Angela's Lesson Helps
by Angela Williams / ga11112007


 

I held up a doll and told the girls, this young women has developed many bad habits.

The other day at school during lunch she and her friends were gossiping about this girl in their history class. Then she went home from school and knew she had a ton of homework and chores to do, but decided to sit in front of the TV all day. Then that night on the phone with her friend she used a bad word (which had been coming out of her mouth more and more lately). Her mother asked her if she had finished all her homework and she told her mom “yes” even though she hadn’t. She went to bed late and was too tired to wake up for seminary and so she just slept through it. She wasn’t prepared for her test, so she ended up cheating off the kid that she sat next to.

As I read each bad habit I placed a chain (of paper clips) around the doll’s shoulder, neck, body, and bound her tightly.

Discussion
• What has happened to this young woman?
• What effect do bad habits have in our lives?

READ 2nd Nephi 1:13

O that ye would awake; awake from a deep asleep, yea, even from the sleep of hell, and shake off the awful chains by which ye are bound, which are the chains which bind the children of men, that they are carried away captive down to the eternal gulf of misery and woe.

• How can these chains be broken?
• Can someone else break these chains for you?

Q: Where do bad habits start? (thoughts and actions)

Discuss the following statement.

We sow our (thoughts), we reap our (actions)

We sow our (actions), we reap our (habits)

We sow our (habits), we reap our (character)

We sow our (character), we reap our (destiny)

Q: What are other terms we use for ruling our spirits? (Self-control, self-mastery, self-discipline.)

We can overcome bad habits by developing self-control.

Q: What are some bad habits that could be overcome by self-mastery?

Hold in your hand five or six small balls and tell the young women that these represent a handful of weaknesses (list some weaknesses while you put each ball in your hand). Select a young woman and tell her you want her to try to overcome these weaknesses by catching them. Then throw the balls to her all at once. She will probably be unable to catch them.

These balls are like overcoming bad habits? Were you able to do all of them at once?
Now throw the balls to her one at a time so she can catch each one. Point out that we develop self-mastery by working on one habit at a time, not expecting perfection from ourselves all at once.

Give each young woman a pencil and card or small piece of paper. Ask each to list three areas in which she desires to develop self-mastery.

Then I told them there are 4 keys to Self-Mastery. As I introduced and discussed each one, I handed the girls a paper key with the point written on each key to put on a key chain I brought for each girl.

1) “The first key TRUST IN THE LORD. Read Proverbs 3:5–6.
2) BELIEVE IN YOURSELF. Have an understanding that you are a child of God, with Godlike attributes to be discovered and developed.
3) HAVE A WORTHWHILE GOAL. One worthy of total commitment, even an obsession, to attain and know the necessary steps to achieve it.
4) DECIDE TO DO IT. Decide what you are going to do and then determine the necessary steps to accomplish it—to make yourself mind you” (Ardeth Greene Kapp, Miracles in Pinafores and Bluejeans [Salt Lake City: Deseret Book Co., 1977], p. 78).

The Savior has said that if we do our part in overcoming our weaknesses he will strengthen us. Have a young woman read Ether 12:27. Discuss what this scripture means to them.

“Proper self-management is a great virtue, which can lead to personal pride. Personal pride is a great motivator. It is a virtue to understand who we are and to conduct ourselves accordingly. To be created in God’s image is a tremendous blessing with accompanying choice responsibilities. … We need to be constantly aware of the fact that we are children of God. He knows us. He hears us. He loves us” (Marvin J. Ashton, in Conference Report, Oct. 1976, pp. 124–25; or Ensign, Nov. 1976, p. 84).