SHMILY

Yesterday I was able to go to Sunday School with Lyle for the first time in a while. Since I have been in the Nursery I haven't had a chance to go, and I miss it sometimes. Anyways, we were learning about things that can be done to continue strengthening your relationship after you get married. Our Stake President  told us of something that he and his wife do. They give each other "Shmily's"(pronounced SH-miley) through the day. Shmily stands for: "See How Much I Love You." He talked about how they can be little things like leaving a love note somewhere and other things. I absolutely love this idea. I am going to make a goal to give Lyle SHMILY's every day. Hopefully I am already giving him Shmily's often. I am so lucky to have him for my husband because he is a sweet, wonderful, amazing, etc. man. He is so good to me and I want him to know that I love him and appreciate him.

We all know we are going to die....

So, this semester finally finished last Friday. Lyle had one week off (this last one) so we went to visit his family. While we were there we ended up visiting the dentist a lot. He had some work that needed to be done so I was there waiting for him a couple of times. I brought a book to read with me. It's called, "Tuesdays with Morrie" by Mitch Albom. There is a movie about it, and I have seen it. I cried. I thought it was fantastic so I read the book. I cried again. It is a marvelous and inspiring story. There was one thing that Morrie said, however, that has stuck with me. It is, "Everybody knows they're going to die, but no one believes it. If we did, we'd do things differently." (In case you didn't know, this is a story about a man who is slowly dying from ALS) His point being, if I knew that I could die tomorrow, wouldn't I do things differently today? I have been thinking about that a lot. Have I truly accepted death? Can I truly accept death? I don't mean that I want to accept that I will die and then do nothing with my life. I want to accept that one day I will die. That day could be today, it could be 70 years from now. I have done things in my life that I am not proud of, and I am sure that I will still make more mistakes. But how many of those things could be avoided if I thought about the fact that today could be my last?
In the book Morrie also talks about some Buddhists and how they go around with "a bird on their shoulder" and they as the bird often, "Is today the day little bird? Is today the day I die?" This isn't something that should be morbid at all. I'm not saying we should all think about death all the time and become all "gloom and doom" because we're going to die so life doesn't matter. On the contrary I am saying that we should make sure we do things right the first time. If today were my last, would it really matter that I got a B instead of an A on my test? Or would it be more important that I spent time making sure my husband knows I really love him? If we made all of our small decisions and most of our large (I say most of our large because you still need to go to work, earn a living, be healthy, etc) would we be better people? I think so.

My new goal is to make sure that I ask the little bird on my shoulder that question everyday. "Is today the day I die?" We aren't all as "lucky" as Morrie. He got ample time to tell people goodbye. I want to make sure that if I die today I'm ready. I also want my family to know that I love them.