Discovering Your Strengths



image from healthylikelauren.com


Last week we had our first Mentoring Mothers Meeting of the year. Oh, how I miss these meetings over the summer. It was so good to reconnect and startt hinking together again how we can become better mothers, better mentors, and srtonger as women in general.

This year we are dissecting the book, “Achieving Your Life's Mission” by Randal Wright. Fabulous book!

Is there something you are passionate about and never tire of? What is it? Because, it could be a part of your life mission.

Now, I've had a love/hate relationship with the idea of having a mission in life...unitl I read this book. I think the idea of recognizing you have a life mission could bring on feelings of guilt that you might not be fulfilling that mission (whether you know what it is or not). Knowing there is a life mission can also take you away from what is most important at the time (i.e. motherhood...which is a mission in and of itself) as you seek out your mission in an unhealthy balance of interest and focus.

Really, though, prophets and apostles have taught this principle for years, that we each have a purpose to fulfill in this life. An individualized purpose. Even in the most recent General Conference, Elder Soares stated, “Christ banished from His life any influence that would take His focus from His divine mission.” We, too, need to take the time to discover what our mission(s) just might be!

How do we do this?

First we really need to identify our strengths.

Of course, as Latter-Day Saints, one of the first places we look will be in our Patriarchal Blessings. There is much open and hidden tidbits of information that will help us understand where the Lord needs us to be. What He needs us to do and the tools we've been blessed with are clarified in these special blessings.

For our Mentoring Mothers group we took sticky notes and wrote the strengths we saw in one another. One friend expressed that's much easier to do than writing your own list. As mothers we need to be able to recognize our strengths so that we can then help our children gain that confidence we so desire for them to have in their own.

Make a list. It's harder than you think. What are your gifts? What are your talents? (yes, gifts and talents are two different things)

What are your desires?

President James E. Faust has said, “Where your talents and the needs of the world intersect, there lies your vocation.”

Good luck!! :-)