Whatever You Choose to Be by Ann Romney

Author:Ann Romney [Romney, Ann]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Graduation, Inspiration
Publisher: Shadow Mountain Publishing
Published: 2015-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

As a young married person, I’d sit in class or at church and see all the other folks looking so happy and carefree. I felt that my problems were mine alone. But some years later, I was given the responsibility of counseling and caring for other women in my congregation. And what I found was that almost everyone was carrying a bag of rocks on his or her back.

Everyone is burdened with challenges, so don’t judge people too harshly. They are probably carrying a heavier load than you might imagine. And don’t feel alone—­everyone might not have the same problems as you, but everyone has problems.

It’s sometimes easy to feel that there are people who live a charmed life. Without question, some people do in fact escape problems that many others encounter. Mitt and I feel that we have been unusually fortunate in a number of ways. But our experience has also shown us that nearly everyone faces challenges of one kind or another—­challenges that strain their hearts and draw them to their knees.

For some years, we attended a congregation of our church that included a disproportionate number of highly successful businessmen, four of whom were corporate CEOs. Most of the congregants were of modest means, and for them it may have seemed that those four very prosperous families had somehow been spared from heartache. They were not. One family had a daughter afflicted with a degenerative disease that ultimately took her life. Another couple agonized as their eldest child separated herself from the church they loved. One family learned that three of their grandchildren had cystic fibrosis, and another ­couple’s grandchild became seriously disabled.

Over the years Mitt and I have had the opportunity of getting to know many people in a variety of circumstances. What has been most revealing is learning of the struggles and challenges that virtually everyone has endured or is currently experiencing. There are business failures, job losses, health crises, marriage struggles, wayward children, untimely deaths, and so forth. Problems are the rule, not the exception. Those who are happiest are those who don’t dwell on why they have problems, but instead accept those challenges and move their lives beyond them.

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