If You Don't Chase It You Can't Catch It (What's It?)

"It", whether it's family, career, education, hope, faith or anything else our heart desires can be ours. All we have to do is catch "It". That sounds easy enough. I think I will start chasing "It" tomorrow. Oh yea, tomorrow never comes. That is truly unfortunate. I guess I better start now. First I need to figure out what "It" it is that I'm chasing, so I will know when I catch "It".

There have been times when it was crystal clear what I was chasing, like in the seventh grade when I wanted to be first chair first soprano in the school choir. Cheryl was a really wonderful singer, the best in the class, and she had a lot of confidence. I loved to sing and my mother thought I had a beautiful voice, but I wasn't so sure. When it came time to challenge for a chair, first chair being best of course, there were only two ways to win. The first, and easiest, which was my strategy, was to know more of the song than the other girl. The second, and most difficult way to win, was to just flat out be a better singer. I was good at memorizing. Cheryl was a natural singer, but didn't spend much time studying the lyrics and, you guessed it, I picked a song I new she didn't know. The challenge was on. Let the best man win, or at least the one who knew all the words. Mean or nice, good or bad, fair or unfair, you be the judge, I sang with the knock of my knees carrying farther than the sound of my voice. I won the challange and took first chair. Mr. Kemper let the class know that even though Cheryl had sung better, I had sung longer and knowing the music was also important. I went to my new chair and Cheryl went to hers, the whole class making sure I knew I would not be there long. Cheryl would be challenging me the next week and she would definitely know the entire song and, of course, out sing me. After all she was the better singer, even Mr. Kemper said so. I didn't listen.

It was Challenge Monday. Cheryl was in the fifth chair and I was in the first. All the girls thought I was the meanest girl around for winning first chair the way I did. I was beginning to think it wasn't the nicest thing either, and what's the point of having first chair first soprano for just a week. If I couldn't sing longer this time, I had to sing better. I really did not want to lose that chair. I was scared to death.

The walk up to the piano was eternally long. When I got there facing Mr. Kemper to sing, and not the class, was all that made it bareable. Cheryl was the challenger, so she sang first. She sang all the lyrics and she sounded beautiful. I could hear giggles behind me. I was all but beat. My turn. I closed my eyes. I took a deep breath. I sang. I sang all the lyrics, but this time my voice carried farther than my knocking knees. Apparently, and most definitely to everyones suprise, especially mine, I sang more beautifully than Cheryl. Mr Kemper's jaw dropped. I heard quiet wows from behind me. And Mr Kemper told the class that was how he wanted everyone to sing. I kept first chair first soprano. I kept it all year. No one ever beat me and most of the class quit trying.

It may seem silly that one small victory from so many years ago could still give confidence, but it does. We need to remember our little triumphs and use them to help us now. So many times when I think something is impossible I remember seventh grade choir. I chased "It" and I caught "It". I caught it and kept it the whole year.

Now I am chasing success with my shop and a new dress line coming out in the fall. I am sure I will get winded and worn out along the way, but I am not giving up. Did you know Chanel couldn't sew or draw? If she could do "It" so can I!

Signing off until....

A Sunday Observance at an Observance on Sunday

Yes, I am a person of faith. I always have been and I always will be. It makes my life so much easier. Faith gets me through. The great thing about having faith, is that you don't have to start with any. All anyone needs is a desire, and bendable knees. This is all a loving Heavenly Father needs to guide you on your very own journey of a lifetime. As you travel you will press forward gaining faith, backtrack a little, bend those knees some more, move ahead again, hopefully beyond where you were, and so on and so forth. It can be a slow, plodding and even painful process, but hey we have a lifetime and then some to gain an infinite amount of faith. Best of all you get as many do overs as you want.

I happen to belong to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. That's right I am a Mormon. I figure it is good to get that out on the table right away. Have no fear, my purpose is not to convert, but to give a perspective on how I might look at some things differently, or maybe even the same as you do. Besides that, the Sunday observance I had at an observance on Sunday comes from Joseph Smith --History, so if I didn't tell you I was a Mormon you probably would have guessed it anyway.

Most of my adult life I have struggled with depression. I know, what a surprise, who hasn't right? The last eighteen years of that life have been spent trying to find the right help. So, through this personal struggle, the knee bending and guidance began. Countless men and women have suffered with this or other mental illnesses and I want whomever this may reach, even if it is only my family, to know that there is light at the end of the tunnel. The light may not arrive at the exact moment we think it is best, but it will arrive at the exact time the Lord thinks is best. The latter is what makes it the journey of a lifetime.

I won't bore you with the particulars. You have your own knee bending trip to take. My purpose is to encourage you to keep going. The faith you gain along the way will keep you going. No matter how much you might backtrack, keep pressing forward, keep taking your do overs. If you don't quit, you will be guided to what is right for you. Remember, you have all the time you need. There is no hurry.

Eighteen Year Knee Bending Faith Journey

Short List:

Pray

Go to doctor

"Your depressed!"

Take medication

Pray

Go to therapy

"You have post traumatic stress disorder!"

"Your depressed"

Go to doctor

take more medication

Pray

Go to therapy

Go to Psychiatrist

Go to doctor

blah blah blah

Pray

Go to therapy

"You have an anxiety disorder that is causing depression!"

Go to new psychiatrist

Take more medication

Pray

Go to therapy

Go to another new psychiatrist

"If these meds. don't work your going to the hospital!"

"You may be bipolar."

Take anti psychotic medication

Take tranquilizers

Take anti depressants

Get a little better

Pray

Get fat

Go to doctor

Get Lap band surgery

It fails

Get lap band surgery fixed

It fails

I guess there is no help for me

Keep fighting

Pray

Move out of state

lose tons of money

Still fat

Lose some weight

Gain weight back

Look for doctor

don't like him

Look for doctor

Some better

Yeah!

Doctor leaves practice

Oh no!

Try different Doctor in practice

My new best friend!!

"I am sure all of your problems are caused by ADD"

"I don't believe ADD really exists."

"Well start, cause you got it and you got it bad!!!"

Take Adderall

It worked!

Pray

Say thank you.

Okay, so maybe the short list is not that short. The point is I didn't give up. I kept bending at the knee and fighting.

Result: Life is great. Not perfect, because perfect isn't for here.

In Sunday school today we read the account of the First Vision from Joseph Smith--History. I have read this many times but never looked at it as a parallel for how I have felt over the years. Joseph's description of what happened to him when he went into the grove to pray is a perfect description of what happens when adversity comes our way.

Joseph Smith--History

Chapter 1:15,16

"After I had retired to the place where I had previously designed to go, having looked around me, and finding myself alone, I kneeled down and began to offer up the desires of my heart to God. I had scarcely done so, when immediately I was seized upon by some power which entirely overcame me, and had such an astonishing influence over me as to bind my tongue so that I could not speak. Thick darkness gathered around me, and it seemed to me for a time as if I were doomed to sudden destruction."

"But, exerting all my powers to call upon God to deliver me out of the power of this enemy which had seized upon me, and at the very moment when I was ready to sink into despair and abandon myself to destruction-- not to an imaginary ruin, but to the power of some actual being from the unseen world, who had such marvelous power as I had never felt in any being--just at this moment of great alarm, I saw a pillar of light exactly over my head, above the brightness of the sun, which descended gradually until it fell upon me."

That's all until.....