Choose it all!

17 November 2012, 8:21 am by Giggles
Categories: Food, Happy Things

Good or bad, everything we do is our best choice at that moment.
– William Glasser

Yesterday Brett and I went to Sam’s Club. I needed to buy snacks for the youth temple trip today, and I’d heard on the radio that they were having a big samples thing this weekend – all the hors d’oeuvres they advertised in their most recent mailer. Yum!

So we walked back and forth and had lots of specialty cheeses and mini cheese cakes and turkey with cranberry relish on french baguet, and sparkling grape juice and my first ever brussels sprout that was served with red onion, asperagus, and bacon (because bacon makes everything better). We had fresh fruit and flaky cinnamon rolls and Waldorf salad. We had garlic fillet, spiral ham, Italian meat balls, and baked macaroni and cheese.

When we go to Sam’s Club we always put “samples” on our list of things to get. But this was the jackpot. If they’re advertising samples on the radio you know it’s going to be good.

We’re going to have to remember this next holiday season. When the samples are free you might as well choose them all!

(Although I did choose not to sample the green bean casserole because I don’t like green beans or mushrooms.)

4 Shared thoughts

Choosing to fly a jet

16 November 2012, 1:37 pm by Giggles
Categories: Education, Family, Gospel, Science & Tech, Work

My career choice was to be a mother.
– Ann Romney

I have a book put together by my classmates when I was in 6th grade about me. I was the student of the week and they did a large group interview of me and then had to write a one page thing about me. We were encouraged to make them unique, they could be wanted posters or magazine articles or creative things of that nature.

In sixth-grade I was going to be an astronaut/teacher/author. So there are “about the author” pages in there and magazine stories about me teaching school in a rocket ship.

I still love space. As evidenced by the set-up we did this summer to watch the solar eclipse and the Venus transit. And by Brett’s choice of when to propose to me. That guy really knows me. :heart:

I would’ve loved to be an astronaut. To see the world from that perspective. To see the stars that clearly. To feel that free and weightless. I still dream of it.

But it did not take me long to decide that being an astronaut was probably not the right career choice for me. I could have made it work, but it would have interfered with other plans I had for my life.

I believe in keeping the Sabbath day holy, and part of that means attending church services, not exactly something that’s possible on a space ship. And I want to be at the crossroads for the members of my family. I love waving good-bye to Brett in the morning and welcoming him home in the evening.

I’ve been a teacher at different levels and that part of my life is still full of possibilities. And some day I will be writing a book, hopefully one someone will want to publish even, and something more exciting than a bound edition of my dissertation. And while I might not fly to space, taking a ride in a hot air balloon and learning to fly a plane are on my list of things to do some day. And I find this xkcd about the Saturn 5 rocket that was used for the Apollo missions to be hilarious. Maybe I should take up model rockets as a hobby again.

2 Shared thoughts

Choosing traditions

15 November 2012, 11:26 am by Giggles
Categories: Family, Relationships

There are three constants in life… change, choice and principles.
– Stephen Covey

I am a really big tradition person. I love the consistency they provide to an ever changing life. I know that traditions themselves change and adapt, but they still anchor us.

I was really worried for our first anniversary that we got one shot to set up traditional anniversary things that we would do and I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what those things would be that we would carry on for the rest of our marriage. Which was a little silly. Big huge elaborate things can make good traditions, but the largeness of them complicates them. Some of the best traditions are the small ones.

Yesterday as we spent time in the temple remembering our wedding and reflecting on everything the last three years have brought I was glad that the temple is part of our anniversary tradition.

Brett played the piano for me again and we danced to our song in the living room.

Some years we might be more elaborate than that. But for all my worry two years ago, I think we’ve inadvertently chosen some pretty good anniversary traditions. And the fun thing is, all three of those didn’t start with our first anniversary but actually started at our wedding.

4 Shared thoughts

I choose you!

14 November 2012, 8:49 am by Giggles
Categories: Family, Happy Things, Relationships

Choose your love, Love your choice.
– Thomas S. Monson

Guess what? I still choose Brett. Best choice I ever made. :love:


4 Shared thoughts

Choosing cucumbers?

13 November 2012, 11:42 am by Giggles
Categories: Life, Random

It is almost impossible for anyone, even the most ineffective among us, to continue to choose misery after becoming aware that it is a choice.
– William Glasser

Brett really likes this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g8mynrRd7Ak

I choose cucumbers some times because I know I need to eat vegetables. Brett also finds it strange that cucumbers are the only food I put salt on. But I can easily down a pound of good grapes before I realize what I’ve done.

That monkey on the left can’t really make the choice for the graduate assistant to give her a grape, none of us can choose the actions of others. But she can definitely choose how she reacts to it. Sometimes it seems like we don’t have a choice at all, but we can always choose how to react.

What that monkey should do is choose to convince the other monkey that cucumbers are better and she should choose to hand over her grapes.

Of course it’s not really the protests from last year because that wasn’t unequal pay for equal work since those people weren’t exactly working.

2 Shared thoughts

Choose something crazy

12 November 2012, 10:11 am by Giggles
Categories: Education, Exercise, Life

As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss.
– Noam Chomsky

I first learned of Chomsky during my Masters studies. Actually, that’s probably not true. I first remember learning about him then. I probably heard about him sooner but his name didn’t stick with me. He was the guy who looked at language and looked at what the behaviorists were saying about human behavior and said, “Nuh-uh.” A behavorist would say that everything you say is something you have heard elsewhere because all human behavior is a result of response to a stimulus. We have no choice in the response, it’s all a result of stimulus/response programming.

I’m with Chomsky on this one. There are a lot of things I do I’m pretty sure Skinner couldn’t explain – like running marathons. Which is admittedly a bit of a crazy thing to do and can’t be a result of stimulus/response if you’ve ever seen me try to walk up and down stairs for a few days after a marathon.

If people were possessed by reason, running marathons would not work … but we are not creatures of reason. We are creatures of passion.
– Noel Carroll, Irish runner

And I don’t think anyone could convince me that graduate degrees are a result of stimulus/response programming either. I had good reasons when I started, but I don’t think I’d be this close to finishing if I wasn’t possessed of passion (and I’d probably be further along if I had any kind of passion at all for statistics).

Choose to do something crazy with your life, like learn to belly dance. It really messes with those behaviorists.

3 Shared thoughts

Choosing to serve

11 November 2012, 5:02 pm by Giggles
Categories: Gospel

Character… is a habit, the daily choice of right over wrong; it is a moral quality which grows to maturity in peace and is not suddenly developed on the outbreak of war.
– Charles Wilson

My mom says that I used to grab my scriptures and march around the room singing “I hope they call me on a mission” when I was little. It was always something I thought of, but I still had to make the choice to serve when the time came.

When I turned 20 and realized it would be possible for me to serve in a year, I decided I needed to know if that was the right choice for me. I made it a matter of personal prayer, study, and fasting. And the answer I received was that it was the right choice for me.

The previous October to me making that choice, President Hinckley had said this:

I wish to say that the First Presidency and the Council of the Twelve are united in saying to our young sisters that they are not under obligation to go on missions. I hope I can say what I have to say in a way that will not be offensive to anyone. Young women should not feel that they have a duty comparable to that of young men. Some of them will very much wish to go. If so, they should counsel with their bishop as well as their parents. If the idea persists, the bishop will know what to do.

I say what has been said before, that missionary work is essentially a priesthood responsibility. As such, our young men must carry the major burden. This is their responsibility and their obligation.

We do not ask the young women to consider a mission as an essential part of their life’s program. Over a period of many years, we have held the age level higher for them in an effort to keep the number going relatively small. Again to the sisters I say that you will be as highly respected, you will be considered as being as much in the line of duty, your efforts will be as acceptable to the Lord and to the Church whether you go on a mission or do not go on a mission.

– President Gordon B. Hinckley
Some Thoughts on Temples, Retention of Converts, and Missionary Service
General Conference, October 1997

The interesting thing to me was how many people, when they found out about my decision to serve, seemed to have taken the words of the prophet as meaning that sisters should not serve. Some people need to learn to pay attention better.

I did not choose to serve a mission because my mom served a mission (my mom did not). My younger sister did not choose to serve a mission because I served a mission (my sister did not). I did not choose to serve a mission because my bishop asked me to. For young women who wish to serve it needs to be a personal decision. I’ve seen sisters who were serving because of parents or friends or because they did not know what else to do at that point in their lives, and they were ineffective in many ways. Without a conviction of why they were doing what they were doing they could not press forward when things got hard.

Not all young women should serve missions. But I believe all young women should choose to prepare for a mission, whether it be an official full-time one or not. Choosing to prepare to serve a mission involves choosing to study the scriptures and make them part of your life, to know the gospel and write it in your heart. It involves choosing to be at your best health and to live a fiscally responsible life. It means choosing to prepare for and live worthy of the temple. And whether those choices lead to a full-time mission or not, they will greatly benefit your life for years to come. There are many types of missions after all.

3 Shared thoughts