WEBVTT 00:00:04.860 --> 00:00:07.440 Paisley: Hey everybody, welcome back Paisley and perfect. Here 00:00:07.440 --> 00:00:11.820 again, and today we're going to talk some more about families in 00:00:11.880 --> 00:00:19.080 2015 sister Bonnie Oscarson, she was the young women general 00:00:19.080 --> 00:00:22.700 president at the time. She gave a talk called defenders of the 00:00:22.700 --> 00:00:26.360 family proclamation. You may remember President Hinckley 00:00:26.480 --> 00:00:33.200 presented the family proclamation in 1995 during the 00:00:33.200 --> 00:00:36.980 women's session of General Conference. And so she talks 00:00:36.980 --> 00:00:40.540 about how it's been 20 years. Can you believe it's almost been 00:00:40.660 --> 00:00:46.960 30 years now, since then, since the family Proclamation was 00:00:46.960 --> 00:00:50.380 given. Anyway, her talk is called defenders of the family 00:00:50.380 --> 00:00:53.320 proclamation, and that's the one that I want to focus on today. 00:00:53.440 --> 00:00:57.280 And I want to start with a quote from the talk that kind of backs 00:00:57.280 --> 00:01:00.180 up and confirms what we talked about in the last episode, that 00:01:00.180 --> 00:01:03.780 all families are different, and not all of us have the ideal. 00:01:04.560 --> 00:01:09.600 Here's what she said. Quote, may I point out something obvious, 00:01:09.840 --> 00:01:14.220 life rarely goes exactly according to plan for anyone, 00:01:14.580 --> 00:01:18.000 and we are very aware that not all women are experiencing what 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:21.920 the proclamation describes. It is important to understand and 00:01:21.920 --> 00:01:25.280 teach the Lord's pattern and strive for the realization of 00:01:25.280 --> 00:01:29.900 that pattern the best we can Okay, so the way that I put it 00:01:29.900 --> 00:01:36.200 in the last episode was, not everybody's going to get the 00:01:36.200 --> 00:01:38.780 ideal, but we have to teach it, because we need to know what 00:01:38.780 --> 00:01:41.740 we're supposed to strive for. We need to know what we're supposed 00:01:41.740 --> 00:01:45.160 to try for, and that's what she's saying. It is important to 00:01:45.160 --> 00:01:48.220 understand and teach the Lord's pattern and strive for the 00:01:48.220 --> 00:01:52.780 realization of that pattern the best, the best we can so see our 00:01:52.780 --> 00:01:57.160 church leaders do see us. They do know that there are those of 00:01:57.160 --> 00:02:03.000 us who don't have the ideal and possibly never, will never will 00:02:03.180 --> 00:02:08.100 have the ideal. She continues with this quote, each of us has 00:02:08.100 --> 00:02:11.760 a part to play in the plan, and each of us is equally valued in 00:02:11.760 --> 00:02:15.360 the eyes of the Lord. We should remember that a loving Heavenly 00:02:15.360 --> 00:02:19.320 Father is aware of our righteous desires and will honor His 00:02:19.320 --> 00:02:21.920 promises that nothing will be withheld from those who 00:02:21.920 --> 00:02:25.640 faithfully keep their covenants. Heavenly Father has a mission 00:02:25.640 --> 00:02:29.360 and a plan for each of us, but he also has his own timetable. 00:02:29.840 --> 00:02:32.900 One of the hardest challenges in this life is to have faith in 00:02:32.900 --> 00:02:36.620 the Lord's timing. It's a good idea to have an alternative plan 00:02:36.620 --> 00:02:40.720 in mind which helps us to be covenant keeping charitable and 00:02:40.720 --> 00:02:43.060 righteous women who build the kingdom of God no matter which 00:02:43.060 --> 00:02:46.420 way our lives go, we need to teach our daughters to aim for 00:02:46.420 --> 00:02:51.880 the ideal, but plan for contingencies. Aim for the 00:02:51.880 --> 00:02:55.240 ideal, but have a backup plan. Now, I don't know about you, but 00:02:55.240 --> 00:03:00.420 nobody told me about this backup plan idea. I remember being in 00:03:00.420 --> 00:03:03.600 my young women classes and firesides and all of those other 00:03:03.600 --> 00:03:08.340 things, and really only hearing about the ideal. So when I had 00:03:08.340 --> 00:03:15.120 my plan, I had a plan A, and that's it. I had a plan A. But 00:03:15.660 --> 00:03:19.440 how many of us are actually living in the backup plan, 00:03:19.680 --> 00:03:22.700 whether we had one or not. How many of us are actually living 00:03:22.700 --> 00:03:37.100 the backup plan? My Plan A was. My Plan A was exactly what my 00:03:37.280 --> 00:03:41.920 leaders told me it should be. Find a worthy young man who 00:03:41.920 --> 00:03:46.300 could take me to the temple plan to be a mom and to stay home 00:03:46.300 --> 00:03:50.080 with my kids. That was my plan. A and then every once in a 00:03:50.080 --> 00:03:52.900 while, somebody would throw in something like, oh, you should 00:03:52.900 --> 00:03:55.660 also get an education, because if you're an educated women, if 00:03:55.660 --> 00:03:58.540 you're an educated woman, then your children will want to be 00:03:58.540 --> 00:04:07.920 educated too. Okay, but my plan was find the worthy young man 00:04:07.920 --> 00:04:12.360 who could take me to the temple, get married in the temple, have 00:04:12.360 --> 00:04:15.780 kids, buy a house, two cars, because I was going to need to 00:04:15.780 --> 00:04:18.480 drive them places, and he was going to need to drive to work 00:04:19.260 --> 00:04:25.700 and live happily ever after, that was the plan. Well, with 00:04:25.700 --> 00:04:29.600 that in mind, I suppose you could say that I'm living some 00:04:29.600 --> 00:04:34.400 sort of random Plan C. I don't know. It's probably further 00:04:34.400 --> 00:04:37.100 along than Plan C. It felt like the plan kept changing. Right? 00:04:39.560 --> 00:04:43.540 As most of you know those who've been with me for a little while, 00:04:44.680 --> 00:04:48.220 my life did not work out according to my plan. Yes, I 00:04:48.220 --> 00:04:51.460 found my worthy young man who could take me to the temple. I 00:04:51.460 --> 00:04:57.160 didn't find him until I was 23 he left to go on a mission at 23 00:04:57.760 --> 00:05:01.320 and we got married when nine. Too long after you got home at 00:05:01.320 --> 00:05:08.940 25 by then, my little sister was married, and so were most of my 00:05:08.940 --> 00:05:14.400 friends, and so I already I felt like I was behind there. So 00:05:14.460 --> 00:05:17.400 first of all, if you're young and you're listening to this, 00:05:17.700 --> 00:05:21.860 there's nothing to get there's nothing to get behind. You can't 00:05:21.860 --> 00:05:24.500 be behind because there's nothing to get there's nothing 00:05:24.500 --> 00:05:29.600 to be behind. Anyway, I felt like I was behind because I was 00:05:29.600 --> 00:05:35.300 old. I was 25 and I was getting married at 25 but still, I found 00:05:35.300 --> 00:05:37.940 my worthy young man, and I was going to the temple, I was 00:05:37.940 --> 00:05:40.660 getting married in the temple, and I was going to have my kids 00:05:40.660 --> 00:05:43.240 and get my house and my cars and everything was going to be fine. 00:05:43.240 --> 00:05:45.640 It's going to be the stay at home mom and the PTO and all 00:05:45.640 --> 00:05:48.460 that stuff. And it was going to be great, right? So I'm still, 00:05:48.640 --> 00:05:51.100 I'm still on track for planning just a little bit. It took a 00:05:51.100 --> 00:05:56.740 little bit longer than I thought, um, but then the kids 00:05:56.740 --> 00:06:01.440 didn't come, and then they didn't come some more, and then 00:06:01.440 --> 00:06:05.280 they still didn't come. For 11 years, they still didn't come. 00:06:05.760 --> 00:06:11.700 And it wasn't until I was 3434 and still childless, and I 00:06:11.700 --> 00:06:15.180 finally decided, you know, I should probably like come up 00:06:15.180 --> 00:06:21.140 with a plan B. The kids clearly aren't coming, so maybe I should 00:06:21.140 --> 00:06:23.660 do something else. And by then, I was working full time and a 00:06:23.660 --> 00:06:27.440 job that I loved. I was learning a ton, and I was finding out 00:06:27.440 --> 00:06:29.960 that I was actually kind of good at some of the stuff that I was 00:06:29.960 --> 00:06:35.720 learning how to do. And so right around that time, I had been 00:06:35.720 --> 00:06:38.900 praying for years. I'd always wanted a college degree. It 00:06:38.900 --> 00:06:41.380 didn't work out for me for various reasons, which maybe 00:06:41.380 --> 00:06:44.980 I'll go into someday, that didn't work out for me. I went 00:06:44.980 --> 00:06:47.560 to the University of Utah straight out of high school. 00:06:48.700 --> 00:06:52.480 Lasted up there for a couple of years. I loved the university. I 00:06:52.480 --> 00:06:59.860 loved being in Salt Lake, mostly, but I didn't know what 00:06:59.860 --> 00:07:05.940 opportunities and such were available to me, and for a lot 00:07:05.940 --> 00:07:12.120 of different reasons, I left school and came back home. And I 00:07:12.120 --> 00:07:15.480 had always wanted to go back. I had always wanted to go back, 00:07:16.020 --> 00:07:19.740 but I couldn't, I couldn't figure out how to go back to 00:07:19.740 --> 00:07:23.300 school and work full time. And then BYU Idaho released the 00:07:23.300 --> 00:07:28.520 pathway program, and the second I heard about it, I signed up 00:07:28.520 --> 00:07:31.520 for the fireside. I went. I signed up for classes. I was in 00:07:31.520 --> 00:07:35.300 the first wave of classes down here. Started with pathway 00:07:35.300 --> 00:07:38.540 immediately got admitted to BYU Idaho, and did all the rest of 00:07:38.540 --> 00:07:41.740 my degree online. I started when I was 34 00:07:46.839 --> 00:07:51.339 um, so any I guess you could call this my de facto Plan B, 00:07:51.399 --> 00:07:54.699 right, something I just fell into. I had a job I loved. I was 00:07:54.759 --> 00:07:57.819 I was getting to go back to school. The kids weren't coming. 00:07:58.059 --> 00:08:02.099 I had the husband. I had the cars. I had the house. Did not 00:08:02.099 --> 00:08:06.299 have the kids, and now I was going to go get a degree, so 00:08:13.019 --> 00:08:16.319 it took me six years to finish. It took me six years to finish 00:08:16.319 --> 00:08:19.379 the degree because working full time, I could only take two 00:08:19.379 --> 00:08:22.939 classes a semester. I had a lot of those credits from the 00:08:22.939 --> 00:08:27.259 University of Utah, and then I had also taken some classes at 00:08:27.259 --> 00:08:30.499 the local community colleges down here in San Diego. And so I 00:08:30.499 --> 00:08:35.719 had some credits that, the that the that BYU, Idaho took and 00:08:35.719 --> 00:08:39.439 accepted towards my degree. So I only had to go for six years. I 00:08:39.439 --> 00:08:47.739 could make it work in six years. By the time I finished, I had an 00:08:47.739 --> 00:08:51.999 almost two year old and was about four months pregnant with 00:08:51.999 --> 00:09:00.539 twins. I graduated in July of 2018 had my twins in November of 00:09:00.539 --> 00:09:07.679 2018 and I turned 40 in December of 2018 that was not the plan. 00:09:07.979 --> 00:09:11.219 You're supposed to have your degree. Now I'm not saying 00:09:11.219 --> 00:09:15.299 you're supposed to have your degree. Back then, I thought I 00:09:15.299 --> 00:09:19.259 was supposed to have my degree by the time I was 23 right? You 00:09:19.259 --> 00:09:25.639 graduate from high school at 18, four years that's 2423 tops 00:09:25.759 --> 00:09:31.759 right? 2324 Wait, I can't do math. Graduate from high school 00:09:31.759 --> 00:09:34.279 when you're 18, you're supposed to graduate from college when 00:09:34.279 --> 00:09:39.439 you're 22 be all ready to go and know exactly what you want to do 00:09:39.439 --> 00:09:42.339 with your life by the time you're 23 that's how I thought 00:09:42.399 --> 00:09:44.919 things were supposed to be, and that's what I thought planning 00:09:44.919 --> 00:09:51.699 was going to do. Well, here I am, 40, in a job that I love. 00:09:51.759 --> 00:09:59.499 Finally have my business degree and plunging right into Plan C 00:09:59.559 --> 00:10:03.239 or. Whatever letter we were at by this time, because things 00:10:03.239 --> 00:10:09.359 kept changing. Anyway, I'm sharing this because I don't 00:10:09.359 --> 00:10:13.919 think that very many of us are actually living our plan a I 00:10:13.919 --> 00:10:17.279 know very few people who are living the plan they had when 00:10:17.279 --> 00:10:20.419 they graduated from high school and started college, or even the 00:10:20.419 --> 00:10:24.139 plan they had when they graduated from college. Very few 00:10:24.139 --> 00:10:28.759 people are actually living that plan. But if we go back to her 00:10:28.759 --> 00:10:33.499 quote, she said, each of us has a part to play in the plan, and 00:10:33.499 --> 00:10:36.499 each of us is equally valued in the eyes of the Lord, so it 00:10:36.499 --> 00:10:39.139 doesn't matter which version of the plan that we're on, whether 00:10:39.139 --> 00:10:43.839 you're on your A, B, C, D, or J, K, L, M, N, O, P, it doesn't 00:10:43.839 --> 00:10:47.859 matter which version of your plan that you're on, you still 00:10:47.859 --> 00:10:51.699 have a part in his plan, and nobody can can play that part 00:10:51.699 --> 00:10:57.279 like you can. So another quote from Sister Oscarson, we have 00:10:57.279 --> 00:11:00.599 opportunities and possibilities which no other generation of 00:11:00.599 --> 00:11:03.839 women has had in the world, let us help build the kingdom of God 00:11:03.839 --> 00:11:07.379 by standing up boldly and being defenders of marriage, 00:11:07.379 --> 00:11:12.059 parenthood and the home The Lord needs us to be brave, steadfast 00:11:12.239 --> 00:11:16.259 and immovable warriors who will defend and teach the upcoming 00:11:16.259 --> 00:11:20.719 generations His truth. We have to defend, and we have to teach, 00:11:20.899 --> 00:11:24.319 and we have to do it as much as we can with love and compassion 00:11:24.319 --> 00:11:29.479 and hopefully even some empathy. She also says, everyone, no 00:11:29.479 --> 00:11:31.879 matter what their marital circumstance or number of 00:11:31.879 --> 00:11:35.719 children, no matter what their marital circumstance or number 00:11:35.719 --> 00:11:39.979 of children, can be defenders of the Lord's plan described in the 00:11:39.979 --> 00:11:44.019 family proclamation, if it is the Lord's plan, it should also 00:11:44.019 --> 00:11:48.759 be our plan. That seems like a no brainer, right? When it's 00:11:48.879 --> 00:11:52.719 stated simply and perfectly like that, if it's the Lord's plan, 00:11:52.719 --> 00:11:56.259 it should also be our plan. But then when you sit down and you 00:11:56.259 --> 00:11:58.779 think about the plan, well, what about this and what about that? 00:11:58.779 --> 00:12:01.199 And you hear something about this, and then you hear 00:12:01.199 --> 00:12:03.479 something about that, and you start to wonder, well, wait a 00:12:03.479 --> 00:12:08.399 second, what about this? It really is that simple. It's not 00:12:08.399 --> 00:12:12.299 easy, but it is that simple. If it's the Lord's plan, it should 00:12:12.299 --> 00:12:16.259 also be our plan. Now, like I said, I don't know which version 00:12:16.319 --> 00:12:20.839 of the plan I'm on at this point. I have my husband, I have 00:12:20.839 --> 00:12:25.639 my girls, we have our house and our two cars, and I have my 00:12:25.639 --> 00:12:32.119 degree. That's maybe I am back in plan a but how many plans did 00:12:32.119 --> 00:12:35.719 it take me to get there? How many side streets did I have to 00:12:35.719 --> 00:12:42.159 go down? How many surprises popped up along the way? And I 00:12:42.159 --> 00:12:46.059 don't know that I would have had Plan A without the other side 00:12:46.059 --> 00:12:49.719 streets, without the other plans, without all of that work 00:12:49.719 --> 00:12:56.079 and time and effort put into all of those other paths I never saw 00:12:56.079 --> 00:13:05.219 coming. I do know that I am part of his plan, and I know that you 00:13:05.219 --> 00:13:10.319 are part of his plan, too, and I'm doing my best to find out 00:13:10.499 --> 00:13:15.719 where I fit in his plan, what his timeline looks for me. I 00:13:15.719 --> 00:13:19.439 don't know. I don't know everything. I barely know some 00:13:19.439 --> 00:13:24.979 things I feel like most days, but I do know that i i have the 00:13:24.979 --> 00:13:30.199 desire for my plan to align with his, not to have his plan align 00:13:30.199 --> 00:13:34.219 with mine. That's an important distinction, but to have my plan 00:13:34.219 --> 00:13:37.939 align with his, because I truly believe that if it does, I will 00:13:37.939 --> 00:13:43.179 be happier for it. Thank you for being here with me as I keep 00:13:43.179 --> 00:13:47.319 trying to learn and grow closer to my savior. Hopefully you are 00:13:47.319 --> 00:13:51.999 learning something along the way too, and are, or are at least 00:13:51.999 --> 00:13:57.939 feeling something. Thank you for being here. Keep learning, keep 00:13:57.939 --> 00:14:02.699 growing, and be of good cheer, until next time, my friends. 00:14:02.699 --> 00:14:03.299 Thank you. You.