Living In The Mix

I'm sitting at home having missed work for two days now, because I'm sick. My throat is sore and swollen, my joints hurt, and I've completely lost my voice. Even whispering is painful. So, what do I do? Take meds, sip on hot lemon and honey water, wear sweats all day, take frequent naps, and work on the blog post I didn't get done for this week, of course. It has been almost 5 years since I came out to Emma about my being gay. As if that wasn't hard enough for her to learn, it also came with years of baggage and heartbreaking, earth shattering, trauma-inducing confessions.  It's curious how, despite the fact that I have publicly shared a lot about our marriage and my personal struggles in our Voices of Hope video and essays, I still find myself feeling nervous and vulnerable writing about it here. I think there will always be a level of those feelings when I talk about all of that. I don't think it's very easy to talk about the not-so-shiny and ugl...

This last weekend was the 189th Semi-Annual General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. All I have to say is WOW! It was a beautiful conference. It's probably my favorite to date. So much to think about and apply into my own life.  Last week I spoke on the topic of how those within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, despite coming from a place of genuine love, can cause hurt and pain from the things they say and do.  This part 2 will address this same topic, but from the other end of the spectrum, from those of the LGBTQ+ community.  I have come to appreciate the PRIDE flag. For me, it means that there's a lot about human sexuality, gender identity, and love that we don't know or understand. There are all different kinds of love. Love is diverse. To me, the flag is taking PRIDE in diversity of love. Even if a type of love doesn't fit within the bounds of your own personal beliefs, you still honor and respect tha...

Over the course of this year members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have had the amazing opportunity to study the New Testament through the new Come, Follow Me program.  One of my favorite scenes from the recorded life of Christ is when he taught the people what really mattered in life.  "Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying, Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." This has become one of my absolute favorite moments in the scriptures. There is SO much to unfold in these verses. I feel like we could spend an entire year...

On August 24, 2012 I married the love of my life in the Manti Utah Temple. It is without a doubt one of the best days of my life. The two pictures below have come to be my absolute favorite from our wedding.  If you've never been to the Manti Utah Temple it is on top of a very large, very steep hill (you can see the full size of it in the first picture of this post). These pictures do not do justice to just how tall and steep it is. Our photographer caught these two candid shots while we were climbing back up the hill after taking some photos at the bottom. It was very difficult for Emma to walk up the hill in her wedding dress, and her feet kept slipping. It was very slow going, because we did not want her to fall and get a grass stain on her dress. I had to help push her up the hill and keep her from falling when she slipped.  Over the years these two pictures have become beautifully symbolic of our marriage.  Our marriage is what may be ca...