Clothes Suck

Gotta get this off my chest, pun intended.

Postpartum bodies are not fun. I don't even want to go into all the magnificent details of it.

I just want to write about clothes.

Ah, clothes shopping. That "universal" female pastime. Billions and billions of dollars go into perfecting the female form. We are supposed to care an awful lot about our looks.

I can't fully disengage with this near constant cultural pressure, as much as I'd like to sometimes. It matters how I look because it is extremely connected in both overt and subtle ways with how I act and how I'm treated.

None of my clothes fit. I resisted the intense desire to burn all my maternity clothes and instead gave them all to a pregnant lady in my ward. Well, most of 'em.

Maternity pants are way too big. Maternity shirts are too big and too small in the wrong places.

None of my prepregnancy clothes fit, either. Shirts are all too short. My biggest pants fit fine in the legs but not in the hips. The hair-tie trick doesn't work.

So I got to spend my day shopping for clothes.

Great.

Not.

Clothes shopping as a latter-day saint woman is always a challenge due to my underwear, called temple garments. Endowed adults pretty much always wear these night and day, the exceptions being fairly obvious (working out, swimming, etc). It's an outward expression of the covenants I made in the temple to devote my life to serving God.

So here's how the temple garments affect my clothes shopping experience:

- does the shirt have sleeves?
- is the skirt long enough?
- is it see through?

Then there's my own personal requirements:
- is this shirt breathable? I'm wearing two layers minimum at all times. I really don't want to be required to wear three for it to cover my garment top. I wear jackets and sweatshirts, but like, if I get hot, I can take those off.
- do the pants stay on? I have an obnoxiously curvy figure. Most of the time pants that fit over my hips do not fit my waist because they are too loose. I am a big fan of spandexy leggings but they aren't pants. You have to wear a long shirt or tunic or you look like you're not actually dressed.
- is it comfortable? My life is spent lifting, crouching, kneeling, washing dishes, sitting with children on my lap or in my arms. The clothes have to allow movement, be soft to the touch, and allow some kind of margin for my underwear to not show when I'm being touched by children.
- is it something I can nurse a baby in? I happen to love wearing dresses. Unless they are a wrap-style or have buttons, I can't nurse in them. So there goes half my Sunday options.
- is it machine washable and dryable? I don't have the patience or interest or budget for dry cleaning. Also, every single item of clothing I wear gets covered in sweat, milk, dirty hands, actual dirt, food/oil, baby spit up, urine, poop, blood etc. I also don't have a good place to lay things flat to dry. Everything I own goes through the washing machine and dryer except for very, very rare exceptions.
- is it durable? Will I get some wear out of it?

And of course, how much does it cost: is the cost to value ratio acceptable?

All this before even starting to think about how it looks: is it attractive on me?

I'm not a hideously ugly person. Some clothes look better than others with how I'm shaped. My postpartum shape is really disproportionate. I personally don't like or enjoy the crazy proportions. It's inconvenient. It's uncomfortable. I could (and have) devote many, many words writing about the topic of bra shopping in a culture that doesn't believe in objective bra sizing standards. But that's not what I'm writing about now.

I had to go clothes shopping for myself today, so I went to three stores: Goodwill, Hy-Vee, and Duluth Trading Company. I spent $100 and got 3 pairs of jeans, 4 skirts, 1 blouse, and 4 black t-shirts.

Goodwill is a thrift store. I bought everything except for 3 of the black t-shirts there. It's completely hit or miss, it feels grungy, and it's not very organized. But hardly worn jeans for less than $5? That's pretty great. Also there's some fun, eclectic, weird pieces there. I like that.

Hy-Vee is the grocery store. It is really weird, but there's a clothing shop inside of it and it happens to be really cute clothes. All my friends also agree: it's the best clothing store in Ankeny. This is partially a statement on how few clothing stores we have, but partially not. It's a British clothing company, and all the clothes are modest and work with garments. They're also well made and cheap.  The only downside is that the sizing can be confusing since it is European, but American sizes are ridiculous, unstandardized, and wildly inconsistent, so it's not really that confusing anyway. There wasn't anything that great there today.

Duluth Trading Company is a midwestern cultural phenomenon. It sells work clothes, shoes, outerwear, and "long tail" t-shirts. Meaning, t-shirts with slightly more length, maybe two inches. They have pretty raunchy, distasteful ads but the clothes are great. The t-shirts are thick, durable, prewashed, and comfortable. It is ridiculous that 3 black t-shirts cost more than all the other clothes combined. But they fit great, will match anything, and will hide stains okay. No regrets.

When I buy new clothes that I like that aren't statement pieces (ahem, jeans, bras) I buy 2 because it's rare to find the perfect combination of all the above factors and I personally don't love shopping that much. I don't hate it, but what I do kind of hate is how I feel like my day was wasted. I really want to get to my computer so I can work on some of my Czech language endeavors. It's as though I spend almost every day trying to claw my way to my computer. It is frustrating that I didn't get that time today. My phone is a really poor substitute for some things.

The Sixth "Love Language"?

I mean, who hasn't read the Love Languages book? And maybe it's useful to people who have never thought the idea, "my spouse experiences the world differently than I do." Except instead of 16 options, there's five. And instead of taking a test, you're supposed to intuitively know which of the five awesome things you like best. As if any normal person in the world doesn't like sex. Pfff.

There's this studio c sketch about how Santa Claus decides to give all the kids gifts based on their love languages. So only one of them actually gets gifts, while the others get Santa's hand in their face (physical touch), their toys given away to charity (acts of service), etc. In the morning I'll embed it in this post.

My brother: "Well, that sketch funny because they get the languages completely wrong."

Me: "No, it's funny because it's making fun of the entire idea that people like to be appreciated only one way; every single person likes getting gifts."

I recently discovered my "love language" (even the term makes me somewhat vomit in my mouth: the alliteration, admitting this loaded word into non-spousal relationship contexts, oozing sentimentality and disgusting piles of subjective feelings) and it's something completely different from quality time, words of affirmation, acts of service, gifts, or physical touch (omgosh seriously, how did this shrink fail to think about sex. "Hey honey, wanna fulfil our primary evolutionary function?" said no person in a serious way ever).

It's interest.

Me: "Hey, I discovered this course about Beethoven's sonatas and it's really interesting! What do you think about it?"

My uncle: "Yeah, I recently started listening to [some other works] by Beethoven. Really, I think there's nothing the man produced which is not of interest."

Later
Me: [daydreaming aloud] "But seriously, doesn't that sound like the most magnificent compliment one could ever receive? Wouldn't it be amazing if someone said those words about you?"

Danny: "I think for those words to objectively be true one would have to produce very little."

Ha. HA!

To summarize a conversation that pierced me to my core:

Me: "whine whine whine I feel like very few people out there care about my thoughts."

My friend: "I think there's lots of people who care about your thoughts. Anyway, what's the signal that people [online] give you that they care?"

i.e. what's your love language. Excuse me while I vomit my displeasure at realizing this.

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Okay, back.

Me: "I have no idea what the signal is that people online care about my thoughts, but I definitely know that they DON'T care when they ghost me or just don't read what I've said at all."

Ghosting is when you contact someone online, you know they received what you wrote, and they don't respond. They ignore you on purpose even when you specifically are trying to communicate with them.

Scrolling past my writing because it's not interesting is also ignoring me on purpose but it's less aggregious; you can't be interesting to everybody at all times. Even if you're Beethoven.

But like, what the heck. I carefully pour my most important thoughts - my genuine testimony! - out of my mind, sacrificing nearly all that days alloted precious, limited free time - and I get a response from...4 or 5 people? I had low expectations but apparently they weren't low enough. In five seconds I can reshare a pretty postcard photo from the place where I grew up or write down one of the millions of snarky thoughts that pass through my mind and generate more interest in a matter of hours. That's...

Well, that's sad.

Interest doesn't fit neatly into any of these dumb five categories. It's pretty much some combination of all of them.

It's really difficult to guage interest online. You get these weird signals that are oddly specific (did they open this document and leave tracks in it? Did they like or comment? Can I see them writing something and then going back and erasing it and rewriting it? If I'm feeling extremely creepy - haven't done this one for a few years but I used to regularly and even labeled them in my blog stats tracker - did someone at their IP address open my blog?). You don't have any of the fundamentally human visual signals that are so impossible to name: a tiny microglance to the side, a slight wrinkle of the nose, a goofy laugh or involuntary grin. I can't see those but I'm $&#@ good at imagining them. Or am I.

If you want to know your love language, the best way to figure it out is not to ponder over it for days and days. It's simply to ask yourself, "how do people you love piss you off the most?" The opposite is your love language. Or maybe, "how do you like to show people you care about them?" That's probably your love language, too.

I really, really like to show love by being interested. It's what I enjoy doing most. I don't even think of it in those terms because it is the way I naturally am. It is infinitely fun to watch people react, especially when they are provoked into laughing or smiling. I love this. And I enjoy doing it in all the five "official" ways, except that physical touch is in this roped-off strictly family-only area.

My greatest worry is that I'm not actually that interesting.

Going off of social media for a while is inevitably going to give you these powerful messages: "People don't care about your online thoughts even close to as much as you hope they do."

"You're never going to be able to get everyone you know to care."

"You're the only one obsessing over yourself. Get over yourself and get out in the real world."

"You can show a lot more interest in others by a simple phone call or text than by a like or a comment."

And mainly: "LACK OF A SIGNAL ISN'T ALWAYS A SIGN OF DISINTEREST." There could be a hundred really good reasons somebody doesn't respond, so base your self worth off something real, something more concrete and lasting, like the promise that is repeated on every page of the scriptures by every prophet since the dawn of time: God cares about you.

Thoughts about Jesus Christ

If you are reading this post and are in a snarky mood, I invite you to go stop and take a walk in the woods or some calm, quiet place first before continuing on. The words I want to write are earnest, sincere and serious. How can you hope to understand the tender feelings of my heart if your head is full of cynicism and sarcastic GIFs and memes?

No, I mean it.

I'll wait.

This isn't going anywhere.

It'll be here when you're actually ready to read it someday.

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.......dum de dum dee dooo....

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No, seriously, if you're grouchy or tired or not in the mood for whatever reason, just come back some other time.

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Okay, so I hope that gave you some time to quiet your mind and yourself, and hopefully now you are ready to hear my words.

I want to write about this theme: "I'm not stupid or crazy AND I *love* to talk about Jesus Christ, can't I please tell you why?"  My husband, who never comments or posts on anything online, actually answered this loaded question on Quora: How can intelligent and logical people believe so heavily in the Mormon church? "Because even though it's nastily worded it's actually a very good question from an external perspective and I think it has a good answer." 

Like my beloved husband, I am also a highly educated person. I have had many opportunities to travel throughout the world and the United States, meeting new and interesting people, being exposed to a wide range of physical and intellectual viewpoints. I speak three languages proficiently, and four if you count Czech, which I speak poorly. I am definitely not a stupid person.

I am going to explore this idea about how smart, non-crazy, non-fanatical people like myself can have faith in Jesus Christ, albeit from a completely different perspective that is not about following a logical test, the way my husband explained it.

I sometimes feel as though I have a stamp with the word "Unsatisfactory" in my hand. I find myself constantly metaphorically stamping many things in my life with it. Generally what gets stamped is not so much other people or even necessarily myself, but rather these things that could be loosely called "conditions of mortality." Limitations of my physical body: UNSATISFACTORY. Inability to communicate what I'm really feeling: UNSATISFACTORY. Trying my best to do what I believe is right, but still failing: UNSATISFACTORY. I don't hate myself per se, I am just well aware that UNSATISFACTORY touches every piece of my existence.

The idea that I am not just a random bunch of cells and electrical impulses but that my existence is eternal and has meaning is intuitive to me; it is not something I think I could convince anyone else to believe, even if I tried to throw as many words as possible at them. It is the prerequisite to all my beliefs and values. Rather than clumsily try to explain how I know that I am known and loved by God as his child (especially since becoming a parent myself), I will trust that you have the ability to temporarily suspend your disbelief in this idea so that you can understand the other things I want to share.

I believe that before I came to this earth, I lived as a spirit somewhere else. I was a daughter of God then the way I am now. I could not progress and really become like God until I had gone through specific experiences only possible outside of his watchful parental care. For some reason, a physical body was a really important part of this plan. I suspect that leaving God's presence was a painful decision for me. I decided to come to earth to experience many things essential to my eternal progression (probably the most important being to choose to marry in the temple) and to prove whether I would choose good instead of evil.

I strongly dislike the feeling of separation from God. It basically sucks. It is miserable. Apart from a few very special, sacred moments, is more or less the constant state of my mortal existence. I would describe the feeling of separation as a kind of void - like I know that I am not whole yet. That there's something incomplete and missing, just beyond my grasp. I would also paint this idea as much more of a spectrum or range than black/white or on/off. It's as though there are times in my life when I feel closer to God than others, but have I ever literally been in his presence while on earth? No. Unfortunately not.

No matter how hard I try, and how often I repent, I'm constantly plagued by conditions of mortality: a weak mind which can never perfectly remember what it ought to, clumsy management of this physical communication interface (saying the wrong thing at the wrong time to the wrong person in a very dorky way), a tendency to become angry and rebellious and proud, etc. A kind of blindness when it comes to other peoples' needs and feelings, try as I may to always be aware and caring.

Basically, tldr: I'm pretty #@*& imperfect. 

God is perfect. He perfectly knows and loves me. I am well aware that there would be no way to return to my heavenly parents on my own. I am so imperfect, and imperfect, unclean things cannot be in God's presence. 

Therefore: my loving Heavenly Father who wants me to return to him also provided me with the way to return. 

That way is Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ has a lot of names. When you call him (by the way, I sometimes get sick of capitalizing the "H" - it is jarring both to read and write and I've noticed recently that they don't always do this in the scriptures, so I'm taking that as permission to also not have to do that) by this name, Jesus Christ, you can sometimes be painted as a fool or a fanatic by those around you. They might see you as a haughty evangelist or a deluded sentimental fool or worst of all (in my opinion, because I probably overvalue intelligence) somebody who is incapable of logical thinking or reason. This is why I often prefer to use words like "my Savior" or "the Redeemer" or "the Lord." They seem less mock-able. But I want there to be no ambiguity here, so I will use his name. 

Jesus Christ is my older brother. Before this earth was created, he volunteered to take upon himself the sins and pains of the world. He chose to be a sacrifice so that the laws of justice could be met. He came to this earth, lived a life completely devoid of sin, and in him the law of Moses was fulfilled. He was and continues to be despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief. 

He is acquainted with my grief, my very lonely, very personal grief that quite often comes from these "conditions of mortality." I have a stamp across my forehead that reads UNSATISFACTORY. He takes a damp cloth and washes that ink away when I repent. I don't know all the details about why it had to be him, or how it is possible for a male person to experience all the female-specific pains that exist. But who am I to tell God why it should or shouldn't be this way? If I really believe in an all-knowing, all-loving, all-just, all-merciful, almighty Father in Heaven, surely I can be obedient and put my faith in Jesus Christ, the vehicle by which the plan works, even if I don't fully understand why or how it could work.

By the way, I have lots of theories about it, many of which come from a lively imagination and a love of Fantasy/Science Fiction. Like maybe Jesus Christ used a time bubble in the garden of Gethsemane (the exact location of which remains unknown, but I have visited several of the posited locations). I guess if that mattered, we would know about it. Maybe we will know about it someday.

The consistent message I have received through a lifelong reading of the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Book of Mormon, the Doctrine and Covenants, the Pearl of Great Price and the words of the living prophet on the earth today is that Jesus Christ is the most important part of the plan of salvation. Jesus Christ's sacrifice for me is the reason why I can hope to someday truly become whole. Jesus Christ was perfectly obedient to Heavenly Father, even going so far as to be baptized even though he did not need a remission of his sins. Jesus Christ knows my name, and literally all my imperfections. He wants me to repent and believe his words, which are repeated on nearly every page of all the scriptures, something I had not previously noticed before starting to study them with a greater degree of focus. 

Jesus Christ is not some scary statue in a musty and dimly lit Cathedral, or a mossy effigy on a stone cross. He is not a hateful, snide meme or a political jibe. He is a perfect friend who knows me, and loves me. He is my example. He's also perfect, so he knows all languages - including the language of my heart. He is also a perfect computer programmer - really, he is the Creator, so of course creating a measly program would be within his grasp. He's a perfectly patient and kind listener, and he fully gets me. I feel better about myself the more I read about him and come to know him. I really love him. I would give away all of my sins to know him. How great would it be if I could convince all the people around me that this is true?

It is quite painful to live in a world surrounded by people who do not feel the same way, who esteem something I treasure so highly as something trifling, or irrelevant to modern life, or worst of all, a silly deception from the past designed to oppress mankind. I strongly dislike conflict, so living in a world like this with friends like these is painful for me. I think I would have made a terrible full time missionary. I think my heart would have been repeatedly broken to pieces. I am glad that it was not required of me to serve that way.

What I do feel required to do is actually a huge joy, though! I was recently urged by the living prophet of God on the earth today to pray to understand, cultivate, use, and expand my spiritual gifts with a promise that as I do so, I will change the world. 

Even though I often feel self-loathing for being this way, I can recognize that I'm a pretty verbose writer. I really like to write my deep thoughts, and these are the deepest ones I have. I scratch my head a little bit in consternation about the impression I had to share these thoughts, but that is what I feel is the right thing to do. I hope that I have been able to express to you what I really mean in a way that you can really understand. I hope that I can inspire whoever chooses to read these words to discover your own individual worth and value before God, and that this implicit seed of faith will lead you to become curious and want to know more about how our lives have meaning and purpose, and that there is a way by which we can be saved and eventually perfected. That way is Jesus Christ.

The Best People are the "Quiet" People

Once when I was in college I went on a date with a guy who was really fun, friendly, nice, interested, interesting, good looking, smart, successful - and also an ENFP.

Yeah, yeah, yeah...MBTI has major limitations and is kinda horoscopey. I know, I know. But it is one fast and easy way to categorize people that is not completely useless, so I still kinda like it (and all other systems for analyzing people around me, to be honest) and probably always will: "They are genuinely warm and interested in people, and place great importance on their inter-personal relationships."Anyone who ever wanted to know me better would only have to read this precise description which has been floating around the interwebs for a long, loong time, because it fits me perfectly and has for decades.

So the date with this fellow ENFP was a total failure, and that was a weird surprise to me, since were supposedly really compatible. I mean, we had similar interests, values, and our friend groups intersected. I think we were in a linguistics or Arabic class together? Or maybe it was an Old Testament class?

During the date, we went to his apartment to drop something off before going out - probably to a movie or something else completely non-memorable. What I remember is sitting at the counter in his apartment and listening to him talk on and on and on and it was so...well, frustrating. I mean, he had interesting things to say - I distinctly remember him talking about Brazilian Jiu-jitsu as it related to his mission in Brazil, which was interesting enough - I mean, martial arts are pretty cool! - but...

But...

But he wouldn't shut up. I wanted to talk.

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Fast forward a couple years to when I had three kids in diapers at the same time (!) in Houston. A blonde woman moved into the ward with her family. She was bubbly, talkative, gorgeous, and I immediately knew she was also an ENFP (this was confirmed later in a conversation with her). It was yet again like looking in a mirror. Myself reflected. But only...she was much more beautiful, funny, and socially adept, or so it seemed. I was struggling to survive under a mountain of laundry. I felt huge amounts of jealousy.

Until I befriended her.

Then we were great friends! She was fun to talk to, she had great stories and shared them freely. She was very kind - we hung out in play group and at other random church activities. She babysat my kids a couple times. I remember standing outside her house and just talking for a long time in her doorway, because we had a lot of things to say.

I never felt particularly close to her, but that was probably partially a function of time more than anything.

All this to say, I am friends with other ENFPs - or other personality types that are also extroverts. I don't really base my friendships off of MBTI in any way.

But yet, somehow, my closest friends seem to be the so-called "quiet" people. I want to explore why that might be in this blog post.

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Back to that date with that fellow ENFP (by the way, we are still friends on facebook - I definitely do not carry bad feelings for him personally. In fact, if our paths ever did cross again, I would probably really enjoy catching up. It wasn't him - it was "us" that was problematic):

The ENFP needs to be given positive assurance and affirmation. 

I didn't really want to have to give it constantly!

More than one ENFP has been known to "go fishing" for compliments. 

I could totally perceive him doing this, and it was so irritating! "Hey, buddy, that's my line!"

They like to hear from their significant others that they are loved and valued, and are willing and eager to return the favor. 

But that wasn't a possibility without being able to get a word in edge-wise.

They enjoy lavishing love and affection on their mates, and are creative and energetic in their efforts to please. 

But it was just exhausting listening to him and trying to stay one step ahead in the conversation. I could never hope to please him, I had to be the quiet observer, the one who was pleased. It was a terrible role for me.

The ENFP gets a lot of their personal satisfaction from observing the happiness of others, and so is generally determined to please and serve their partners.

How to please and serve someone who is bending over backwards to try to please and serve you? It didn't work well at all.

A problem area for ENFPs in relationships is their dislike of conflict and sensitivity to criticism. 

There was no possibility for interesting discussion because we were just walking on eggshells and laughing everything off whenever anything approached a conflict. I think I may have even mentioned how we were both very definitely ENFPs during this date, and both of our reaction was just to laugh at that, though on the inside I was rolling my eyes.

They are perfectionists who believe that any form of criticism is a stab at their character, which is very difficult for them to take. Conflict situations are sources of extreme stress to the ENFP. They have a tendency to brush issues under the rug rather than confront them head-on, if there is likely to be a conflict. They are also prone to "give in" easily in conflict situations, just to end the conflict. They might agree to something which goes against their values just to end the uncomfortable situation. In such cases, the problem is extended and will return at a later time. 

Yeah. The best solution in this situation was to run away. Or rather, avoid going on dates with this guy again.

I would be so unhappy married to someone exactly like me.

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This sums up nicely the kind of relationships that I am drawn to:

For close friendships, ENFPs are especially drawn to other iNtuitive Feeling types, and to other Extraverts who are also enthusiastic about life. Like the other iNtuitive Feeling types, the ENFP needs authenticity and depth in their close relationships. They're likely to have friends from all walks of life who they feel close to and care about, but will have only a few very close friends with similar ideals to their own. The ENFP also tends to value the company of iNtuitive Thinkers.

Introverts, extroverts - intuitive, thinking - all these dumb labels aside, it seems like one of the main qualities that my closest, dearest friends all have in common is this: they are considered to be "quiet" by many other people.

I put quiet in quotes because it's my experience that these people, if provoked correctly, will not be capable of shutting up, and isn't that the exact opposite of "quiet"?

There are legitimately quiet people, to be sure. I'm not really talking about that. Really - those "quiet" people? Not so quiet, once you get them talking. Being introverted isn't about being quiet, it's about where you get your energy: from time spent alone rather than time spent with others.

My husband is considered by my parents and siblings as a "quiet" person, but we talk for hours and hours. It isn't just because he's "quiet"; nobody likes talking to a wall, after all. He is an active listener. He shares his ideas, which I love to hear. And sometimes he needs some time to just be alone. 

There's probably some sort of game aspect involved in this. Coax-the-idea-out-of-the-mind-cave (Danny: "What, I don't get a mind palace?!") or something like that. Honestly, it's something I do without even thinking about it. On Sunday, I stopped in the hall and had a 10 minute conversation with a man in my ward who I only vaguely know. I had heard that he had changed jobs (he's a computer programmer). I asked him about it, and he did all the talking. This was really surprising to my family, since they had never heard him voluntarily say anything. 

"Quiet" people, especially those that share interests with me, quite often have secret hidden treasures of thoughts inside of them which I really love to discover. I love to hear their thoughts. They are usually better crafted than those of us loud people, since they don't seem to need oral articulation in order to process their thoughts.

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In the workplace, ENFPs are pleasant and friendly, and interact in a positive and creative manner with both their co-workers and the public. ENFPs are also a major asset in brainstorming sessions; follow-through on projects can be a problem, however. ENFPs do get distracted, especially if another interesting issue comes along. They also tend towards procrastination, and dislike performing small, uninteresting tasks. ENFPs are most productive when working in a group with a few Js to handle the details and the deadlines.

All of my closest friends have turned out to be very confident introverted J's - these "quiet" types. I think it's because they very often are the only ones with the patience to hear out my crazy ideas. I think I'm attracted to "quiet" people because of a few reasons: 

1. Pure curiosity: what is going on in their head?

2. I have space to talk.

3. I think we generally have complimentary emotional needs: I really need attention, people with whom to share interests, projects, and ideas - people who like to be around me. In turn, without an extrovert jumping in and toppling over their lives, these "quiet" people would probably not have much opportunity to make close interpersonal connections, which is a basic human need.

4. It's fun to talk with other loud people, too, but I think the "quiet" people are usually better observers and listeners, which makes their insights much more interesting. 

There are probably more reasons why "quiet" people have turned out to be the best people for me to surround myself with, but my tiny bit of discretionary time is up. 

Limited Agency Theory

Latter-day saints should listen to deterministic atheists, because they might have some important ideas about God that we are missing.

(Then again, they might not, since it's pretty much impossible to describe a belief system around what one does not believe. And since atheism is in no way whatsoever any kind of organized belief system, it's hard to make generalizations about what one does or does not believe. In every case, those generalizations end up being meaningless. But hey, it's a sufficiently hook-ing opening line, enough to raise your eyebrows and compel you to hear me out, which was the actual point of writing it!)

I am going to make the case that our agency on earth is far more limited than we latter-day saints usually tend to think, and that limited agency is actually a "tender mercy" - an individualized blessing directly from God that demonstrates His divinity and love for each of us on the most immensely personal level that is only just barely imaginable.

We know that what causes us to make choices is not always something within our control. I think that most latter-day saints will resist this idea, probably because we so strongly value our agency, but this is an obvious fact that we must all come to face at some point. Here are some specific examples:

• Parole is more likely to be granted to prisoners by a parole board who has just eaten.
• Mass murderer Charles Whitman had a brain tumor which undeniably affected his choice to murder his mother, his wife, fourteen other people (including a pregnant woman) and eventually himself.
• (halfway through the article, the guy is named "Alex") ...and this guy's recurring brain tumor also definitely affected his choices.
• You are more likely to buy products (or help people) when you smell something good

Here are some more common-sense, broad examples:

• We can't make choices for the people that we love. We can't force our children to behave, and neither can we force our siblings, parents, and spouses to do what we want them to do.
• We are born with a set of individual, unique DNA that determines all kinds of things about our physical body: now that I am born, I can't alter that DNA (well...maybe in the future that will be somewhat possible with DNA splicing, but...) to change all kinds of things about myself which affect me and the choices which I make on a daily basis.  
• So far as we know, we don't choose where we are born, to whom we are born, when we are born, the circumstances of our families - all kinds of things about our environment are the way they are, and they aren't ours to choose. Yet these have bearing on our choices and actions.
• I learn many things which I can't remember perfectly. I have to learn them over and over and over, and even then sometimes I don't really fully understand what I've learned. My memory (or lack thereof) definitely affects my agency.

Our environment and our genetics play huge, huge roles in the everyday decisions we make, and failing to admit that is pretty prideful, in my opinion.

I had an awful nightmare the other night, the specifics of which are just a little bit too personal to recount. I don't know if you've ever experienced this, but it is truly horrible to wake up and then feel worse. In this case, the thing that was so horrible was a significant loss of my own personal agency, which also had to do with my memory. In my dream, I had no memory of x happening to me, but then I discovered that it had, and I was livid. I am not exactly sure what is the role of memory in relationship to agency, but it has to be connected in some important way.

On Sunday I got up and bore my testimony of limited agency being evidence of God's love for me. I testified to a group of 200-some-odd people that I strongly believe that God designed the exact circumstances of my life - including my environment, my DNA, all these things that work on, pull at, tug, and often limit, my personal agency. If this life is a test, which I believe it is, then the maker of the test knew what He was doing. He wasn't going to give me a test which I would definitely fail. In fact, because He loves me, and wants me to succeed and pass the test and return to live with Him again, this test He gave me has the greatest chance for me to succeed. Therefore, the circumstances which limit my agency are evidence that He thought them through beforehand, and it's okay to let go of some of the piles of typical Christian guilt that we (read: I) so often lay upon ourselves (myself) over our (my) human condition.

The test is simple: will we follow Jesus Christ?

We probably don't talk that much about our limitations because it would be really easy to make it sound like an excuse to sin. After all, if we don't have agency, or if it is severely handicapped - if all my choices were predetermined - then what does it matter if I become a whore or rob from the bank or willfully murder somebody or...? I do still scratch my head to observe my friends who do not believe in God or consequences of life after death, who are still very devoted to following their own moral codes, most of which intersect very closely with my own. Why? I know that keeping commandments very often results in temporal blessings - like, if you don't sleep around, you're way less likely to get an STD, for example. But if I did not have a strong belief in God, I imagine I would justify my sins a whole lot more and be much less apt to make righteous choices.

(This, by the way, is probably why a loving God put me into a latter-day saint family. He designed the test so that I would have the best chance to succeed. But I digress.)

Also we are limited as to our knowledge of our limitations. Sometimes we know them, but other times we actually don't. In a way, it is good for us to not preoccupy ourselves too much with thoughts about our limitations, again, to avoid making excuses for not choosing the right. 

To paraphrase a conversation I had recently about a person who was really getting on my friend's nerves:

My friend: "Do you think that someday, after we die, I'll get to talk to him and this condition of his will be removed, so that we will really be able to talk and I'll really be able to understand him?"

 

Me: "I think...I think that is what it will be like for all of us, actually. I think after we die, and are resurrected and receive perfect bodies, with perfect brains, we will finally, finally be able to successfully communicate. I think we all have some kind of "condition" - not just this person, but you, me - everybody around us."

I like to think this conversation was a great comfort to my friend. It's comforting to me that I don't have to bear the burden of all my awkwardness alone.

Christians in general also probably don't think a lot about the limitations of our agency because we've been told we won't be given trials that are too much for us to handle (except for like, the trials which cause us to die, I guess). Still, for people like me who are more apt to lament the fact that we are so imperfect, I think recognizing that my limitations were predetermined is a hugely comforting reassurance. It gives me permission to trust that things will be okay in spite of what it seems. Deterministic atheists inherently believe this. Things are the way they are, and that's okay. It's as it should be.

Elder Hales said, "Agency permits us to make faithful, obedient choices that strengthen us so that we can lift and strengthen others." I think if we had perfect agency we would be able to successfully do that perfectly at all times. In other words, I strongly believe that the difference between mortals and God is that God has perfect agency and we don't yet. Because we are limited by our knowledge, we don't have the perfect ability that God has to minister to others. The point is that we should always strive to be more godlike, in spite of these limitations; this is why the Christian message is so often completely centered on what we can do with our agency, which is to repent and to come unto Christ. This theme must be repeated several thousand times throughout all the scriptures, both ancient and modern.

I think 2 Nephi 9:25 is evidence supporting this, "people have limited agency and that's okay," theory. Basically, here Jacob suggests that if there's no law, there's no punishment for x, and without punishment for x there's no condemnation for x, and without condemnation for x, the mercy of God through the Atonement of Jesus Christ covers x. What is x? All of the pain and suffering humans have ever felt but not been accountable for, either because they were pain from our human condition, or pain from sin for which we weren't fully accountable because we didn't have the knowledge (aka the law) - or the capacity to have that knowledge.

Later in the chapter is that verse about the vainness and the frailties and the foolishness of men, for when they are learned they think they are wise and hearken not unto the counsel of God. Why should latter-day saints assume that this knowledge does not also include gospel knowledge? For my entire life I have felt like as saints, we assume that because we have the restored gospel we have perfect agency. 

We definitely don't. 

Our agency is definitely limited still because we are human. We should take a page out of the deterministic atheist's book and recognize that our agency is limited, and what a blessing from God that it is. I don't think I'd do very well in a test of perfect agency. I'm not there yet.

39 weeks

Imagine if you suddenly lost your capacity to dream.

But then, maybe you're one of those people firmly rooted in the present. Or constantly looking towards the past. Then you won't relate.

I'm always thinking about the future. Like, there isn't a moment where the future isn't a bright, shiny ball of possibilities, just right outside my reach. I want so badly to achieve and to accomplish meaningful, useful things.

Imagine that the ability to stretch towards the ideal was completely taken away.

It wasn't instantly. It was very piecemeal. It started out with a conscious decision to delay my study of Czech... FOR A YEAR. Nobody except me can really understand what a big deal that was in my life. It was like consciously promising myself not to eat chocolate... For a year.

Slowly, one at a time, other projects got filed away for another time. Imagine a stack of files from the floor to the ceiling. These files are filled with things I'm interested in. One or two files per day would get tucked away in some unknown, unfindable cabinet, starting around the time I got pregnant in January. It wasn't super noticeable, least of all to anybody not living inside my head.

For the first few months very little had changed. I was still running, I went to a Genealogy conference across the country, I continued to blog, etc. The most noticeable change was when suddenly, without at least two dozen connected "files", I finally wasn't capable of blogging about Czech gen anymore. This happened around May or June.

It was terrible. I could still remember (obviously) my feelings and passion about this, but I could no longer participate. It was like my capacity, my interest, my passion - all these things were taken away. It is hard to explain to people who haven't experienced it. It's like preferring to stare at a blank wall rather than do what I used to love. It's like being unable to physically sit in a chair at a computer because it's so uncomfortable. It's like bursting into tears whenever someone is a jerk (or might be a jerk) to you on the internet: hint: that's all the time! For my own sanity, I had to focus on the files that remained in the pile.

There are only about a dozen left, and for me that's almost nothing. Even these files seem to be missing pieces; like, I still enjoy painting but only for very short bursts of time and only with lots and lots of ridiculous extrinsic praise. I still enjoy organizing my house and making it beautiful but nothing that involves physically moving things heavier than like, a poster, is included in the file anymore. I enjoy watching movies and talking about them with Danny. But I can't handle extremely violent or negative films, and the threshold for "extremely violent" is very low. I enjoy dressing up and looking nice for church, but there is only like, one choice of outfits to wear which fit me still. I enjoy more than anything spending time with Danny. It doesn't matter what we are doing. We could be staring at the wall together, though I worry constantly that he's irritated at or bored with me, when mostly he's just panicky about not being able to *do* anything to make me feel better.

I enjoy being with my family, especially my children. I can't bend down and pick things up and put them away, which is frustrating. I can't hold my three year old without it hurting, and she always wants to be held. We finished watching the entire series of My Little Pony together - twice. I enjoyed that even though towards the end I fell asleep in every episode.

I scroll online through an endless stream of news, ideas, thoughts, ads, clickbait, photos, videos, complaints, etc. I like it because it allows me to escape from the prison of my uninterested, lonely mind. I hate it because it's a soul-sucking world full of envy, innuendo, between the lines messages, and blatant cruelty. I disconnected myself from Facebook for a week and for me, my world was a much darker, worse place. Then I was completely alone except for the very brief time when Danny was home. The "friends" folders... They mostly are not exactly put away in the other cabinet, just strewn in a messy heap all over the room, papers everywhere, with one or two in places I know about. Some friends actually are completely put away.

There's going to have to be a massive mind cleaning when things get back to normal. It's going to take forrrrrrrrever.

A file that remains is the one for my personal scripture study. I don't think my faith itself is encapsulated in any of these files; that isn't something that goes away. I still find joy from reading the scriptures. Yesterday I read Alma 32. I really genuinely like this chapter. I find it uplifting. I wish I had more creative files left because those are the ones that I really, really love, but at least I can still find some small amount of joy from imagining the extended metaphor of the tree that Alma talks about. It's a form of creativity I suppose, though nobody but myself in my own head can share it. At least I still have this.

Alzheimer's patients lose their files in a similar way and then lose the ability to understand what they've lost. This is not the same thing as being miserably pregnant, obviously. My state is temporary and if everything goes as it always has, I'll start to bounce back the second the baby is born. Alzheimer's patients won't, at least not until after their bodies are resurrected, which is not going to be soon enough to feel very relevant.

Today I am 39 weeks pregnant. I've always gone into labor on my own at some point between 39 weeks and 40 weeks. Let's hope and pray that this will continue to be the pattern. I really miss my mind, and my body. I want it back.

Some random thoughts through a foggy brain

I landed the jackpot when I married Danny. He just pulled the three year old off me. She was yelling I want chips and nachos! I am laying down drooling into my pillow. Before I was laying on the family room floor. I get to about 4:00 every day and I'm just so exhausted. So exhausted. I feel like...

It's just so unfair that by 11:00 I'm wide awake again. Nearly every night I'm thinking or talking or full of ideas or plans or just... Talking... And it's time to sleep again?! What!

It isn't always like this. But I have been pregnant for a lot of years. And so it seems it's been like this forever.

It's nice to hold on to memories of me in a pretty body when we were traipsing around the Czech Republic a few months ago. Good memories of good people and interesting things to see. I could not move there permanently unless I became an expert in cooking Mexican food first. That should be somewhere on some priority list somewhere regardless. Sounds delicious.

My kids are all playing outside and they are so loud. But I don't care, I'm so tired. I just want to wake up and have it be nine months later.

I'm constantly reminded about how other people manage routines and schedules better than me. In a perfect world that would be something I'd have mastered by my freaking early thirties. But it isn't. And fog brain makes that harder. Things like scheduling dentist appointments and especially responding to emails. I am very bad at these things. It is so difficult to force myself to do something which doesn't sound fun.

So childish! It's lucky the things I think are fun are weird and helpful and productive. I think it's great to accomplish something worthwhile. But I'd only ever start projects if I weren't also strongly and deeply motivated by my personal feelings of connection with the people I work with.

Like, there's no way I would have worked so focusedly and exhaustively for Judith's genealogy problem if I didn't care about her. The relationship was motivating. The desire to please her and help her specifically. To do something right for her. To be praised and adored for solving the problem. Some combination of motivations all related to my relationship with her. I guess I'm not just motivated by admiration alone, but a complex intersection of thoughts and feelings that originate from my relationships. I'd move mountains for the people I love, without hesitation. If they tell me good job I'd purr in stupid illogical satisfaction like a kitty cat.

I want my friends who I collaborate with on projects to blink in stupefied amazement at my awesomeness. I want them to be pleased with both my personal progress and my objective progress. I want them to smile when they open a document and notice there are some hundred or thousand edits on something. I don't want them to feel like I'm destroying their work, but mostly I pick friends with thickish skins who are ok with criticism and discussion of ideas that they don't agree with. I want them to feel a deep sense of admiration and I guess respect is part of it. I guess I'd go more for awe. But these are all ridiculous aspirations that are not actually that worthwhile. Anyway friendships aren't built on wowing and awing an audience. But maybe there's something to the interesting discussion part. Maybe my currency is more simple than I thought: maybe it's just lots of shared words spent on anything at all. Ugh the love languages call that words of affirmation I guess. But it's hard for me to see where I fall in those categories. Too much fluffy psychobabble.

It would be better to focus on the service aspect of working together to build something great. It would also be better to set a schedule and work on my projects steadily. But I'm not a steady person like that. I am a sprinter.

I really am a sprinter. Except in real life I ran the distance races in cross country and track because I'm not really athletic enough to be a good physical sprinter. But the part of me that lives in my head is a sprinter. I take breaks. And I go all out. And then I take more breaks. I'm not a plotter, I'm a pantser.

It is very important to me to not sprint alone. I need meaningful friends in many different contexts who can help me to persevere until the end of a project. I want to finish things but I'm much better at starting them. I need the extra motivation of strong relationships to help me stay focused enough to see my goals through. It's immature probably, but it's also the truth.

I think I'd be a very lonely person without Danny in my life. He doesn't generally work on most of my projects with me, per se, but he listens to me talk and talk and talk and talk about them, and about my friends, and about my conversations, and about my dreams. He is a good man who is very steady. But we both can quite easily escape together to a mental jungle gym where we discuss things from every corner of the universe, which is such a great place to be. Like a virtual world where I'm a gorgeous avatar running around fighting dragons, not an old mom in need of a shower, in yoga pants and a t-shirt who nowadays gets sore in the pubic symphysis from a pathetically short walk around the block.