Time Out for Women

This past weekend, I had the opportunity to attend a Time Out for Women conference in Chicago, IL. This conference is put on by Deseret Book and the theme was Living a Joyful Life. Here's the website for information, if you're interested. http://deseretbook.com/time-out/

The first speaker was Chieko Okazaki and she spoke about the following principle that Joseph Smith taught: "I teach them correct principles and let them govern themselves." She spent some time on how we can apply this principle in our own lives and how we can eliminate stress by allowing the people around us to govern themselves.

Michael McLean was also there and spent alot of time talking about hope and sharing his music. He was very very funny and his music was fantastic. At one point, he started talking about hope hiding just around the corner and that we need to keep moving forward, towards our goals, knowing that we'll find the hope that we need just up ahead. I ended up buying several of his c.d.s because the messages of his songs are so incredibly profound and meaningful.

Elia Gourgouris spent some time discussing relationships and actually said something that really hit home for me. He said, "Instead of surviving, we should be thriving." Then, he went on elaborating on this. He was specifically speaking about marriage, but I took that idea in a totally different direction. I've been wondering how many days I'm just surviving, instead of striving.

Marilee Boyack spoke about the joy that comes from serving others. This was one of the talks that I related to because she talked about the little things that we can do to change the world. I actually had the opportunity to meet her and tell her about the projects I'm working on developing in my courses to help my students learn how to change the world.

Jane Clayson Johnson was the last speaker I heard and she spoke about her life experiences. I won't get into all of the details, but she mentioned her experiences about the disappointments of life and how her life hasn't gone exactly as planned. I know exactly what she was talking about.

Anyways, the weekend was great and I came away feeling very uplifted and renewed and encouraged. I'm looking forward to finding ways thrive instead of survive and also to remember that everything will always work out the way that its supposed to, even when we're truly struggling. Oh, and the conference is happening again in St. Louis on Sept 11-12 and I'm planning on going! Definitely check it out if you're interested.