiness, fulfillment, comfort, purpose, and joy which cannot come from the devil. The IM quotes Elder Russell M. Nelson as teaching that “Satan Spreads Contention,” by saying “To understand why the Lord has commanded us not to ‘contend one with another,’ we must know the true source of contention. A Book of Mormon prophet revealed this important knowledge even before the birth of Christ… Contention existed before the earth was formed. When God’s plan for creation and mortal life on the earth was first announced, sons and daughters of God shouted for joy. The plan was dependent on man’s agency, his subsequent fall from the presence of God, and the merciful provision of a Savior to redeem mankind. Scriptures reveal that Lucifer sought vigorously to ament the plan by destroying the agency of man… Satan’s selfish efforts to alter the plan of God resulted in great contention in heaven… This war in heaven was not a war of bloodshed. It was a war of conflicting ideas- the beginning of contention. Scriptures repeatedly warn that the father of contention opposes the plan of our Heavenly Father. Satan’s method relies on the infectious canker of contention. Satan’s motive: to gain personal acclaim even over God Himself.” The phrase “canker of contention,” is an interesting one, because it conjures up images on like a mouth canker, and those things are terribly painful. They are open, festering, sometimes crippling wounds, and contention is the same way. It feeds off of itself, feeds off of other people’s negativity, negativity is highly contagious , unfortunately positivity isn’t as contagious, but makes the you feel good. Let’s try and be positive and happy and helpful and see how it makes us feel. Let’s try to make others feel good about themselves. It’s really interesting because I try to live by a few different mottos, like “treat people in a way that when the conversation is over they come away feeling better about themselves.” I am still working on this one, because I’m a very confrontational person but that is not good to be like that all the time, it has to be measured, meekness. When I first started to try to implement this saying in my life I started trying to be encouraging to people, positive, tell them that they’re doing a good job, be supportive. It’s made a difference in not only how people see me and how I see myself, but also how I see the people, because I try to see them in what they are doing right and then helping them to see that too, if they are willing to. I also have started using phrases or give advice in a manner that lets people know what I’m not assuming that what they did was wrong, or that they are at fault. For instance instead of saying “well you’re getting defensive,” I would say something like “well it’s natural for people in your situation to get defensive,” that seems to go over better, it allows the person to see another point of view without feeling attacked. Or I’ll say “can I play devil’s advocate here? Is it possible that when you say that to your mom she hears you say…..” Or instead of saying “he’s treating you bad because you allow him to, you need to break up with him or give him boundaries,” I’ll saying something like “I notice that when people I care about treat me poorly it’s because I don’t have any boundaries established and once I set them up we get along much better.” The first step is recognizing that what you say has the power to effect the other person, that they are a human being who deserves respect, and seeing them as an equal. There’s a book that really helped me learn this principle called “Leadership and Self-Deception,” the author has a very unique writing style, but it’s an excellent read. Learning how to treat others properly is a process, there is definitely a learning curve, and I’m not perfect in it yet for sure, but it’s changed me and changed the way that people feel once our conversation is finished, because there’s nothing worse than walking away knowing that you just made someone feel like crap about themselves. Another motto that I try to live by has to do with what I tell others and that is “if I tell this person this information, how will they view the person or situation that I’m talking about?” For instance, by telling people something like “my gardener mowed over my flowers,” that would make the other people think that the gardener is an idiot, is he? No, he’s a human being. By keeping that little tidbit of information to myself I don’t negatively sway their opinion of the gardener. Or if people are complaining at work about the schedule, if I jump in there with my two cents and tell about sometime when I feel like I was mistreated, it helps maintain an attitude of negativity about the workplace, the manager who makes the schedule, the conditions, when it would be much more helpful if we all had an attitude of gratitude about the amazingness of our jobs. It’s not easy and I’m definitely not perfect at this one either, but it’s definitely been an excellent guide post and I’m really happy with the results as far as how I feel about myself and how I get along with others.
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