We often talk about “do’s” when it comes to being a disciple of Christ. (scripture study, going to church, serving, praying, temple worship, etc). A few years ago, I hit an ultimate low, and I couldn’t do the “do’s” anymore. My mental illness interfered with my scripture study and prayer. I didn’t have physical strength or energy to get out of bed and care for my kids the way I wanted to. I felt worthless because I couldn’t “do” things that I felt I needed to do–things that I thought made me valuable. This caused me to reflect deeply on what gives me value and purpose and on my relationship with Jesus Christ.
Firstly, I want to say that nothing you or I do can earn us Heavenly Father’s love. Nothing we do can increase our personal value or worth. Just as President Nelson has said many times, Heavenly Father’s love for you is simply always there. It always has been there and always will be there. Nothing you do can affect or change that (for better or for worse). You can’t earn His love. He has already given it freely and will never take it away. The same goes for your worth as His child. You cannot do anything to lessen or increase your worth. No amount of sin will decrease your worth. No amount of righteousness will increase your worth.
So why be a disciple of Jesus Christ? I believe it’s because He loves us perfectly, and when we experience that love, we want to love Him back with that same amazing, encompassing love. The thing is, He is perfect, we are not. He is unchanging, we are still changing. So we cannot love Him completely perfectly now, but we want to do our best and give Him what we can, which is ultimately just our heart. So for me, I choose to be a disciple of Christ not because it will increase my value as a person or increase God’s love for me, but because I have felt the Savior’s redeeming, unconditional love. And I want to do all I can to love Him the same way, to return that kind of love to Him. And I believe that the journey of learning to love Him that way will bring me joy.
Secondly, think about how you define being a disciple of Jesus Christ. Is discipleship a list of things you do? Or is it more? For me, discipleship is “loving Jesus Christ and relying on Him as I imperfectly strive to follow Him.” I learned from my health crisis a few years ago that if my discipleship and purpose depend on what I can “do,” it is not guaranteed to be lasting in this life. Because mortality is hard, and things change. (Physical health, mental health, capabilities, etc) Heavenly Father understands these limitations and loves us in our brokenness.
As I’ve healed and learned over the past few years, here are 3 things that being a disciple of Christ means to me. I decided to list these three things as things we can “be” rather than things we can “do.” Because even in the lowest points of life when we can’t do what we normally do, we can still choose who we are going to be.
1. Be Authentic (let go of perfectionism)
2. Be a Safe Space (Eliminate shame)
3. Be Kind to Yourself (set gospel-centered goals that encourage you rather than discourage you.)
1. We can Be Authentic.
I've learned about authenticity through my struggles with perfectionism. There were times I was so focused on the do’s that I lost the “music”, or joy, of the gospel for a while. I was doing things because I was afraid of not doing them instead of doing them to be with the Lord.
I've come to believe that perfectionism is based on a lie: “I don’t need, or shouldn’t need, the Savior.”
Perfectionism becomes about “do’s” or accomplishments, rather than on who we are and how much God loves us.
I kept having this visual come to mind while thinking about this talk. Imagine that you are walking along a path carrying a huge bag of burdens on your back. You stagger along, sweating, muscles taught. Eventually, you stop focusing on your burden long enough to realize that the Savior is walking beside you. You glance at Him, and He tells you He can carry the burden for you, that He has already done the work. Now here are two different ideas of how a person could react.
-First response: “Lord, you shouldn’t have to carry any more. This is my burden and I should be able to carry it. If I ever want to be like you, I should be able to do what you do. I should be able to do this for myself.”
-I got to a point in my life where I thought this was discipleship. Loving Him so much that I should be able to do what He does, and be able to do it now.
-Second response: The Lord offers to take your burden, you fall to His feet, laying the burden there, and bathing His feet in your tears. When you can speak, you say, “Thank you, Lord. I need You. I need Your help. Tell me what to do as I follow You.”
-Now I believe that this second response is true and lasting discipleship. Our efforts alone (like the first response) won’t last. No matter how hard we try to be exactly like the Savior now, it is impossible, and it is not what the Lord asks us to do.
I love the footnotes in the scriptures when God commands us to be perfect even as He is. As I’ve studied more on this, I’ve learned that God is asking us to be “whole” or “complete” like He is. He’s given us the way to be whole. And it is Jesus Christ.
Being whole and complete won’t come from anything we do. It will come from being with the Savior. And discipleship is the way we can be with Him.
One example of how we might see or fall into perfectionism in the church is focusing too much on what we and others do. For example: “I will only date and/or marry a returned missionary.” Or “I will be righteous if I serve a mission that is ‘full time’.” This mindset is all about something someone accomplished and tells little about who someone is striving to be. Eliminating perfectionism might look like changing that to “I will date/marry someone who deeply loves the Lord and who wants to serve Him with me.” Or instead of “I have to serve a mission to be righteous.” “I would like to serve a mission if I’m able. But more importantly, I want to make covenants with the Lord and be with Him however that looks in my life.”
Changing the mindset in our church culture in this way might invite more of Christ’s love into our church body. Letting go of perfectionism might make church a safer place for people who come home from missions “early” or choose not to go on missions. Because they will know that we know their value is not based on things they do but on who they are as a child of God. And their identity as a child of God is unchanging and warrants unconditional love. I think Christ’s church should be a safe space for all of God’s children, because the Savior is a safe space. He invites all to come unto Him, no matter what state they are in or what they have or haven’t done.
Back to authenticity... Instead of trying to be “perfect,” let’s allow ourselves to be authentic human beings. God made you with special and unique gifts and traits. He also knows you are only human right now. Allow yourself to be human, and allow yourself to be the wonderful child of God you already are.
2. We can be a Safe Space. (Eliminate Shame.)
I have learned what safe spaces look like and feel like in my life as I have learned to identify shame and try to eliminate it from my life. Satan introduced shame to Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. It’s one of his greatest and oldest tactics. When Adam and Eve transgressed, Satan told them to hide from God.
Unfortunately, shame is so pervasive that it’s even interwoven in some aspects of church culture and definitely in societal culture. (Kind of like the mission example we talked about. The message of shame: You are not good if you didn’t do this thing.) In reality, what we do or don’t do cannot change our worth!!!
Shame vs. Guilt. I've heard the difference between shame and guilt be explained like this: "Guilt is 'I did something bad.' Shame is 'I am bad.'" I like this explanation and want to take it a bit further. Yes, shame attacks your identity. Guilt does not. While guilt tells us that we did something that wounded our spirit, shame tells us that we are bad or worthless.
To take this further, shame moves us away from God. Guilt is designed to move us towards God.
In the scriptures and temple, we learn that Satan used shame as one of his first tactics with Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. He told Adam and Eve to hide from God. Even though again and again, the Lord asks us to “come unto Him” not to hide from Him. Satan’s tactic with shame is often the same today! Shame tells us to hide from God. Shame is never helpful and is not from God. On the other hand, guilt is like feeling a spiritual wound. It’s a feeling that tells us “Go to God. He can help.”
I had an experience with my daughter recently that taught me about shame and how we can create a safe space by eliminating shame. My daughter Emily is an excellent climber. Generally, parents put things on high shelves that they want to keep away from their children (things like medicine, delicate items, etc). In our house, putting something on a high shelf just gives Emily an extra fun challenge. She’s a problem solver. And rather than ask for help, she knows she can climb any cabinet or shelf to get what she wants at the top. For a while now, I’ve reacted strongly to this behavior. When I have caught her at the top shelf grabbing cereal or vitamins, I’ve been so terrified that I’ve shouted, “Emily! Get down from there! What are you doing?” Interestingly enough, after doing this several times, Emily did not stop climbing shelves but instead started to hide the behavior from me. When a box of cereal spilled from the top shelf because she had tried to climb and grab it, she came to me and said, “Mom, the cereal jiggled and fell off the shelf by itself.” She's young, so she doesn't realize that that explanation defies all the laws of physics.
I realized that she was learning to lie to me (or to hide her behavior from me) because of my strong and harsh reactions to her. She was afraid of coming to me and telling me the truth when she made a mistake (like spilling cereal everywhere). I promised her that if she would tell me the truth, I would do my very best not to yell at her or talk loudly anymore. Since then, I’ve gotten better at saying “Thanks for telling me the truth, Emily. I love you.” And more and more she comes to me and asks for help or tells me the truth instead of hiding. When I am soft, kind, and gentle, she tells me the truth and feels safe with me.
Heavenly Father is this way with us. Never once, no matter what terrible thing I’ve done, have I come to Heavenly Father and had him say, “How could you? What’s wrong with you? Why would you do this to me?” (This is a voice of shame.) Instead He responds gently with an increase of love. “Thank you for coming to me. I love you. I’m here to help.”
Shame does not change behavior. Unconditional love and the Savior can change behaviors.
We can let go of “shoulds” and lovingly embracing where we and others are at. I learned from an Marriage and Family Therapy graduate student that she considers “should” to be practically a curse word. We’re learning to eliminate it from how we talk to ourselves and each other in our home. (example: writing this talk. “I should fast, I should go to the temple, I should prepare in a quiet, sacred place.” Reality: “I have a sick baby on my lap and my kids are watching cartoons right next to me so I can prepare this talk. And that’s okay. I’m being a disciple of Christ by doing my best.”)
Letting go of "shoulds" includes letting go of what you can’t control, which includes “feeling the Spirit.” We can’t control how we feel or experience things. We can only control our actions and who we choose to be. I've had to learn this because at times I am unable to feel the Spirit due to my mental illness. I'm learning to be a disciple of Christ even when I don’t “feel it.”
You don’t need to scare or shame yourself into being “good.” You are here! You love the Lord! You are doing what you need to do already. So allow yourself to be a safe space for yourself and others by treating yourself and others with kindness and mercy. Choose now to stop shaming yourself and instead encourage and love yourself.
3. We can be Kind to Ourselves.
I intentionally chose not to say “Be Joyful.” We often talk about being joyful in the church. We have the restored gospel! We have eternal truths and covenants! So we often think "He's given us all of that. We have no right to not be happy. We should be joyful all the time." (The bad word! "should"!) Though I do believe the gospel of Jesus Christ offers lasting and eternal joy, the truth is that we don’t have control over how we feel or which emotions we experience here in mortality!
We don’t have control over whether a day feels good or bad, whether we wake up feeling excited and positive or depleted and discouraged. But we do have control over how we treat ourselves and others.
What if, even on the bad days, we allowed ourselves to feel whatever feelings came (like disappointment or frustration), yet still treated ourselves with unconditional kindness. What we feel isn’t a reflection of who we are (whether we are good or bad). Feeling bad doesn't mean you are bad. Feeling is just part of being a human. And all feelings are acceptable and valid.
Example: when we pray and we feel Heavenly Father say, “Thank you for being here,” not “I don’t want your negativity!”
This goes along with what we’ve already talked about. Being authentic, not expecting perfection, being a safe space for ourselves and others by eliminating shame–these are ways we can be kind to ourselves. But one more thing about being kind to ourselves:
What if we set gospel-centered goals that encouraged and inspired us instead of discouraged us? What if our goals were so simple and doable that we set ourselves up for success and encouragement?
My experience with family scripture study and “Come Follow Me”: By the time “Come Follow Me” came out, I was deep into perfectionism. Instead of being excited for a new resource and study guide, I felt “Great, another way for me to fail the Lord and disappoint Him.” How sad! This feeling was evidence of shame and perfectionism in my life.
For a while, I remained paralyzed by the fear of failure. I imagined having family gatherings where our children sat quietly on the couch and listened as we read the scriptures, then contributed to meaningful discussions–and didn't fight or jump or do anything kid-ish. Oh, and there would be child-friendly activities which I had preplanned and prepared. And freshly baked cookies. It would be "perfect." And impossible.
When my husband and I were finally able to let go of the “should” mindset (We should be able to keep our three tiny kids sitting peacefully and quietly on the couch while we read scriptures for half an hour with meaningful discussion and cute hand-prepared activities for the kids and fresh cookies), we had an idea.
Instead of baking cookies and preparing crafts that our kids would destroy, we printed a verse of scripture, slapped it on the wall with some scotch tape, and read the same scripture with the kids every night for a month!
It was a simple but achievable goal for us for family scripture study. And letting go of my shame around not being able to “do it all” allowed me to find joy in doing this simple thing with my kids each day.
Our goal wasn’t to memorize. Just to read a scripture together as a family each day. And putting it on the wall made it easier for us.
The result: Our kids have each memorized 5+ versus of scripture! This was unintentional, and I consider it a miracle. This is the way the Lord works. We give what we can do, even if it feels like a widow’s mite. We do something small, not knowing what the result will be, but having faith that even if it's small, it can make a difference. And the Lord makes that effort into something beautiful, no matter how small or simple our offering is. He doesn’t expect perfection. He just wants us to be with Him and experience Him in our lives.
