Gratitude Post #11

Today I am grateful for President Henry B. Eyring.  That may seem a little off the wall, but let me explain.  Today we had our stake conference and it was a mutli-stake conference and it was a broadcast from the Conference Center in Salt Lake to 95 stakes in Arizona.  It was fantastic.  And a little shorter than a usual stake conference which is very much appreciated by parents of small children.  Not that they really heard much of the conference anyway, but at least the Battle on the Hard Seats was over earlier.  Elder Jeffrey R. Holland spoke about missionary work and getting our missionaries ready and being ready to accept the missionaries that come to our ward or stakes.  It was a fabulous talk and I took copious notes that I hope to follow.  But it was President Eyring's talk that he gave that I had actually been thinking a lot about the subject and was planning on blogging about my gratitude for it anyway.  He was taking about being an optimist and how an optimist will have a much greater ability to deal with life's challenges than a pessimist.  I had begin to think about this subject when I attended a school district sponsored presentation from an organization that helps children/teenagers stay out of trouble with drugs, internet, bullying, or whatever is going on with teens these days.  The topic was specifically Cyber Bullying and what we can do to protect our children.  The speaker had statistic after statistic of how our children are exposed to pornography, violence, predators, and any kind of evil that you can think of out there.  I was with a friend and she commented how grateful she was that her children were raised and that she didn't have to worry about this and how daunting it must be for me to be raising my children in the middle of it.  I replied that there are many challenges facing parents to raise their children to adulthood and to give them the protection that they need from outside forces, but throughout time, there have been other challenges that have faced parents that have prevented them from raising their children to adulthood at all.  I told her how grateful I was that I didn't have to worry about my children dying from small pox, or getting eaten by a mountain lion (that's the dramatic me), or freezing to death in the cold.  I know that there are troubles out there and I try to educate myself to prevent my children from exposure to these other dangers, but how grateful I am to live here, now, with all of the advances is everything from medicine to technology to education to housing.  My friend told me that I am a little Pollyanna, and I agree.  I believe that I get that from my mom, which is funny because it used to bother me when she would look on the bright side.  That gives me hope that my children may get some of my better character traits.  But most of all, I am grateful that I live here on the earth at this time when there is a living prophet of our Heavenly Father who gives each one of us direction and all of the apostles that serve with him and share with us their knowledge and testimony. I love that I can listen to general conference whenever/wherever now.  I believe that the messages have become much more powerful over the years or maybe I have just matured and can gain more insight into them, but I am amazed at how many of the talks I think "I needed that right now!"  It's amazing.