WHAT I PRAY YOU KNOW

Ever since I was called to serve the Young Women (girls ages eleven to eighteen), there have been a couple of questions circling endlessly in my mind. I’m sure it’s questions all leaders of our youth grapple with.

What do I want them to know? What do I want them to know that I didn’t know?

Sixteen-year-old Ellie continues to make reappearances in my head, and as I picture her bright and shiny face, there is so much I wish I could tell her. There is advice I would offer, truths I would pound into that thick skull of hers until they stuck, and I’d maybe let her know that life doesn’t turn out exactly like she pictured it. And that’s ok.

However, I can’t do that. It’s impossible to go back and teach young Ellie what I know now, and probably for good reason. In contrast, though, I do have my beautiful Young Women right before me. With my words, my actions, my love that funnels directly from their Savior through me, I can hopefully send them off without having to learn the lessons I learned the tough way. I can teach them what I wished I had recognized at their age.

Now, there are so many life lessons I would like to bestow upon them. For example?

The style now will go out, and you will look back at your old choices and cringe.

That boy with the floppy blond hair and the blue eyes? Not worth it girl. Not because he’s not great, but because the Lord has the perfect person picked out for you, and unfortunately, he isn’t it. (Glean what you will from the specifics of this one😉)

Trying to be anyone but yourself is exhausting, and it breaks the hearts of those you love. We love you just the way you are, the spunk and goofiness you carry with you are the characteristics we treasure. Don’t worry about what the kids in your English class think, because years from now, you’ll wonder why you were trying to impress them.

Don’t compare yourself to others, in any aspect. Looks, grades, hobbies, achievements. Everyone is running a different race, and it isn’t even really a competition. We all can win, and it doesn’t take others to lose for us to do so.

Give yourself grace, and those around you grace. Growing up is hard! It’s ok to mess up at it sometimes. What matters is the direction you are facing, not the mistakes that are behind you.

Yup, I have a whole slew of fortune cookie wisdom I’d love to transfer from my brain to theirs. However, the lesson that I am constantly, every day, praying they learn, is that their Heavenly Father and Savior are real. That Their love for them never fades. That they can always trust Them. That They really do have our best interest at heart.

Little Ellie had this viewpoint so skewed, and it would break my heart to think that any of my girls viewed their Savior or Heavenly Father as I used to. As someone to be feared. As someone who took a little bit of joy in punishing you for putting a toe out of line. As someone with standards that could never be measured up to. As someone who was cold, distant, and didn’t actually play an active role in our lives.

Man, oh man, do I wish sixteen-year-old Ellie had listened when her parents, her leaders, the prophets and apostles and scriptures were preaching everything against that. I wish she had understood that her Heavenly Father and her Savior were loving. That They loved her. That Their plans for her were full of joy, not heartache.

Luckily, though it has taken far too long into her adult life for this to be the case, present day Ellie holds tight to these truths. Or, tries her best to. And, she is desperate to share them with you, the girls she loves so much. And as such, I direct these next words straight to you.

Please, come to know your Savior. Believe Him, and us, when we say He loves you. There is not a truer truth on this planet than that. He loves you. Period. Full stop. He hurts when you hurt, He celebrates when you succeed, He weeps when you weep, and He walks with you through it all. He is real. As we turn to Him, we can better feel His presence in our lives. He wants us to turn to Him. He wants us to ask Him for help in everything we go through, the big and the small.

Please don’t view Him as someone who judges you for the mistakes you’ve made, but rather, the person who doesn’t exude an ounce of judgement as He helps you clean up the messes you’ve made. He suffered so He could help you do just that. He uses it all, our pains and weakness, always for our good. I have found that it is in my most heartbroken moments that I become more tied to Him. I would not want to take one step of this life without Him, and I pray He becomes that real to you, too.

Please, believe in your loving Heavenly Father. Please, recognize that He wants to hear from you, about everything. The minuscule, the large and commanding, your goings on at school and in every aspect of life. Nothing is too trivial for you to talk about with Him. Prayer is one of the best ways we come to know Him, and I have found that as I talk to Him about my worries, I can actively see His hand in them. That doesn’t always mean things turn out the way we hoped, or that our trials are taken away, but we can always trust that He knows exactly what He is doing.

Many of the trials I begged Him to take away I would now never give up for the world. They have made me who I am, someone who is more like Them. As a single, still-living-at-home thirty-year-old, I trust my Heavenly Father completely with the plan of my life, and that is kind of saying a lot 😂 I promise, He will take you exactly where you want to go. Just trust Him. Trust Them. Keep doing the small actions that anchor you to Them, and just hang on. We all struggle with questions and doubts at times, but clinging to Their hands will never lead you astray.

Oh, how I hope you know these words to be true. How I hope that you can feel Their love for you, Their pride in you, Their joy in connecting with you, in every aspect of your life. They are there, in every minute, I promise.

Please, learn from the heartbreak of younger me, and the wisdom of older me. Know Them, as early as you can in this life, and watch the hope, peace, and love that fills you, even in the most difficult of times. Please, come to know Them. That is my greatest prayer for you.