Mornings
I believe it happened during a month when I was spending an inordinate amount of time in bed because of a pressure sore. Thankfully, when I spend time in bed I am able to work on my laptop computer making the downtime not as "down" as it would be otherwise. For some reason I was spending a lot of time reading the Old Testament. I just couldn't seem to get enough of it. I was reading 2 Samuel one afternoon when some words just leaped off the page at me. These words were David's final words recorded by the author or authors of Samuel, preserving a metaphor regarding Jehovah, Christ, The God of Israel. "Now these be the last words of David...The God of Israel...the Rock of Israel spake to me [saying]...And he shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds..." [2 Samuel 23:1-4] [Emphasis added]
I think David's metaphor concerning Christ struck such a responsive chord in me because of my love for the precious rising of the sun I have witnessed and enjoyed during my lifetime.
I have diminished eyesight. I can't really see out of my right eye and only good enough out of my left eye to read on my computer with the fonts magnified to the max. I can watch TV if I sit close enough to the screen and also movies if I am close to the front of the theater. However, one of the things I still am able to enjoy about life is to wake up each morning just as the sky is beginning to gray and witness the sun beginning to stream through the two large windows in my bedroom. To me it is a glorious and comforting sight.
I believe my love of the morning began when I worked for Kennecott Copper Corp. each summer as a young man. I would make enough money each summer working for Kennecott in Eastern Nevada to pay for two semesters at BYU the following fall and winter. I invariably worked what was known as the "Graveyard Shift" which began at 11:30 p.m. and ended at 7:30 a.m.
The summer I worked as a drill helper I will never forget. The drill was mounted on a rig that could be driven slowly from site to site depending on where holes needed to be drilled. We would drill holes all night and then in the morning the powder crew would come and fill the holes with explosives, ignite them, and the entire town would shake, rattle and roll for just a few minutes during the moment of explosion. Immense electric shovels would then scoop up the shattered earth which contained the precious copper ore, and deposit it in large trucks for ultimate transport to the mill and smelter.
Once the drill began its work the driller and his helper didn't have much to do but watch the drill and correct any problems that might occur.
The Liberty Pit in Ruth, Nevada, where I worked is located in a mountainous area which is more than 7000 feet in elevation. I remember standing and shivering outside in the very cold Nevada night air, hour after hour and night after night, anxiously awaiting one thing -- the arrival of morning. The Nevada nights were beautiful, full of stars, but I felt a great joy inside me as I looked at the Eastern Mountains and could discern them against a graying sky. The dark would reluctantly and imperceptibly give way to the powerful light of the rising sun. The morning star would still be visible, and then the sun would just seem to explode above the mountains and bathe me in its warm, life-giving rays. The long, cold night was over, and one of God's greatest gifts to his children, a new day, had dawned.
In the mission field I became an "early morning Nazi"(translation -- fanatic). I made it part of my mission to always be out of bed before any of my companions. I felt so righteous (self-righteous) as I would sit at my desk studying Spanish and searching the scriptures for an hour or so before my companions would begin to stir. Those hours, undisturbed by the awakening world, became precious to me. I would always make a point of going outside, or looking out the window as the sky would begin to gray to witness another glorious morning burst upon the world.
Arising early did not end with my mission. My most productive time of day was in those early hours before the sun would break over the horizon.
While I served as bishop my two oldest children were in early morning seminary, but not old enough to drive. We had an old Volkswagen bus and I would take my two children and pick up three or four of their friends and drive them to the chapel each morning. While they were in seminary I would run from the chapel up a street that led me into the foothills. My run would begin in the dark, but as I would return, the sky would begin to gray and by the time I reached the chapel to pick up the kids, the warming rays of the sun heralded that indeed, once again, a new day had been born.
I could go on with many more sunrise experiences, but suffice it to say, I think I know why David chose to describe Christ the way he did: "... He shall be as the light of the morning, when the sun riseth, even a morning without clouds..." David was a shepherd boy who cared for his father's sheep in the hills surrounding Bethlehem. How many long nights did he spend guarding those precious sheep, anxiously awaiting the glorious sunrise and dawning of a new day? How he must have enjoyed the warming and life-giving rays of the sun that would come each morning bringing life to him, the sheep, and to the earth.
Christ himself said: "... I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life." [John 8:12] Christ disperses darkness, the darkness of sin and of death. Light and darkness cannot occupy the same space at the same time. David's metaphor is very powerful in teaching us that Christ is as the "light of the morning, when the sun rises, even a morning without clouds", dispelling the cold darkness of night and symbolically reassuring mankind that just as the night of death will come to each one of us, so will their come a glorious and literal "morning" of resurrection.
The scriptures reveal the following significant truth as well: "...Christ...is in the sun, and the light of the sun, and the power thereof by which it was made. And the light which shineth, which giveth you light, is through him who enlighteneth your eyes, which is the same light that quickeneth your understandings... Which light proceedeth forth from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space— The light which is in all things, which giveth life to all things..." [Doctrine & Covenants 88:7,11,12-13]
I believe when Christ comes to usher in his millennial reign he will come as the "light of the morning, when the sun rises, even a morning without clouds." I hope we will all be "morning" people then.
Yes, mornings are special as they remind us of the "light and life of the world".
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Wisdom Teeth
Well, I hate to admit it, but I am not nearly as wise today as I was a couple of days ago. I had to go to an oral surgeon to have a bottom wisdom tooth and the one next to it extracted.
When I was a young married man I let a dentist in Ogden, Utah talk me into pulling all my wisdom teeth. As it turned out it was not a very wise decision on my part. He started in the afternoon and by 8 p.m. I was still in the chair with only the two wisdom teeth on the right side of my mouth having been pulled. As he was working on me he would say things like, "Oops, I think maybe I shouldn't have done it that way," and etc. He wanted to make an appointment to pull out the wisdom teeth on the left side but for some reason I did not feel inclined to take him up on his offer. He said that at some point in time those remaining wisdom teeth would be a problem to me. I never wanted to see the fulfillment of his prophecy and ever since that time one of my life's goals was to die before the wisdom teeth went bad on me. No such luck!
In all honesty it was a brutal experience. Several times during the procedure I wanted to cry, but old men are supposed to be tough and so I stifled the desire to scream, moan and groan, and just suffered in silence.
The longer the tooth extraction took, the oral surgeon began to look, in my mind's eye anyway, like a hairy, muscle bound, 800 pound gorilla, who was trying to pull my head off.
I must admit that as the procedure continued on and seemed that it would never end I was only thinking of one thing and that was me -- Jack Rushton and the pain and misery I was experiencing at that moment. With the oral surgeon's hands in my mouth, along with his various instruments of torture, I was not very concerned about those troops who had been recently killed at Fort Hood, Texas, and their surviving families and loved ones, or the thousands that have been killed in recent earthquakes and tsunamis, or the poor starving children in Africa, or even some dear friends that are suffering from severe health problems much worse than mine -- I was only thinking about one thing -- me!
I had the same feeling when I suffered my injury many years ago. I was consumed with "me." I was totally self-absorbed in my pain and in that condition could not reach out to help others or to even be concerned with their unique and individual challenges.
I take comfort in the fact that I think all of us, because of our humanness, are much the same way. Victor Frankl, the author of the important book, "Man's Search for Meaning", drew the following analogy regarding the relativity of human suffering: "... a man's suffering is similar to the behavior of gas. If a certain quantity of gas is pumped into an empty chamber, it will fill the chamber completely and evenly, no matter how big the chamber. Thus suffering completely fills the human soul and conscious mind, no matter whether the suffering is great or little. Therefore the "size" of human suffering is absolutely relative." [Man's Search for Meaning, Pages 61-62.]
I believe what he is saying is that if I am having wisdom teeth pulled out in California while people in Fort Hood, Texas are being slaughtered by a maniacal killer, or the good folks in Samoa or Peru are losing their lives because of earthquakes and tsunamis, I am going to be much more concerned with my pain than theirs. I believe like Victor Frankl that each individual's suffering -- regardless of the kind or "size" -- can completely fill his soul and conscious mind leaving little room to be concerned about the miseries of others. Because of this I also believe one of the challenges we all face is to rise above our own self-absorbing pain and misery and be able to reach out emotionally and spiritually to help others in need.
I took a life altering course at BYU as a junior. It was called "Major British Authors." My teacher, absolutely the best one I ever had from kindergarten through graduate school, Nan Grass, had written her doctoral dissertation on the great English writer, John Donne (1573-1631).
Because of her love for the writings of John Donne, we as her students began to love them as well. She felt his prose was the most sublime ever written in the English language. I do not doubt that statement was just hyperbole on her part.
One of her favorite passages from his writings, and one of my favorites as well, comes from his "Meditation 17, from Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions." (1624) "...No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less... Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee..."
I have pondered for years about what John Donne wrote so long ago, and believe he described beautifully an eternal principle. Truly, "No man is an island" and any man's death (or suffering) diminishes us because, hopefully as he stated "... [we are] involved in mankind...."
As I think about Donne's words I cannot help but think of the suffering experienced by all of God's children during their Telestial tour of duty upon this earth. As we struggle with our own pain and observe the pain and suffering of others we have several options available to us. We can, for example, ignore and pretend we don't see the suffering of others. At our worst we could take advantage of the sick and weak and take from them what little resources they may have, or on the other hand, be willing to give of our means and time to bless the unfortunate about us.
One thing I know for sure, based on my own personal experience, none of us will ever successfully traverse this Telestial terrain alone without the love and support of others.
We need one another! That is the genius of the organization of the Church. We simply cannot go it alone. Eugene England, many years ago, wrote a profound essay entitled "The Church Is As True As the Gospel!" This was no clever play on words but a profound statement regarding how a divinely inspired Church organization would bless us with the love, support, and strength of others to carry us through, because truly, "No man is an island." Without my family, friends, and the love and support that has been constant from members of the Church since the day of my injury I would certainly have perished long ago.
When the hairy, 800 pound gorilla comes into our lives and is trying to pull our heads off hopefully we will be able to see beyond our own pain and misery and reach out to bless others, and in so doing bless ourselves as well.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
"It's Good to Be Alive!"
http://www.observationsbyjack.blogspot.com/
Saturday, November 28, 2009
The Great Debaters
I am very wary of recommending movies for others to see. We all have
such different tastes and sensibilities. If I recommend a movie I think
is great and you watch it and think to yourself, "Boy, old Jack has
finally lost it," it just makes me feel badly. Therefore, it is with
some trepidation that I am going to skate out onto thin ice and
recommend a movie I have seen a couple of times. Each time as it comes
to an end, I have tried to get out of my wheelchair and give those
around me a high five.
The movie I am referring to is "The Great Debaters" released in 2007, starring and directed by Denzel Washington. I am sure that many of you have already seen it. The film, based on a true story, revolves around the efforts of debate coach and poet, Melvin Tolson, (Denzel Washington) at historically black Wiley College to place his team on equal footing with whites in the American South during the 1930s, when Jim Crow Laws were common and lynch mobs were a pervasive fear for blacks. In the movie, the Wiley team eventually succeeds to the point where they are able to debate Harvard University (Actually Hollywood felt a debate with Harvard would be more prestigious than the one that actually took place between the Wiley team and the debate team from the University of Southern California, the reigning champion debate team in the United States in 1935.)
The movie also explores the social milieu of Texas during the Great Depression, including not only the day-to-day insults and slights African Americans endured, but also a lynching. Depicted, as well, is James L. Farmer Jr., who, at 14-years of age, was on Wiley's debate team after completing high school at that tender age, and who would go on to be a powerful figure in the civil rights movement during the 50s and 60s. [The information cited above is from Wikipedia]
Although they were not necessarily the focal point of the story, I was most impressed by James Farmer Sr. and his son James Jr.. James Farmer Sr. was born on June 12, 1886 in North Carolina. After graduating from the Cookman Institute in Jacksonville, Florida, he came to Massachusetts on foot to attend college. In 1918 he earned his Ph.D. from Boston University, becoming one of only twenty five African-Americans who held Ph.D.s at the time. He was the first African-American from Texas to earn a Ph.D. Farmer could read English, Aramaic, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, and Latin. He was a good, moral man as well, and tutored James Jr. to follow in his footsteps. [Information from Wikipedia]
To me, the highlight of the story was the often repeated advice James Farmer Sr. kept giving to his son, James Farmer Jr. when he was tempted to not study or give his best effort as head researcher for the debate team because for many months during 1935-36 James Jr. never had the opportunity of actually engaging in a debate, which was his dream and passion. In those moments of discouragement his father would say to him, "We have to do what we have to do so we can do what we want to do!"
For some reason I can't get that statement out of my mind. It just rings so true and is very important to me. "We have to do what we have to do so we can do what we want to do!" So many people, both young and old, have dreams of doing great things -- things they want to do -- but are unwilling to pay the price and do what they have to do each day so they can eventually do what they really want to do.
For example, I suppose every missionary that has had to learn a foreign language can hopefully identify with that statement. About a hundred years ago when I went to Central America to serve a 2 1/2 year mission, there was no MTC or language training. We were told to buy a good Spanish College grammar book and bring it with us. I had visions of speaking fluent Spanish and communicating effectively with the people -- this is what I wanted to do. To get from where I was to where I wanted to be was a long arduous journey. Each day I had to do what I had to do to become fluent in a foreign language. By rising each day between 4:30 and 5 a.m. for months, conjugating verbs, memorizing vocabulary, and spending hours reading out loud from the Spanish Book of Mormon, alongside the English Book of Mormon as well as the Bible, after many long months I was able to do what I wanted to do and dreamed of doing.
This truth of course applies to so many aspects of our lives. I believe one of the great lessons we hopefully learn early in our lives is that we have to do what we have to do so we can do what we want to do -- or more importantly become who we want to be.
My son John is an ER doctor. He truly did not like his first two years of medical school at USC. It was all theory and little or no hands-on work with patients that had health problems. I know there were times he wanted to throw in the towel and maybe do something else with his life. Finally however, after doing for two years what he had to do, he finally was able to do what he wanted to do -- be a doctor and help people. He is currently a critical care doctor flying wounded troops from Afghanistan to Germany and after they are sufficiently stabilized, flying them from Germany to Walter Reed Hospital in the United States. What satisfaction this must give to him to help keep these special people alive so they can get the help they need to improve the quality of their lives. Had he thrown in the towel prematurely, and not done what he had to do when he had to do it, he never would have been able to do what he really wanted to do with his life.
I'm going to tweak the James L. Farmer philosophy just a bit, but I think in an important way. My life has taught me that "We must do what we have to do so that we can do what we may have to do."
Life being what it is, full of bumps and detours and curves that we never expected to see, some of us may never really get to do what we wanted to do and dreamed of doing. However, if we have consistently done what we have had to do, we will be prepared to do what we may have to do when life introduces unexpected, difficult, and mostly unwanted circumstances to us.
Good movie! Important philosophy!
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
The movie I am referring to is "The Great Debaters" released in 2007, starring and directed by Denzel Washington. I am sure that many of you have already seen it. The film, based on a true story, revolves around the efforts of debate coach and poet, Melvin Tolson, (Denzel Washington) at historically black Wiley College to place his team on equal footing with whites in the American South during the 1930s, when Jim Crow Laws were common and lynch mobs were a pervasive fear for blacks. In the movie, the Wiley team eventually succeeds to the point where they are able to debate Harvard University (Actually Hollywood felt a debate with Harvard would be more prestigious than the one that actually took place between the Wiley team and the debate team from the University of Southern California, the reigning champion debate team in the United States in 1935.)
The movie also explores the social milieu of Texas during the Great Depression, including not only the day-to-day insults and slights African Americans endured, but also a lynching. Depicted, as well, is James L. Farmer Jr., who, at 14-years of age, was on Wiley's debate team after completing high school at that tender age, and who would go on to be a powerful figure in the civil rights movement during the 50s and 60s. [The information cited above is from Wikipedia]
Although they were not necessarily the focal point of the story, I was most impressed by James Farmer Sr. and his son James Jr.. James Farmer Sr. was born on June 12, 1886 in North Carolina. After graduating from the Cookman Institute in Jacksonville, Florida, he came to Massachusetts on foot to attend college. In 1918 he earned his Ph.D. from Boston University, becoming one of only twenty five African-Americans who held Ph.D.s at the time. He was the first African-American from Texas to earn a Ph.D. Farmer could read English, Aramaic, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, and Latin. He was a good, moral man as well, and tutored James Jr. to follow in his footsteps. [Information from Wikipedia]
To me, the highlight of the story was the often repeated advice James Farmer Sr. kept giving to his son, James Farmer Jr. when he was tempted to not study or give his best effort as head researcher for the debate team because for many months during 1935-36 James Jr. never had the opportunity of actually engaging in a debate, which was his dream and passion. In those moments of discouragement his father would say to him, "We have to do what we have to do so we can do what we want to do!"
For some reason I can't get that statement out of my mind. It just rings so true and is very important to me. "We have to do what we have to do so we can do what we want to do!" So many people, both young and old, have dreams of doing great things -- things they want to do -- but are unwilling to pay the price and do what they have to do each day so they can eventually do what they really want to do.
For example, I suppose every missionary that has had to learn a foreign language can hopefully identify with that statement. About a hundred years ago when I went to Central America to serve a 2 1/2 year mission, there was no MTC or language training. We were told to buy a good Spanish College grammar book and bring it with us. I had visions of speaking fluent Spanish and communicating effectively with the people -- this is what I wanted to do. To get from where I was to where I wanted to be was a long arduous journey. Each day I had to do what I had to do to become fluent in a foreign language. By rising each day between 4:30 and 5 a.m. for months, conjugating verbs, memorizing vocabulary, and spending hours reading out loud from the Spanish Book of Mormon, alongside the English Book of Mormon as well as the Bible, after many long months I was able to do what I wanted to do and dreamed of doing.
This truth of course applies to so many aspects of our lives. I believe one of the great lessons we hopefully learn early in our lives is that we have to do what we have to do so we can do what we want to do -- or more importantly become who we want to be.
My son John is an ER doctor. He truly did not like his first two years of medical school at USC. It was all theory and little or no hands-on work with patients that had health problems. I know there were times he wanted to throw in the towel and maybe do something else with his life. Finally however, after doing for two years what he had to do, he finally was able to do what he wanted to do -- be a doctor and help people. He is currently a critical care doctor flying wounded troops from Afghanistan to Germany and after they are sufficiently stabilized, flying them from Germany to Walter Reed Hospital in the United States. What satisfaction this must give to him to help keep these special people alive so they can get the help they need to improve the quality of their lives. Had he thrown in the towel prematurely, and not done what he had to do when he had to do it, he never would have been able to do what he really wanted to do with his life.
I'm going to tweak the James L. Farmer philosophy just a bit, but I think in an important way. My life has taught me that "We must do what we have to do so that we can do what we may have to do."
Life being what it is, full of bumps and detours and curves that we never expected to see, some of us may never really get to do what we wanted to do and dreamed of doing. However, if we have consistently done what we have had to do, we will be prepared to do what we may have to do when life introduces unexpected, difficult, and mostly unwanted circumstances to us.
Good movie! Important philosophy!
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Blood for an Enemy
"Blood for an Enemy"
Our son, John, is an ER doctor. The Air Force paid for his education and he agreed to serve in the Air Force for the next three years blessing wounded troops with the skills he had gained in medical school and his residency.
John and his friend Matt Mecuro, as 16-year-olds, were body surfing with me that fateful day when I had my accident and were able to get me onto the beach and basically saved my life. John was very involved in my care until he left on his mission, and through it all gained a desire to study medicine.
His home base is in Las Vegas, Nevada, at Nellis Air Force Base. Each year, he is deployed somewhere in the world to practice ER medicine as needed. His first deployment was a big army base outside of Kabul, Afghanistan. He and two other ER doctors managed the ER unit 24 hours a day and seven days a week. Part of their duty was to take turns going out in helicopters to pick up the wounded.
I thought you might enjoy hearing about John’s first helicopter experience and about what took place. What follows is his e-mail to me.
"Hey Dad and family,
"So things are going well here. I went on my first helicopter mission a few days ago. It was pretty exciting. We had to go pick up an enemy combatant who was shot while trying to set up an IED (improvised explosive device). We flew about an hour to where the patient was being held. He was shot in the bottom while bent over setting up a bomb, but the bullet went into his stomach and hurt his intestines and nicked a big artery in his pelvis. By the time I saw him he had already gone through 11 units of blood, which was the entire supply of blood at that base. Throughout the chopper ride back, I had to monitor his vitals and had to keep giving him drugs to keep him sedated. He kept waking up and looking at me, so I kept giving him drugs to knock him out.
"We flew really close to the ground, about 200 feet. The surrounding area is really pretty and you would never know there was a war going on. There are a lot of rivers and farms, kids playing soccer, etc. In the helicopter was myself, 2 pilots, and 2 soldiers looking out both sides of the helicopter for possible enemies on the ground. Behind us we had a big black hawk helicopter loaded with guns that was covering us incase we came under fire. I was a little nervous on the flight to the get the patient, but on the way back I was so busy keeping him stabilized that I didn't have time to think about the dangers.
"Its pretty amazing the effort we make to take care of the enemy. I don't think they would do the same for us. I mean the guy got all the blood at that one base. If one of our soldiers had gotten hurt, there would not have been any blood for them. Also just think of the risk involved in just going to pick the wounded enemy up. When we arrived with the patient, we discovered we were also out of B- blood and we actually had to get volunteers to give their blood to this guy who was essentially trying to kill us. I think it says something really special about this country that we would put so much effort into saving people like this."
I don't know about you, but reading John's e-mail made me feel proud to be an American. Imagine risking your life to save the life of an enemy who is seeking to take your life -- even giving him your own blood. We do value human life and freedom in this country!
I believe that many of the pundits in Washington, DC could benefit from reading John's simple little e-mail. I know many are opposed to what we are doing in Iraq and Afghanistan, and maybe President Bush got us into this war on terrorism in Iraq prematurely -- who really knows? But isn't it refreshing to know that we really are trying to do something very good in the world and that we place such a high value on human life, dignity, freedom and liberty.
There is a spirit of pessimism and negativism abroad in the land. Ten years ago President Gordon B. Hinckley described it as follows: "... there is a terrible ailment of pessimism in the land. It's almost endemic. We're constantly fed a steady and sour diet of character assassination, faultfinding, evil speaking of one another. Read the newspaper columnists. Listen to the radio and television commentators. The writers of our news columns are brilliant, the commentators on the electronic media are masters--but they seem unable to deal with balanced truth, notwithstanding their protests otherwise. The negative becomes the stuff of headlines and long broadsides that, in many cases, caricature the facts and distort the truth--at least the whole truth." [CES fireside, March 6, 1994]
President Hinckley, in that same CES fireside talk, also said while speaking of the United States of America: "I know that she has problems. We've heard so much of these for so long. But surely, my brothers and sisters, this is a good land, a choice land, a chosen land. To me it is a miracle, a creation of the Almighty. It was born of travail. The Constitution under which we live is the keystone of our nation. It was inspired of God. Of it the great Englishman Gladstone said, "As the British Constitution is the most subtle organism which has proceeded from . . . progressive history, so the American Constitution is . . . the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man" ("Kin Beyond Sea," North American Review 127 [September/October 1878], p. 185).
Since 9/11 we feel we have truly been put upon as a nation. Can you even imagine what it would have been like to have been living in England at the beginning of World War II when Nazi Germany had already overrun most of Europe and was threatening to invade England as well? Thankfully for Western civilization there was a Winston Churchill, who like President Hinckley, was the essence of optimism and courage. He rallied the people as no one else could in that dark and desperate time. In speaking at Harrow School which he had attended as a boy he significantly said: "Do not let us speak of darker days; let us speak rather of sterner days. These are not dark days: these are great days--the greatest days our country has ever lived; and we must all thank God that we have been allowed, each of us according to our stations, to play a part in making these days memorable in the history of our race." [Address at Harrow School, 29 October 1941]
And then Churchill spoke the following stirring words to his countrymen after the disaster at Dunkirk when the prophets of doom were prophesying disaster and the imminent demise of the British Empire: "We shall not flag or fail. . . . We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." [Speech on Dunkirk, House of Commons, 4 June 1940]
I believe we need the spirit of a Winston Churchill today in this country. Our way of life, the way of life that inspires us to give our blood to the enemy to save his life, must be preserved at any cost. Whatever your feelings about the war on terrorism or about President George W. Bush, don't you believe we have just begun a battle to the death with a very evil ideology that would rob us of everything we hold dear?
Thank you John, for reminding us that we do belong to a pretty special country!
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
Our son, John, is an ER doctor. The Air Force paid for his education and he agreed to serve in the Air Force for the next three years blessing wounded troops with the skills he had gained in medical school and his residency.
John and his friend Matt Mecuro, as 16-year-olds, were body surfing with me that fateful day when I had my accident and were able to get me onto the beach and basically saved my life. John was very involved in my care until he left on his mission, and through it all gained a desire to study medicine.
His home base is in Las Vegas, Nevada, at Nellis Air Force Base. Each year, he is deployed somewhere in the world to practice ER medicine as needed. His first deployment was a big army base outside of Kabul, Afghanistan. He and two other ER doctors managed the ER unit 24 hours a day and seven days a week. Part of their duty was to take turns going out in helicopters to pick up the wounded.
I thought you might enjoy hearing about John’s first helicopter experience and about what took place. What follows is his e-mail to me.
"Hey Dad and family,
"So things are going well here. I went on my first helicopter mission a few days ago. It was pretty exciting. We had to go pick up an enemy combatant who was shot while trying to set up an IED (improvised explosive device). We flew about an hour to where the patient was being held. He was shot in the bottom while bent over setting up a bomb, but the bullet went into his stomach and hurt his intestines and nicked a big artery in his pelvis. By the time I saw him he had already gone through 11 units of blood, which was the entire supply of blood at that base. Throughout the chopper ride back, I had to monitor his vitals and had to keep giving him drugs to keep him sedated. He kept waking up and looking at me, so I kept giving him drugs to knock him out.
"We flew really close to the ground, about 200 feet. The surrounding area is really pretty and you would never know there was a war going on. There are a lot of rivers and farms, kids playing soccer, etc. In the helicopter was myself, 2 pilots, and 2 soldiers looking out both sides of the helicopter for possible enemies on the ground. Behind us we had a big black hawk helicopter loaded with guns that was covering us incase we came under fire. I was a little nervous on the flight to the get the patient, but on the way back I was so busy keeping him stabilized that I didn't have time to think about the dangers.
"Its pretty amazing the effort we make to take care of the enemy. I don't think they would do the same for us. I mean the guy got all the blood at that one base. If one of our soldiers had gotten hurt, there would not have been any blood for them. Also just think of the risk involved in just going to pick the wounded enemy up. When we arrived with the patient, we discovered we were also out of B- blood and we actually had to get volunteers to give their blood to this guy who was essentially trying to kill us. I think it says something really special about this country that we would put so much effort into saving people like this."
I don't know about you, but reading John's e-mail made me feel proud to be an American. Imagine risking your life to save the life of an enemy who is seeking to take your life -- even giving him your own blood. We do value human life and freedom in this country!
I believe that many of the pundits in Washington, DC could benefit from reading John's simple little e-mail. I know many are opposed to what we are doing in Iraq and Afghanistan, and maybe President Bush got us into this war on terrorism in Iraq prematurely -- who really knows? But isn't it refreshing to know that we really are trying to do something very good in the world and that we place such a high value on human life, dignity, freedom and liberty.
There is a spirit of pessimism and negativism abroad in the land. Ten years ago President Gordon B. Hinckley described it as follows: "... there is a terrible ailment of pessimism in the land. It's almost endemic. We're constantly fed a steady and sour diet of character assassination, faultfinding, evil speaking of one another. Read the newspaper columnists. Listen to the radio and television commentators. The writers of our news columns are brilliant, the commentators on the electronic media are masters--but they seem unable to deal with balanced truth, notwithstanding their protests otherwise. The negative becomes the stuff of headlines and long broadsides that, in many cases, caricature the facts and distort the truth--at least the whole truth." [CES fireside, March 6, 1994]
President Hinckley, in that same CES fireside talk, also said while speaking of the United States of America: "I know that she has problems. We've heard so much of these for so long. But surely, my brothers and sisters, this is a good land, a choice land, a chosen land. To me it is a miracle, a creation of the Almighty. It was born of travail. The Constitution under which we live is the keystone of our nation. It was inspired of God. Of it the great Englishman Gladstone said, "As the British Constitution is the most subtle organism which has proceeded from . . . progressive history, so the American Constitution is . . . the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of man" ("Kin Beyond Sea," North American Review 127 [September/October 1878], p. 185).
Since 9/11 we feel we have truly been put upon as a nation. Can you even imagine what it would have been like to have been living in England at the beginning of World War II when Nazi Germany had already overrun most of Europe and was threatening to invade England as well? Thankfully for Western civilization there was a Winston Churchill, who like President Hinckley, was the essence of optimism and courage. He rallied the people as no one else could in that dark and desperate time. In speaking at Harrow School which he had attended as a boy he significantly said: "Do not let us speak of darker days; let us speak rather of sterner days. These are not dark days: these are great days--the greatest days our country has ever lived; and we must all thank God that we have been allowed, each of us according to our stations, to play a part in making these days memorable in the history of our race." [Address at Harrow School, 29 October 1941]
And then Churchill spoke the following stirring words to his countrymen after the disaster at Dunkirk when the prophets of doom were prophesying disaster and the imminent demise of the British Empire: "We shall not flag or fail. . . . We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." [Speech on Dunkirk, House of Commons, 4 June 1940]
I believe we need the spirit of a Winston Churchill today in this country. Our way of life, the way of life that inspires us to give our blood to the enemy to save his life, must be preserved at any cost. Whatever your feelings about the war on terrorism or about President George W. Bush, don't you believe we have just begun a battle to the death with a very evil ideology that would rob us of everything we hold dear?
Thank you John, for reminding us that we do belong to a pretty special country!
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
Friday, November 13, 2009
The Precious Present
"To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven..." [Ecclesiastes 3:1].
Several years after my accident, I was sitting in our dining room waiting for Jo Anne to go somewhere in our van. Sometime before, she had prepared a collage of pictures of me interacting with members of our family on different occasions before my accident. It was in a nice frame and hanging on the dining room wall. For some reason I rolled my chair over to the collage so I could see it better. There was a picture of me with my arm around my oldest son at his high school graduation; another with me sitting at the side of my oldest daughter at her wedding reception. There was a picture of me with my arm around my daughter Rachel just prior to baptizing her and another with me holding my oldest grandson in my arms shortly after his birth. There were a number of other similar kinds of pictures.
As I sat there looking at those photographs a very strong feeling came over me. I wouldn't describe it as a feeling of sorrow, unhappiness or depression; nonetheless it was a very sobering kind of feeling. It was as though a voice was saying to me, "Jack, you really didn't fully realize how good your life was during all those years. You took so many things for granted. What an absolute joy it was for example, to carry your little children upstairs, pray with them, and sing to them and put them to bed. Think of all the basketball games out in the driveway with your sons and the neighborhood kids. What a blessing to be able to sit down at the piano and play and sing the hymns and to use those same fingers to work at the computer." On and on came memories of experiences flooding into my mind that maybe I did not value as I could have at the time.
As I sat there I realized how important it is to enjoy the moment -- "the precious present" -- and to not live so much in the past or in the future. We need to be grateful for the particular season we are experiencing in our lives and not be in such a hurry to just get through it.
A while back we had "Dumpster Day" in our little community of Tustin Meadows. Large dumpsters are brought in and on the designated day we can take all our junk and deposit it in one of the dumpsters. Jo Anne looks forward to "Dumpster Day" like most people look forward to Christmas. As the great day approaches she can be seen searching through the house, with a gleam in her eye, looking for anything of no value that is just sitting there gathering dust. Any possession not carrying its weight by serving some utilitarian purpose is going to end up in the dumpster. I became very nervous as it seemed to me she was spending an inordinate amount of time in my office. Each time she would look longingly at me I tried to say something somewhat intelligent which is difficult, blink my eyes, and give her my most endearing smile. I did not want to end up in the dumpster with the rest of the dust gathering stuff!
The morning of "Dumpster Day" she was in my office and I saw her eying the shelf where my journals are kept and finally, in a panic, I convinced her that they don't eat anything and I would pay rent on the space they occupied if she wouldn't throw them out. At length I convinced her, and in the process we read some interesting journal entries I had made just before I had my accident.
The following are my last two journal entries before being injured.
June 30, 1989, just one month and one day before my accident I wrote: "... being stake president is a wonderful privilege. I value this calling and try not to take myself too seriously while taking the calling very seriously. The Lord has blessed me tremendously and my heart is filled with gratitude when I think of the many blessings we enjoy as a family. The new grandchildren, Mike soon to be in law school, Rich on a mission, John (age 16) having a full-time job and learning some things about life and work. The little girls are so precious to me that I can't even express myself regarding them. Life would be so empty without these special people. What can I say about Jo Anne? Life would be no good without her. I love her more now than I did 25 years ago."
My last journal entry was recorded July 26, 1989, just five days before the fateful trip to Laguna Beach. "Jo Anne and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary last week. We went to the Los Angeles Temple to do a session. As we walked into the hallway that leads to the ordinance rooms, one of the workers asked Jo Anne and me if we would be the witness couple. It made this session so special for us... to be the witness couple on our anniversary. Anyway, it was just very special to be in the Temple with Jo Anne and to contemplate the things that have happened in 25 years of marriage. If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't want to change a thing."
And then suddenly, we began a new season of our lives. Truthfully, there was a long period of adjustment, but with the Lord's help the adjustment was made, and this new season of our lives has been remarkably wonderful and fulfilling. I believe I have learned a great lesson and I try hard to no longer live so much in the past or in the future, but strive to enjoy the "precious present." Each day is a gift to be valued. I am afraid that one of the most frequently committed sins -- at least in my life -- has been the sin of ingratitude. We just take so much for granted so much of the time. I think we must be very careful to always express our appreciation to a loving and kind Heavenly Father through our prayers and our actions. He is the source -- the fount -- of all of our blessings, both spiritual and material. To recognize this fact daily is perhaps the wisest and most important thing we can do to keep life in proper perspective.
"And in nothing doth man offend God, or against none is his wrath kindled, save those who confess not his hand in all things, and obey not his commandments." [D&C 59:18]
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Beware of hippie bands
Being old and retired, I have too much time on my hands to think about the past. One morning recently I was lying in bed and thinking about some of the experiences I have had as a quadriplegic on life support. As I did so, for some reason (maybe because it was about this same time of year when it happened), one of my most bizarre episodes came into my mind.
It went down at Bolsa Chica beach, part of Huntington Beach, California. In the spring of that year I had spoken to the Interfaith Council of Orange County at their yearly breakfast. Afterwards I was approached by a young high school teacher from San Clemente who asked if I would be interested in speaking at the annual Walk for Hope that he organized each year as a fundraiser for a variety of charities throughout the world.
He said their goal was to help people in India, Afghanistan, and other countries in the Middle East, as well as the needy in Southern California. It sounded good to me -- I have always been sort of gullible -- so I said I would be willing to participate.
He took my e-mail address, we communicated during the ensuing months, and finally the fateful day arrived, as it always does when you commit yourself well in advance to do something. He assured me that there would be 1000 people at the beach with a stage and a special ramp for me to get onto the stage area. He said there would be music, a variety of speakers, and would I take 10 minutes?
I felt I should give it my best effort and so I prepared a 10 minute talk around the theme of service. I went so far as to have Jo Anne read it, which resulted in a major revision -- all for the better I hate to admit. I have often felt that if Abraham Lincoln or Thomas Jefferson could have passed their writings by Jo Anne they would have been so much better. Seriously though, Jo Anne has the finest sense of what is good and bad in a talk than anyone I have ever met. I felt good about the final product.
We invited some family members to come with us, which included Jo Anne's 85-year-old mother who was still alive at the time, as well as her Filipino caregiver.
We pulled into the designated parking lot and saw numerous strange looking people milling about. My contact, the young high school teacher from San Clemente, was nowhere to be seen. The parking lot was surrounded by wall to wall booths and as we walked and rolled the perimeter we became aware that every liberal, left-wing organization in most of the world was represented. I went to the ACLU booth to report some quad abuse by Jo Anne, but they didn't seem interested in my case. The Church of Scientology, Dianetics, the Orange County Weekly -- the most liberal newspaper in Orange County, Animal-rights, and a number of legitimate religions were also represented. There were Buddhists, Muslims, Sikhs, Baha'i, and a sprinkling of Protestant and born-again groups assembled on the beach as well. I didn't notice any Catholics or Jews (or Mormons).
Grandma Stuart, at age 85, was asleep about 90% of the time in those days, but as she was pushed in her wheelchair around this parking lot her eyes were wide open. Jo Anne jokingly said to her "Mom, what are you doing here?" She looked Jo Anne in the eyes and said "What are You doing here?" Having grown up as a part of an older generation, she was not very ecumenically minded nor accepting of the left-wing liberal element represented at the beach that day. I did not hold it against her!
About this time a hippie rock band mounted the flimsy platform that was the stage. This group was right out of San Francisco and the sixties, except they had a modern state-of-the-art sound system. They cranked that thing up to the point that it was blowing the waves out to sea. Our contact was still not to be seen. We got behind the band in order for Jo Anne to hear me, and I told her that we ought to just get in the van and go home and leave well enough alone. Jo Anne is tougher than that and encouraged me to stay and see what would happen. That was the problem- I was afraid of what might happen!
Just as the band was concluding their half-hour of "music", my contact drove up in a beat up Volkswagen bus and proceeded to pull out the ramp he had just finished building. It was sagging in the middle and I doubted that it would hold my 400 plus lbs. of wheelchair with me in it, but closing my eyes I shifted my chair into four-wheel-drive and raced up the ramp and onto the platform. I almost shot off the back end but stopped with three wheels still on the platform. I was able to do a 180 and faced the crowd of 10 or 15 who had gathered to see the guy in the wheelchair wearing the BYU hat.
The hippie band agreed to let me use their sound system and with double microphones in front of my face I started to speak and was heard, I am sure, all the way to Malibu. The hippie band members seemed to be pleased and stayed to hear me speak.
I determined that I was going to give this group my best effort. I started out with some paralyzed humor and a few more people walked over to see what was going on. Finally I launched into the body of my talk and quoted a great religious leader who once said "When we are in the service of our fellow beings we are only in the service of our God." They perked up upon hearing that and by the end of the talk I felt that I had connected with at least a few in the audience. I successfully descended from the platform and when I had all four wheels finally on solid ground I breathed a sigh of relief.
Nobody patted me on the back or told me what a great job I had done and we went to the van and drove home as quickly as we could.
Is there a point to all of this? Probably not, except you need to be careful what you commit to do, but once committed, do it with all of your heart. It was also another testimony to the truthfulness of what the Lord has told us in Doctrine & Covenants 38:30 "... but if you are prepared ye shall not fear." How true that was that day at the beach.
Was anybody touched by my message? I will never know, but I knew in my heart that the Lord was pleased that I had prepared well and had given it my best effort. I felt good inside and my loved ones felt that it was well done and meaningful. Maybe after all, this is all that ever counts.
I also learned -- beware of hippie bands from the sixties.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
It went down at Bolsa Chica beach, part of Huntington Beach, California. In the spring of that year I had spoken to the Interfaith Council of Orange County at their yearly breakfast. Afterwards I was approached by a young high school teacher from San Clemente who asked if I would be interested in speaking at the annual Walk for Hope that he organized each year as a fundraiser for a variety of charities throughout the world.
He said their goal was to help people in India, Afghanistan, and other countries in the Middle East, as well as the needy in Southern California. It sounded good to me -- I have always been sort of gullible -- so I said I would be willing to participate.
He took my e-mail address, we communicated during the ensuing months, and finally the fateful day arrived, as it always does when you commit yourself well in advance to do something. He assured me that there would be 1000 people at the beach with a stage and a special ramp for me to get onto the stage area. He said there would be music, a variety of speakers, and would I take 10 minutes?
I felt I should give it my best effort and so I prepared a 10 minute talk around the theme of service. I went so far as to have Jo Anne read it, which resulted in a major revision -- all for the better I hate to admit. I have often felt that if Abraham Lincoln or Thomas Jefferson could have passed their writings by Jo Anne they would have been so much better. Seriously though, Jo Anne has the finest sense of what is good and bad in a talk than anyone I have ever met. I felt good about the final product.
We invited some family members to come with us, which included Jo Anne's 85-year-old mother who was still alive at the time, as well as her Filipino caregiver.
We pulled into the designated parking lot and saw numerous strange looking people milling about. My contact, the young high school teacher from San Clemente, was nowhere to be seen. The parking lot was surrounded by wall to wall booths and as we walked and rolled the perimeter we became aware that every liberal, left-wing organization in most of the world was represented. I went to the ACLU booth to report some quad abuse by Jo Anne, but they didn't seem interested in my case. The Church of Scientology, Dianetics, the Orange County Weekly -- the most liberal newspaper in Orange County, Animal-rights, and a number of legitimate religions were also represented. There were Buddhists, Muslims, Sikhs, Baha'i, and a sprinkling of Protestant and born-again groups assembled on the beach as well. I didn't notice any Catholics or Jews (or Mormons).
Grandma Stuart, at age 85, was asleep about 90% of the time in those days, but as she was pushed in her wheelchair around this parking lot her eyes were wide open. Jo Anne jokingly said to her "Mom, what are you doing here?" She looked Jo Anne in the eyes and said "What are You doing here?" Having grown up as a part of an older generation, she was not very ecumenically minded nor accepting of the left-wing liberal element represented at the beach that day. I did not hold it against her!
About this time a hippie rock band mounted the flimsy platform that was the stage. This group was right out of San Francisco and the sixties, except they had a modern state-of-the-art sound system. They cranked that thing up to the point that it was blowing the waves out to sea. Our contact was still not to be seen. We got behind the band in order for Jo Anne to hear me, and I told her that we ought to just get in the van and go home and leave well enough alone. Jo Anne is tougher than that and encouraged me to stay and see what would happen. That was the problem- I was afraid of what might happen!
Just as the band was concluding their half-hour of "music", my contact drove up in a beat up Volkswagen bus and proceeded to pull out the ramp he had just finished building. It was sagging in the middle and I doubted that it would hold my 400 plus lbs. of wheelchair with me in it, but closing my eyes I shifted my chair into four-wheel-drive and raced up the ramp and onto the platform. I almost shot off the back end but stopped with three wheels still on the platform. I was able to do a 180 and faced the crowd of 10 or 15 who had gathered to see the guy in the wheelchair wearing the BYU hat.
The hippie band agreed to let me use their sound system and with double microphones in front of my face I started to speak and was heard, I am sure, all the way to Malibu. The hippie band members seemed to be pleased and stayed to hear me speak.
I determined that I was going to give this group my best effort. I started out with some paralyzed humor and a few more people walked over to see what was going on. Finally I launched into the body of my talk and quoted a great religious leader who once said "When we are in the service of our fellow beings we are only in the service of our God." They perked up upon hearing that and by the end of the talk I felt that I had connected with at least a few in the audience. I successfully descended from the platform and when I had all four wheels finally on solid ground I breathed a sigh of relief.
Nobody patted me on the back or told me what a great job I had done and we went to the van and drove home as quickly as we could.
Is there a point to all of this? Probably not, except you need to be careful what you commit to do, but once committed, do it with all of your heart. It was also another testimony to the truthfulness of what the Lord has told us in Doctrine & Covenants 38:30 "... but if you are prepared ye shall not fear." How true that was that day at the beach.
Was anybody touched by my message? I will never know, but I knew in my heart that the Lord was pleased that I had prepared well and had given it my best effort. I felt good inside and my loved ones felt that it was well done and meaningful. Maybe after all, this is all that ever counts.
I also learned -- beware of hippie bands from the sixties.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
Thursday, October 15, 2009
We Was Robbed!
"We was robbed!"
I think I first heard it as a young boy when I became a dyed in the wool, true blue, through and through, Dodgers fan. They were then the Brooklyn Dodgers and had the uncanny habit of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory on a regular basis. However, they never owned up to the fact that it was their own fault and ineptitude that the Yankees always beat them in the World Series, or the Giants, coming from 13 games behind, snatched the pennant from them on a sad September afternoon many years ago. Oh why couldn't I have been a Yankee fan? Life would have been so much more pleasant over the years, but I got stuck with the Dodgers.
Especially in those Brooklyn days after blowing yet another game or series, the Dodgers inevitably would excuse themselves by saying, "We was robbed!" In other words, the umpires were against us, there were too many bad hops, the baseballs were doctored up, the Yankees have all the money, or the pitcher was throwing up spitballs, etc.
One of the most blatant scriptural examples of the "we was robbed" mentality is found in Mosiah 10. Mormon quotes Zeniff in describing why the hatred the Lamanites had for the Nephites was so intense and never ending.
"They were a wild, and ferocious, and a blood-thirsty people, believing in the tradition of their fathers, which is this—Believing that they were driven out of the land of Jerusalem because of the iniquities of their fathers, and that they were wronged ["we was robbed"] in the wilderness by their brethren, and they were also wronged ["we was robbed"] while crossing the sea; And again, that they were wronged ["we was robbed"] while in the land of their first inheritance, after they had crossed the sea..." [Mosiah 10:12-13] [emphasis added]
And so, generations of Lamanites had bought into the "we was robbed" way of looking at life, which resulted in hatred, war, misery and suffering. They simply would not admit the truth of the matter which was "... that Nephi was more faithful in keeping the commandments of the Lord—therefore he was favored of the Lord..." [Mosiah 10:14]
The "we was robbed" mentality weakens us and keeps us from achieving our true potential. Sometimes as parents, without realizing it, we promote this kind of thinking in our children. It's the coach's fault that my athletically gifted child is not starting and sits on the bench. It is the teacher's fault that my intelligent child is not getting straight A's. It is the piano teacher's fault that my child prodigy is having difficulty playing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star."
One of the greatest gifts we can give our children and ourselves is to completely eliminate from our approach to life the "we was robbed" mentality and take ownership for what we are doing or not doing with our lives.
My son, Rich, is an avid Dodgers, Lakers, and UCLA basketball fan. I couldn't have had any influence on him in that regard when he was just a little kid could I? John R. Wooden, the great former UCLA basketball coach, and arguably the greatest basketball coach of all time, is one of our all-time favorite heroes. Rich sent me an e-mail that contained a quote made by John Wooden that he thought was very important and that I would enjoy. The quote is found in a book Coach Wooden wrote entitled, "Wooden: A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections On and Off the Court."
In the book, he shared some advise his father gave to him as a young boy that influenced his life forever, both as a basketball coach and as a human being. It was simply this: "Don't whine, don't complain, and don't make excuses."
Of course, this philosophy is the antithesis of "we was robbed!" I can't help but think Coach Wooden's philosophy of not complaining, whining, or making excuses will take us a lot further in life than thinking "we was robbed."
Many years ago, in fact it was in the late 60s, I taught seminary at the Utah State Industrial School in Ogden, Utah for three years. This school was actually a coed prison/Reform School for juvenile delinquents. They were incarcerated for a variety of reasons -- none of them good! They were some of the unhappiest and depressed young people I had ever encountered. They had totally brought in to the "we was robbed" way of looking at life. It is true that, for the most part, they had less than wonderful parents and came from very dysfunctional homes. Using this, and many other negative things in their lives as excuses for their lawless and dangerous behavior, and the inevitable misery that followed, very few of them would ever take ownership for their unhappy lives. They all had the same goal, which was to get out of the Utah State Industrial School so they could be free and happy! The facility was not very high-security and these kids were extremely creative in escaping, and running to "freedom and joy." Within a week, or at most a month or so, they would be returned to the school, worse off and more miserable than when they ran. They constantly whined, complained, and made excuses for their bad behavior and resulting misery, because they felt, "they was robbed."
We tried desperately to teach them the following significant truth about life: "The Way out Is the Way through! They wanted out of misery, and out of the reform school, so they could have freedom and joy. Hardly any of them ever got the message that they couldn't run from their problems but had to face them head on, deal with them, and that the only way to the freedom they desired was to internalize and implement the truth that ultimately, "The Way out Is the Way through!"
It is so much easier to teach a great truth than to live it. After I had my accident many years ago, I found myself slipping into the "we was robbed" mentality. I felt I had been robbed of my body, my vocation as a teacher, my service as a stake president, and how could I ever be an effective husband, father, or grandfather again given my physical limitations.
Eventually, the principle I had taught my juvenile delinquents so many years before came into my mind and heart -- "Jack, the only way out is the way through!"
Immediately after the accident the neurosurgeons had told me I had suffered a "complete" injury to my spinal cord. That means it had been severed and there was absolutely no possibility that I would ever get anything back. It took months and even years to accept this truth. I tried to run and escape from the prison that had become my body even as my reform school kids had done from theirs. I eventually was able to empathize more fully with their challenge.
Finally, the day came that I could say to myself, "Jack, you are paralyzed from the neck down and are on life support and that is the way you will be the rest of this day, tomorrow, next week, next month, and for as long as you live." When I was able in my heart to make that admission I began to work my way out of misery and unhappiness to the freedom and joy I longed to have.
The "we was robbed" way of looking at life, coupled with whining, complaining, and finding excuses for our inadequacies, failures and unhappiness is a one way street to nowhere.
To face life head on with no whining, complaining, or making excuses, and working through our problems, will enable us to truly be free, productive, and fulfilled.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
I think I first heard it as a young boy when I became a dyed in the wool, true blue, through and through, Dodgers fan. They were then the Brooklyn Dodgers and had the uncanny habit of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory on a regular basis. However, they never owned up to the fact that it was their own fault and ineptitude that the Yankees always beat them in the World Series, or the Giants, coming from 13 games behind, snatched the pennant from them on a sad September afternoon many years ago. Oh why couldn't I have been a Yankee fan? Life would have been so much more pleasant over the years, but I got stuck with the Dodgers.
Especially in those Brooklyn days after blowing yet another game or series, the Dodgers inevitably would excuse themselves by saying, "We was robbed!" In other words, the umpires were against us, there were too many bad hops, the baseballs were doctored up, the Yankees have all the money, or the pitcher was throwing up spitballs, etc.
One of the most blatant scriptural examples of the "we was robbed" mentality is found in Mosiah 10. Mormon quotes Zeniff in describing why the hatred the Lamanites had for the Nephites was so intense and never ending.
"They were a wild, and ferocious, and a blood-thirsty people, believing in the tradition of their fathers, which is this—Believing that they were driven out of the land of Jerusalem because of the iniquities of their fathers, and that they were wronged ["we was robbed"] in the wilderness by their brethren, and they were also wronged ["we was robbed"] while crossing the sea; And again, that they were wronged ["we was robbed"] while in the land of their first inheritance, after they had crossed the sea..." [Mosiah 10:12-13] [emphasis added]
And so, generations of Lamanites had bought into the "we was robbed" way of looking at life, which resulted in hatred, war, misery and suffering. They simply would not admit the truth of the matter which was "... that Nephi was more faithful in keeping the commandments of the Lord—therefore he was favored of the Lord..." [Mosiah 10:14]
The "we was robbed" mentality weakens us and keeps us from achieving our true potential. Sometimes as parents, without realizing it, we promote this kind of thinking in our children. It's the coach's fault that my athletically gifted child is not starting and sits on the bench. It is the teacher's fault that my intelligent child is not getting straight A's. It is the piano teacher's fault that my child prodigy is having difficulty playing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star."
One of the greatest gifts we can give our children and ourselves is to completely eliminate from our approach to life the "we was robbed" mentality and take ownership for what we are doing or not doing with our lives.
My son, Rich, is an avid Dodgers, Lakers, and UCLA basketball fan. I couldn't have had any influence on him in that regard when he was just a little kid could I? John R. Wooden, the great former UCLA basketball coach, and arguably the greatest basketball coach of all time, is one of our all-time favorite heroes. Rich sent me an e-mail that contained a quote made by John Wooden that he thought was very important and that I would enjoy. The quote is found in a book Coach Wooden wrote entitled, "Wooden: A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections On and Off the Court."
In the book, he shared some advise his father gave to him as a young boy that influenced his life forever, both as a basketball coach and as a human being. It was simply this: "Don't whine, don't complain, and don't make excuses."
Of course, this philosophy is the antithesis of "we was robbed!" I can't help but think Coach Wooden's philosophy of not complaining, whining, or making excuses will take us a lot further in life than thinking "we was robbed."
Many years ago, in fact it was in the late 60s, I taught seminary at the Utah State Industrial School in Ogden, Utah for three years. This school was actually a coed prison/Reform School for juvenile delinquents. They were incarcerated for a variety of reasons -- none of them good! They were some of the unhappiest and depressed young people I had ever encountered. They had totally brought in to the "we was robbed" way of looking at life. It is true that, for the most part, they had less than wonderful parents and came from very dysfunctional homes. Using this, and many other negative things in their lives as excuses for their lawless and dangerous behavior, and the inevitable misery that followed, very few of them would ever take ownership for their unhappy lives. They all had the same goal, which was to get out of the Utah State Industrial School so they could be free and happy! The facility was not very high-security and these kids were extremely creative in escaping, and running to "freedom and joy." Within a week, or at most a month or so, they would be returned to the school, worse off and more miserable than when they ran. They constantly whined, complained, and made excuses for their bad behavior and resulting misery, because they felt, "they was robbed."
We tried desperately to teach them the following significant truth about life: "The Way out Is the Way through! They wanted out of misery, and out of the reform school, so they could have freedom and joy. Hardly any of them ever got the message that they couldn't run from their problems but had to face them head on, deal with them, and that the only way to the freedom they desired was to internalize and implement the truth that ultimately, "The Way out Is the Way through!"
It is so much easier to teach a great truth than to live it. After I had my accident many years ago, I found myself slipping into the "we was robbed" mentality. I felt I had been robbed of my body, my vocation as a teacher, my service as a stake president, and how could I ever be an effective husband, father, or grandfather again given my physical limitations.
Eventually, the principle I had taught my juvenile delinquents so many years before came into my mind and heart -- "Jack, the only way out is the way through!"
Immediately after the accident the neurosurgeons had told me I had suffered a "complete" injury to my spinal cord. That means it had been severed and there was absolutely no possibility that I would ever get anything back. It took months and even years to accept this truth. I tried to run and escape from the prison that had become my body even as my reform school kids had done from theirs. I eventually was able to empathize more fully with their challenge.
Finally, the day came that I could say to myself, "Jack, you are paralyzed from the neck down and are on life support and that is the way you will be the rest of this day, tomorrow, next week, next month, and for as long as you live." When I was able in my heart to make that admission I began to work my way out of misery and unhappiness to the freedom and joy I longed to have.
The "we was robbed" way of looking at life, coupled with whining, complaining, and finding excuses for our inadequacies, failures and unhappiness is a one way street to nowhere.
To face life head on with no whining, complaining, or making excuses, and working through our problems, will enable us to truly be free, productive, and fulfilled.
Dad/Grandpa/Jack
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