Self Realization Sunday

During Relief Society on Sunday, we were discussing forgiveness, using the Prodigal Son parable as a main source of the lesson. As I listened to this familiar story and heard about the younger, wayward son as he was welcomed back into the home with a great feast, I felt a kind of kinship with the elder son when he gets angry and says, "Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at anyt time thy commandment: and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends. But as soon as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatted calf." (Luke 15: 29-30)

Now, none of my siblings have devoured anyone's living with harlots. They are all really good people. But I feel like the elder son in my jealousy of my siblings. I'm jealous because my youngest sister gets to go to a really great university. I really and truely loved going to Ricks College, but before I went there, I had visions of going to one of the country's top schools. I wanted a huge university! So, sometimes I get angry and think that she doesn't really appreciate what she has, and how come my parents are letting her go there instead of encouraging her to go somewhere smaller, cheaper, closer to them? I'm jealous that when my brother and sister each got married, they were given furniture from family members. When I got married, Ches and I had nothing. We borrowed a bed for a year until we bought our own, and everything else we had to buy ourselves at second-hand stores. When I was in high school, my parents didn't have a lot of money (like, none) so I earned my own money for everything I did. I paid for flag camp. I paid for clothes. I paid for fun. I paid for my senior pictures. I paid for graduation announcements. When I went to college, I had $60 in savings. Not much to do anything with. I had to scrimp and save and work and take out loans just to get through school. When my siblings went for college, they also had to scrimp and save and get loans, but they are still able to be supported by parents to a degree. They didn't have to pay for every little thing on their own throughout high school. I have tons and tons of examples of things that I think they get that I don't or didn't get. I'm jealous that I feel like I do everything that I'm expected to do, but I have to work so much harder and do it all completely on my own. I feel sorry for myself.

Back to the parable. I realized that it is stupid to feel sorry for myself. I don't deserve all this extra stuff. My siblings don't get half the attention and support that I think they do, I'm sure. I tend to blow things WAY out of proportion, and then feel even more sorry for myself, and then I get angry. Why do I continue to do this??

I realized that I really don't like this about myself. Even though Erica got to go tryout for the Olympics, that doesn't mean I should be angry because I never even got to go to band camp. Even though Vince was allowed a later curfew his senior year of high school doesn't mean I have to be angry because I had to be in at midnight... even on my 18th birthday when I was watching "Gone With The Wind" at the movie theatre and had to leave at Intermission. Even though Lura got to have fresh flowers and a wedding party when she got married doesn't mean that I have to be angry that I felt as if I had to do my entire wedding for everyone else and stay in their budget and hear comments like "when you get married, just elope, okay?" (That will be another post another day, however)

I'm lucky and blessed to have all the things that I do have and to have done the things I have done and to have the experiences that I have had. I have a great life and a great family, even if everything hasn't worked out quite like I planned, and even if we are still waiting for some of the good things we want to happen to actually happen to us!

I resolve to celebrate the successes of my siblings and other family members. I resolve to find happiness in the comings and goings of others and not get so caught up in myself. I resolve to remind myself that I am not forgotten just because I haven't gotten some of the same things as others, but that I am loved in different ways and I am who I am because of those differences.

I hope this works. I want to be a better person!