What is it that I do to remember the covenants I've made?I try to keep the simple commandments like prayer and scripture study to remind me of who I am and my relationship to God. I try to attend the temple regularly and read my patriarchal blessing often.
What do I do specifically to keep those covenants?
I keep trying to discover every day what the Lord's plan is for me and what I should be doing with my life. I stay loyal to my husband. I try to be kind to others, do family history, accept and fulfill callings, pick myself up when I make mistakes, and find out and live what God's plan is for me.
How does keeping my covenants bless me?
I find a great sense of peace in knowing I am where the Lord wants me to be, doing what I feel He wants me to do. A member of my bishopric shared this quotation I like: "No man can have peace who is untrue to his better self." I feel that keeping my covenants is the only way (a way I could never figure out on my own; i.e. the Plan of Salvation) to become my best self and thereby have peace in my life.
If I realize I'm struggling, what do I do to get back on track so that I'm keeping my covenants?
I talk with trusted friends, family, mentors, or my bishop: people who sometimes have a clearer vision of my best self than I do. I seek encouragement, I pray, I turn to the scriptures, I read old journal entries of times I felt motivated to make positive changes in my life, and I repent (i.e. I make an effort to change). To spend time in the temple, in nature, or on my own in a state of meditation helps me to refocus on who I am and what my responsibilities and obligations are.
What makes keeping my covenants hard? What makes it easier?
To me, I find it difficult sometimes to take a general commandment and figure out how it applies to me or what specifically I should be doing. For example, the principle of sacrifice: what do I need to sacrifice in my life to be closer to God? Or service: I know I need to serve, but who needs my immediate help right now?
It makes it easier for me to keep an eternal perspective. I reflect at the end of the day or an era in my life and look for ways that the Lord has been there guiding me. Sometimes looking back in retrospect and realize that oh, I (or we) accomplished something and I didn't even see it. Then I'm more motivated to keep going in that direction towards goodness.
How does keeping my covenants help me?
As a convert, I was very drawn to the Church because of the high standards my high school friends kept (Linda, Laura, Lindsay, Steve, Adam, and so many others).
I had never had a specific set of moral standards laid out for me. I wanted to be a good person, but didn't always know specifically what to do to become a good person. My friends didn't swear, dress immodestly, drink, smoke, or get in trouble with boys, but even more than that, they understood the reasoning behind those standards of virtue. They understood who they were: children of God with a desire for purity. They knew sin would drive the Spirit of God away.
Now, as I'm older and I don't review the For the Strength of Youth pamphlet as often, going through endowments, sealings, and ordinances at the temple is more like my "For the Strength of Me" experience, and it's even more comprehensive. Through my temple covenants I've made a promise to keep specific standards of virtue and purity in the same way I committed to keep those youth standards as a young, newly baptized convert.
And just like the standards for the youth, the temple helps me understand who I am so I have an understanding of why keeping those covenants is so important. I feel a lot of strength in having a foundation of specific moral standards to uphold throughout my life.
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