How To Use Your Mind Pdf

[Hebe Newnam]

NoteThis American Life is produced for the ear and designed to be heard. If you are able, we strongly encourage you to listen to the audio, which includes emotion and emphasis that's not on the page. Transcripts are generated using a combination of speech recognition software and human transcribers, and may contain errors. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. PrologueIra GlassOK. Take a second right now and just think about this. When it comes to the big hot button issues-- I mean climate change, and gun control, and abortion rights, and school vouchers, and affirmative action, and Obamacare-- OK. Do you know anybody who has changed their minds? Who firmly was on one side of the issue, and then they read a story in The New York Times or they heard something on Rush Limbaugh, and now they are firmly on the other side? I'm just going to guess. Probably not, right?

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The thing about a second brain is that it loses its efficacy if I have to stress about forgetting to put something there. As a writer, people have always gifted me notebooks. And as a Capricorn cusp, I love the fresh-start feeling of a new notebook to hold all my lists. But inevitably, these all fall into disuse. I have enough abandoned journals to prove it. So, I digitized my second brain for two reasons: To be able to edit it on the go and to make it fun by experimenting with Notion.

This is a much more benevolent cycle than the alternative. All you have to do is keep a notepad or your preferred app by your bedside (though do try to avoid blue light before bed!). An extra step could be identifying a few priorities on your brain dump list so you can enter the new day with action.

Now, you are young, and I am not. I have been where you are, but you have not been where I am. With the encouragement of my wife, I am going to do something I have never done before. That is to speak very openly and directly and personally to you, speak more about myself than ever I have before a congregation.

I soon found myself in the Air Cadet program where the physical part of it was also very strenuous. So I was back on the army cot, lying at night in agony with aching muscles and swollen limbs and the thought that in the morning we would go right at it again. Actually, that was the best possible therapy.

And then something happened that changed my life entirely in a remarkable way. I had my patriarchal blessing. Usually these are very, very private, and we do not talk about them with others and do not read parts of them to others. But I am going to read a paragraph or two to you tonight, you young people who are with us all over the world.

I found that it did not matter, really, what kind of bodies we have, so long as we understand that our spirit and our body are combined in such a way that our body becomes an instrument of our mind and the foundation of our character.

We came to this earth that we might have a body and present it pure before God in the celestial kingdom. The great principle of happiness consists in having a body. The devil has no body, and herein is his punishment. . . .

All beings who have bodies have power over those who have not. The devil has no power over us only as we permit him. The moment we revolt at anything which comes from God, the devil takes power. [Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, sel. Joseph Fielding Smith (1976), 181]

Now, let me restate that: The punishment of the adversary was that he did not receive a body. All beings who have bodies, as the Prophet said it, will have power over those who do not. The devil has no power over us, only as we permit him.

That was a great moment of enlightenment when I read in my patriarchal blessing. And then, as I began to study and learn, there came the knowledge and understanding of who we are and where we came from.

I do not know whether it has any meaning, but there was one other thing I picked up in that wreckage of the orderly room: a dictionary. I found out you cannot find anything unless you know how to spell it before you look! That became part of my education.

For behold, the Spirit of Christ is given to every man, that he may know good from evil; [The Spirit of Christ or Light of Christ is given to every man. I will comment on that in a moment.] wherefore, I show unto you the way to judge; for every thing which inviteth to do good, and to persuade to believe in Christ, is sent forth by the power and gift of Christ; wherefore ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of God. [Moroni 7:16]

Then, in the course of our having chosen good (and that was mentioned in my patriarchal blessing), we had a body prepared by mortal parents, and we were born into mortality. With that came the power to create life, to follow the plan of redemption, the plan of happiness. How we employ that power and understand the supernal value of it is one major factor that will determine where we go in life.

Now, the Word of Wisdom is, I think, only incidentally to keep us healthy, if we will observe it. But that matter of physical health is a losing battle. You know, no matter what you do to take care of your body, in due course, it begins to weaken! We are not going to live forever in this life. We can live with our infirmities.

We have accepted as the Word of Wisdom in the Church standards that we will not change. You are not going to go on a mission unless you observe it. You are not going to go to the temple for the more sacred ordinances unless you observe it. That is no tea or coffee or liquor or tobacco or whatever else is covered by it.

We get strange letters asking if this or that is a part of the Word of Wisdom. Marijuana is not listed in section 89! And neither is strychnine or arsenic listed! But, of course, they are not habit-forming.

And so, like it or not! If you are tampering, if there is any mischief, you have got to quit it! It is not that you are going to be a healthy athlete all of your life, and it is not that you are going to avoid old age. It is that you will have the key to revelation. When your body begins to deteriorate, the patterns of revelation will be augmented and magnified.

Angels speak by the power of the Holy Ghost; wherefore, they speak the words of Christ [as Nephi said]. Wherefore, I said unto you, feast upon the words of Christ; for behold, the words of Christ will tell you all things what ye should do. [2 Nephi 32:3]

So you are the focus of two conflicting patterns trying to influence you in your life, trying to have you go this way or that way (see Matthew 6:24; Luke 16:13; James 1:8). You are the one who makes the decision.

I gave a talk once in which I likened the mind to a stage. There is always something going on in that stage. Whatever you think is going on in the stage, these ideas and promptings and temptations will move in from the side. What do you do about it? You ought to have a delete key.

I know a little about computers because my grandchildren have taught me. I know that every computer keyboard has a delete key. If there is something there you do not want, something you did that you want to get rid of, you underline it and delete it.

When he was flying in the Eighth Air Force, it was terrible. He was shot down twice. But he said finally he got so he was not afraid. He was not afraid because when fear came, he turned on this little orchestra in his mind. He took his favorite hymn and played it over and over in his mind.

That is one of the reasons why you are very, very, very, very, very, very foolish when you like to participate in music that is dark and noisy. Worthy inspiration cannot get through to you where you are. No matter how popular it may be or how much you want to belong, just remember that there are those angels of the devil using you.

The First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve issued a proclamation on the family. I can tell you how that came about. They had a world conference on the family sponsored by the United Nations in Beijing, China. We sent representatives. It was not pleasant what they heard. They called another one in Cairo. Some of our people were there. I read the proceedings of that. The word marriage was not mentioned. It was at a conference on the family, but marriage was not even mentioned.

There is the matter of pornography. It has become almost a pornographic world. Now, you leave it alone! If you have any, destroy it! And if you know somebody that has it, help them destroy it! And do not look at it, not ever! It is destructive, and it will take you on a path that is not consistent with who you are and what you can decide. Do not watch it, not ever!

To talk in something less than casual terms, do not ever let anybody touch your body in order to stimulate in any way those sacred powers of creation. Nobody! Not of your same gender or any gender! That power is to be expressed only and solely with your husband or wife to whom you are legally and lawfully married (see D&C 42:22). Then all of the happiness possible is open to you. You must guard that sacred power with your life.

There are natural instincts, and they are very strong; they have to be. And they are good! There are also cravings and temptations. There can be habitual self-stimulation and a lot of things that are just unworthy of you.

The young men are not the only ones. We are finding now that the young women, unaccustomed in times past, are becoming aggressive. You young men guard yourselves. You just let it be known that you have ahead of you the fulfillment of the blessings that come with the great plan of happiness. There is not a man that I know that cannot send a woman who has those designs away with just a look or a gesture and just No! And the same with those young women to those young men.

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