you'll never need more

"and you think you'll be happy if granted one more wish, but the truth is, you'll never need more than this"

-my dearest soul sista vanessa carlton

this sort of goes back to my life lessons from the hubble #1 but it has really been something i've been thinking about a lot lately. it's sort of a family joke, where a lot of us were "born on rollerskates. i get antsy staying put for one place too long. i get discouraged and move on if i don't get the wanted response from boys i'm digging. i had a different job just about every year in college. all of those things have changed recently, as i've been in the same house for two years, i've had the same job for two years, and i've become much more patient with dating.


here's the thing. if we have this mentality, we'll never be happy with where we currently are! how selfish and ungrateful of us to not appreciate everything that we've been given. my bishop pointed out this sunday, on a day i was feeling particularly hard on myself, that we need to look around us. just open your eyes and see beyond your own nose. be grateful that you have a nose and eyes first of all. be grateful that you have a fairly healthy beautiful, miraculous body and mind. be grateful that you, unlike most of the world, know how to read. most of you are probably reading this on a personal computer (whether it's our own at home or your own at work makes no difference. in fact, if you have both of those, consider yourself fortunate). there are so many things that i often forget to remind myself that in fact, i'll never need more than this--except for more gratitude, patience, and love.


i remember one particular situation that really impacted my life. i went to the dominican republic in 2006, and my life has never been the same since. i saw some terrible and beautiful things in that short summer that have forever been seared into my heart and mind. i remember, however, one of the first days after we started having children come to the summer camp, this girl noticed that i not only had different pants on, but different shoes as well. she then pointed out to me that she had bought her first pair of shoes ever just for the summer camp. she was 6 years old. best part? she was probably one of the happiest little girls in her class. the picture above is a picture i took on my disposal of some kids that lived in a dug out of a baseball field, and as you can see clothes were not a necessity. 


maybe we think we'll be happy if we just have that "one more thing..." but maybe we wont.