Listen to the still small voice! Listen. Listen.

In 12-step programs there are often promises associated with working the steps.  Families Anonymous is a group that helps those who have addicted loved ones. While the better-known Al-Anon is for those whose loved ones are alcoholics, Families Anonymous is for anyone who has a loved one with any chemical addiction.


And true to the tradition, there are promises in Families Anonymous. The promises are the result in the lives of many people who work the steps. One of them is this:

We will intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle us.

I was thinking about this promise recently. In a lesson someone mentioned this verse from the Doctrine & Covenants:

For it shall be given you in the very hour, yea, in the very moment, what ye shall say.

The revelation to Joseph is an echo of this counsel from the Lord to the ancient apostles: 

But when they shall lead you, and deliver you up, take no thought beforehand what ye shall speak, neither do ye premeditate: but whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye: for it is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost.

None of these admonitions is a suggestion that we should not prepare for difficult circumstances. They are, instead, admonitions that if we prepare, the Lord will provide us with what we need when we need it.

The scriptural references are for those called to do difficult things: to preach the gospel, sometimes in adverse circumstances. And the Lord promises that when His servants are on His errand, He will bless them with the right words to say.

Perhaps you’ve seen that in action: a sacrament meeting speaker who delivers a talk that seems out of his or her natural ability, a missionary who teaches with a particular strength of testimony beyond his years, a Relief Society president who knows what comfort to offer a young sister when she needs it the most.

The Families Anonymous promise, though not scriptural, suggests the same blessing is available in our personal lives. As we work the 12 steps (which are really a path to applying the atonement in our lives), we become more in tune with spiritual things. (Most workers of 12-step programs will refer to them as spiritual journeys.) And it makes sense as we open our hearts to the spirit, we will be more receptive. And the spirit will help us to know instinctively how to do things we could not do before.

As a parent, I relish inviting the spirit to help me learn how to be better. The work I have as parent – to teach the gospel to the most important audience I will ever face – is daunting to me, and I have regularly felt myself unequal to the task. But I am buoyed by the Lord’s promise to help me. And I have seen that help at work in my own home. I have had flashes of inspiration, of instinctively knowing what to say (or how to say it), of having words given to me in the very moment that I need them.

Not that I always listen. But I’m getting better at that. I’m open to the possibility that I don’t have all the answers (that lesson took surprisingly long on my parenting journey). And I recognize that I need to be quiet enough to hear the still small voice. When I can stop and ask, “What wouldst Thou have me do?” I can feel the promptings that will help me.

It’s good to know I’m not alone as a parent. Good for me, and good for my kids.

Allowing Mourning

As I began to write this post I had a flash of a memory from my undergrad days at BYU. We were in one of my English classes, a survey course, I believe, studying Donne's "Valediction Forbidding Mourning." Our instructor, pointing out the need to understand the words before we could understand the poem, indicated the first time she read this poem she substituted "Morning" for "Mourning." And she wondered how anyone could forbid morning from coming.

In Donne's poem, the speaker tries to sooth his lover's mourning at his leaving by presenting a series of metaphysical images which demonstrate how their being apart is actually good for them.

I think about things I have mourned in my life, and about the scriptural injunction to mourn with those that mourn. Of course I have mourned the death of loved ones – first my grandparents in my youth and then my parents when I was an adult. I was relatively young when my grandparents died. The one I remember the most was my mother's father. I knew him better than the others because he spent half of each year in the same town that we lived in. I must have been about 14 when he died (my brother had recently returned from his mission). When my mother gave me the news, I felt nothing. And I was surprised by that. It seemed odd that I didn't feel anything, but there I was.

A day or two later we gathered in the funeral home for a family viewing before Papa's many friends and business associates would file through to pay their respects. When I saw my grandfather in the casket, tears poured from my eyes. I could not control them, nor did I understand them. It was not as if I wanted him to come back; I knew he wouldn't. But the tears were unrelenting.

My mother kindly moved me to a more private part of the funeral home where I continued to weep. My brother, just home from his mission, came in to try to comfort me. He tried to talk about the Plan of Salvation, about life after death. But in the end, he said sometimes we just need to cry, and asked if I wanted him to stay or be alone. After a while, the tears stopped. I blew my nose, and I was done crying.

I have also mourned other losses besides the death of loved ones. I have mourned the loss of my dream of what some of my children would become as they made choices that were radically different from the ones I would have made for them. (I have since learned that it's unfair of me to suppose that my children will choose the dreams I have selected for them; they must be free to choose their own paths.)

I have mourned the loss of opportunities that I either missed or squandered. For instance I work in a job that many would consider to be terrific, but it is not my first choice of profession and does not bring me joy. And for a long time, I mourned what could have been had I traveled a different path. (And at the same time I've learned that work does not have to bring me joy, even though some days I wish it would.)

I have, from time to time, mourned change in my life. When I have left a calling it often has also meant leaving the association of those with whom I worked in that calling. I have mourned the loss of friends who have moved away, or friends I have left behind when I've moved. I have mourned my own innocence when events out of my control showed me more real life consequences than I ever wanted to see. And I've mourned because of mistakes I've made as a parent and as a husband.

When we mourn with those that mourn, what do we do? Of course we bring funeral potatoes. We send sympathy cards or flowers. We offer to help. Sometimes we just listen. And sometimes, like my brother, we let the mourner just cry.

I remember with clarity one friend who mourned with me. We had moved back to the US from an overseas assignment. I had just been released as bishop. The transition back to life in the US was difficult (more difficult than going overseas, as has always been the case for us). Some of my children were not adjusting well, and all the change caused some emotional earthquakes in our home. A good friend had warned me that my release as bishop would likely be followed by a period of depression, and I ignored him. But within months of our return I was, in fact, in a deep depression – fueled by the release, the move, the upheaval in our home.

I finally reached out to a friend who patiently listened as I talked. He read as I wrote. He said very little, really, except to say by what he did that he was there for me, ready to listen and ready to do, if something needed to be done. He encouraged me to visit with the bishop, which I did, but that was not particularly helpful to me. Certainly not as helpful as the listening ear of my dear friend.

And in time, I healed. The sun began to shine on me again. It took years to sort out the tremors in the family (and some still resonate ten years later), but it took much less time for me to find relief. And having someone mourn with me made all the difference.

And it made me look a little closer sometimes for someone whom I might love a little more, encourage a little more, someone who needs someone to mourn with him.

To listen

My wife reminds me from time to time that my job is not always to fix things. Sometimes it's to listen.

I thought of that reminder when I read "We come over, and sit" by Aaron R. at Mormon Matters yesterday.

Sometimes when we visit our bishop, we do so seeking counsel, seeking The Answer to our question, and sometimes the bishop can deliver. After all, he has certain gifts and authority by virtue of his calling. Often a wise bishop will, however, just listen.

It took some effort on my part to learn to listen when I was a bishop. Not that I could not listen when someone spoke. I even did well at reflective listening, that is repeating back what someone had said to me to confirm my understanding. But I was, initially at least, subject to my own distaste for silence. I felt a need to fill the gaps in a conversation, and sometimes I'd fill them with my own voice.

My first time as bishop I served in South America, speaking Spanish (not my native language, and not my mission language, either). My stake president counseled that a bishop should spend less than 30% of an interview talking, and the rest of the time he should be praying for inspiration so that when he spoke what he said would be useful. That was good counsel. And it was necessary for me, except my prayer was often that I would understand and be understood.

Fortunately the members of my ward were patient and understanding with me. They helped me with my Spanish skills. They patiently repeated themselves if I did not understand, and were noticeably relieved when they finally felt I did understand.

During another assignment as bishop I had a friend who had a significant issue. The issue doesn't matter. We talked about it a number of times. On one occasion he asked me on the phone if I were speaking as his friend or his bishop. Without thinking about the question or about him, I answered that I spoke as his bishop. As I hung up the phone I knew I had not said the right thing. I finished some other business at the church and then drove the half hour to his home where I found him sullen and not very willing to visit.

We sat in his living room in silence for some time. Finally I said, "I am your friend, too, you know. And I care about what happens to you." More silence. And then he finally began to speak. To share what he was feeling. To share his fears and concerns. To tell his side of the story. He spoke and I listened for about an hour. I had little to offer him except a listening ear. In the end, not much changed, except he knew I had listened to him. And I had learned an important lesson.

When I got home later that day, I found an email, written by him between my phone call and my visit. It said, "A friend would have listened. A friend would have cared about how I felt." And he was right.

As I think back on this experience, I am grateful for the spiritual nudge to go and see him. And to listen.