MaeLyn's Musings

At Institute this week, we discussed the first few chapters of Ether - the whole bit about the tower of Babel, the languages being changed, and Jared and his brother and their families and friends leaving and traveling to a promised land. It's a fun bit. One thing that was brought out in class that I hadn't really contemplated before was the importance of working and doing our part. First of all, you have the tower, and God changing the languages of the people and scattering them all over the earth. Jared and his brother didn't just sit around and wait to see what was going to happen to them. In other words, they didn't wait to be acted upon, they took action themselves. First of all, they decided they didn't want to have their language changed so they went to the Lord in prayer to ask to be able to keep their language. They didn't just settle for that, either. They thought about who else they would like to be able to communicate with, and then prayed to the L...

In Sunday School yesterday, we were discussing self reliance, and we came across a scripture that I found interesting: Wo unto you poor men, whose hearts are not broken, whose spirits are not contrite, and whose bellies are not satisfied, and whose hands are not stayed from laying hold upon other men’s goods, whose eyes are full of greediness, and who will not  labor with your own hands! ( D&C 56:17 )  We discussed for a little while the importance of work, and why it is important not to be idle. My thoughts are that most people do want to work: most people want to feel useful, and to be appreciated for their contribution to society. I think that it is when people feel that they have nothing to contribute or that their contribution isn't appreciated that they lose the desire to work. On the other hand, work is more satisfying and brings more joy when it provides an appreciated service or when it satisfies our creative urges (I wrote about these last week ). Before...

Did you have a job as a child? My first jobs were babysitting jobs. I babysat at home for my parents frequently, and I was lucky to be paid for it. I think I was about eleven when I started babysitting for a family across the street. They had two children, and I would babysit the younger one while their mom took the older child to a piano lesson once a week. We mostly watched the Disney Channel on TV and drank chocolate milk for the hour or so that I was over there. As a teenager I had more babysitting jobs for various families, although nothing on a regular basis, and I usually found more for me and the children to do than just watch TV. I had a couple odd jobs for short periods of time, including watering a garden while a family was on vacation and tutoring a friend who needed some extra help in math. My first real job was at the beginning of my senior year in high school, for an after school day care program. That lasted for about two weeks. I think I was really nervous the fi...

What did your parents do for work while you were growing up? When I was growing up, my mother was a busy stay at home Mom, with several young children at home. I don't remember her ever working outside the home until I was married and gone. She was always busy with something or other, but I do remember coming home from school to see her folding laundry while watching "Little House on the Prairie" or "Highway to Heaven" on TV. From the time he graduated from college, my Dad worked as a computer programmer at a company called Burroughs, which merged with another company to become Unisys in 1986. He stayed with that company until he retired. As a result of the merger, our family moved to Mission Viejo CA, and I remember that one of the qualities they were looking for in buying a house there was that it be located within biking distance from Dad's new work. Dad almost always rode his bike to work and back. At home we enjoyed the benefits of Dad's being a co...