“Daily, constantly, we choose by our desires, our thoughts, and our actions whether we want to be blessed or cursed, happy or miserable,” said President Ezra Taft Benson.
What will you choose today?
Sometimes, if you can believe it, I choose misery. Yes, I know, why would anyone choose to be miserable? But sometimes I willingly choose it. I bet you do it sometimes too. I can’t explain it, but I think it’s a fact of life and everyone does it sometimes. The thing is, how can we learn to more consistently choose happiness over misery?
President Benson says we choose daily, constantly. Daily, when you wake in the morning, think a few happy thoughts to get your day started off right. Constantly, throughout your day, remind yourself of those happy thoughts. There’s an LDS Hymn that can get you going in the right direction. It says:
When upon life’s billows you are tempest tossed,
When you are discouraged, thinking all is lost,
Count your many blessings; name them one by one,
And it will surprise you what the Lord has done.
Truly, if you count your blessings you’ll find it’s hard to stay miserable for long. Moreover, while at first you may have few things to be thankful for, I bet the more you practice this little exercise, the more things you’ll find for which to be grateful.
President Benson also says that we choose by our desires, our thoughts and our actions. Heavenly Father has given us free agency so that we might be masters of our own destiny. In the book of Helamen in the Book of Mormon, Samuel said “Ye are free; ye are permitted to act for yourselves.”
Your actions determine whether you are miserable or happy. Those things that keep us in line with the teachings of Jesus, think the Beatitudes, will help us to be happy. Choosing behaviors that entertain our more base desires will only lead to misery. “For the natural man is an enemy to God …” (Mosiah 3:19)
God longs to bless us. He watches over us every day to see which choices we will make. He said “I, ; choose today to be happy and back up your desire with righteous actions.
