Adept At Defying Gravity

I was always looking for the angle…
I didn’t necessarily feel like it was always on purpose that I looked to complete tasks differently or create a different way to accomplish something…
I just thought “differently”….
(Still do…)

The Southwest Iowa home I grew up in had a large living room.
We had a seating group on one end. The other side remained an open area where Mom had a large record player console on one wall, an upright piano on another, and the entire end wall was lined with built-in bookcases. It was filled with books I never read including an entire set of Encyclopedias. They were a gift from my grandmother who was an elementary school teacher.

Mom taught us five girls how to maintain good hygiene, work hard, love music, and be lady-like.

I hated the lady-like lessons. I felt like I wasn’t good at any of that “stuff”. Everyone called me a tomboy. Although I wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, I believed it included being less lady-like than my sisters…

It was a common activity in our home where Mom would gather my four sisters and I to our large living room. We were instructed to take an encyclopedia and stand with our heels touching the wall of bookcases. We were then told to walk down and back from one end of the room to the other while balancing the book on our heads.
I’m certain there must have been a lesson on posture here… keeping head up, eyes forward, shoulders back, stepping gracefully…
I wasn’t interested in learning to walk like a model. I was only interested in getting back outside to play. I didn’t take these lessons seriously and was completely annoyed that they were required activities.

I became adept at what I can only describe as defying gravity.
If our book fell off of our heads more than a few times- we had to start over.
I quickly learned to grab the thinnest bound Encyclopedia, place it on my head, and outrun its inevitable fall.
Mom disapproved. But my attitude and argumentative nature gave her little reasoning power as I was clearly meeting the requirements.

I think I still struggle to sit or walk with great posture…
But I am learning more completely what it means to be just the right kind of “lady-like”.

President Russell M. Nelson spoke to women a few years ago.
He urged us –
“My dear sisters, whatever your calling, whatever your circumstances, we need your impressions, your insights, and your inspiration. We need you to speak up and speak out…
…You sisters possess distinctive capabilities and special intuition you have received as gifts from God.
…We need your strength!
…We need women who have a bedrock understanding of the doctrine of Christ and who will use that understanding to teach and help raise a sin-resistant generation. We need women who can detect deception in all of its forms. We need women who know how to access the power that God makes available to covenant keepers and who express their beliefs with confidence and charity. We need women who have courage and vision…
My dear sisters, nothing is more crucial to your eternal life than your own conversion. It is converted, covenant-keeping women whose righteous lives will increasingly stand out in a deteriorating world and who will thus be seen as different and distinct in the happiest of ways.
So today I plead with my sisters of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to step forward! Take your rightful and needful place in your home, in your community, and in the kingdom of God—more than you ever have before.”

I’ll never forget the way I felt when I heard this. I felt as though he was speaking directly to me. I needed to stop using my differences as a reason to remain quiet in my realm of service. I needed to step up and step out of my comfort zones. I needed to become the lady that was just like the one God needed me to be. At the time, those words lent me the confidence and persuasion to do just that.

That was a few years ago…
I’ve been circling back around to these encouragements shared by a man who is now a prophet of God. In doing so, I realize I’ve lost focus of that purpose- of that importance. Instead, I choose silence and disregard thoughts that I may be able to offer another if I speak up and speak out for truth. I sit in the back, disengaged and disinterested in sharing what I’m thinking, assuming it will be mis-understood or mis-communicated. I’ve done some self-check lately. I’ve become lazy…

I’m not doing all I can to share my conversion to Christ and testify that my greatest strengths and joys are made available to me through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. I need to re-light my fire in desiring to share what I know to be true.

It’s okay that I’m bold in thought. I DO have distinct capabilities. God has blessed me with the intellect and atypical thinking I have. He needs me to express my thoughts with confidence and charity…
It’s not easy for me or in my comfort realm-
But then I think back to the girl who can defy gravity in being “lady-like”…
And if she can do that, she can do anything God needs her to do to further His work and be exactly the type of lady who boldly and confidently shares her thoughts, impressions, and inspirations!.

-JC

Pumpkin Oatmeal Chocolate Chunk Cookies

¾ cup soft butter
½ cup pumpkin paste (made by removing extra moisture from pumpkin puree)
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cup quick oats
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoons cinnamon
2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1 ½ cups semi-sweet chocolate chunks

Place ½ cup pumpkin puree into a stack of several paper towels. Wring out extra moisture creating a pumpkin paste. Repeat until you have ½ cup of pumpkin paste. (Different brands of puree have different moisture content.) Cream butter, pumpkin paste, and sugars with an electric mixer on medium high for 1 minute or until fluffy. Hand stir in eggs and vanilla extract; don’t over-mix. Add dry ingredients all at once and mix until fully incorporated. Add 2-3 Tablespoons more flour for high elevation. Stir in chocolate chunks. Scoop out approximately 24 1.5” balls of dough.  Gently roll and flatten slightly. Place dough balls onto parchment lined baking sheet.  Bake at 375 degrees for 10+ min.
Let set. Share.