Saturday School: Progress is a Success

Goals.  We make them with lofty ideals to be better and do better.  How do we do in reaching them?  Perhaps we haven't met our new year's resolutions yet, or even haven't started trying, but there is still opportunity to work on them.  Any progress we make, large or small, is success.  Perhaps the goal to lose 10 lbs isn't going as quickly as hoped, but if any lifestyle changes have been made that has impacted health and weight at all, there is still a measure of success.  Sometimes we look at the end goal and think we are only successful if we reach that and forget that all the steps and changes we've made along the way are successes in and of themselves.

So what about the goal to have a short term or long term supply of food and other necessary items?  Or is this even one of the goals for this year?  As a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I have the opportunity to have reminders about home storage and other provident living aspects. We get reminded that faith is in direct correlation to our doings--faith is a principle of action not just periodic thoughts of goodness.  When it comes to food storage we have to remember that our intentions won't be what we can eat and be nourished by in times of crisis, but it is the actual physical items we store that can make the difference between being nourished and fed or being hungry.  

One of my favorite quotes that goes along with food storage is about beginning and continuing at whatever level we are able to.  Here is that quote as well as my thoughts on it, that I've already shared on my blog about page:

"The first step is to begin.  The second is to continue.  It doesn’t matter how fast we get there so much as that we begin and continue according to our abilities.”  (Family Home Storage A New Message, Ensign, Mar 2009).

Isn’t that just so encouraging?  The fact that we can begin wherever we are, and work on it at our ability to move us forward.

In Mandarine Chinese there is a saying: “Jiayou!” (pronounced j-yah yo).  Which literally means add oil, but in its idiomatic expression it expresses encouragement.  Encouragement to keep working hard & put in the necessary effort to accomplish the task at hand or just general encouragement that you can have the strength to do what you need to.  

I think this is a good time to say “Jiayou”  to families to get their home storage:  follow the prophets' counsel and do it knowing the Lord is on your side, it is possible!

加油 (Jiayou)

So whether your goals include losing weight, getting a home storage, saving money, getting an education, improving your relationships or any of a multitude of other worthwhile goals, first, begin then make progress by continuing, and count that progress a success.