I know that our Heavenly Father and His Son, our Savior, love me and love all of us - even when we are not very lovable, even when we do stupid or unwise things from lack of judgment or from deliberate lack of obedience. I know that we came to earth to learn, to gain experience - and yes, to learn from experience. I know that we have many resources to help us to succeed - because They want us to succeed. The great Plan gave us agency to choose our way. But we need help and I am grateful that we have help. I am grateful to know that the scriptures contain God's truth and teach us what we must know. They teach us that we need to pray, that our Father hears our prayers, and that if we continue to pray in faith, we'll get answers. I know that we must put our trust in Him, and continue in patience, realizing that our timetable is often not the same as His.

I know that we have prophets to lead us and give us counsel and instruction and guidance. I am grateful for what we can read and what we can hear from ward, stake and general conferences and from our Church magazines and other publications. I KNOW the Gospel is true and I know that the true Gospel is here in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I know that Joseph Smith saw what he said he saw and heard what he heard. I know that he was the instrument to restore the Gospel and the Church that Christ organized when he was on the earth. I know if we are in church when we should be, if we read the scriptures and pray for understanding, and pray in gratitude for our blessings, and try to live the way we know to be right - all of that will help us in our journey here and help us to return to our Father's home when that time comes.

I know that agency allows us to make choices that bring heartache, sorrow and misery sometimes - to ourselves, and to those who love us - and to others sometimes. I also know that happiness comes from making right choices - and that we are not really happy unless we are trying to make right choices. Part of our experience here on earth is to find that joy.

I feel that it was part of the plan that I come to earth before you and feel blessed to be the mother and grandmother in this family - blessed beyond what I could ever have deserved. But I am so grateful to be part of the same family - of some of the best people in the world. We are all brothers and sisters, after all - and I am grateful to know that too. I love you all more than I can express.

Anne W. Fisher
Family Letter
March 28, 2010

Time and again we see how men and women have become successful after they learned to apply mental perception. The ability to see is much more than the physical process of taking light rays through the retina of the eye. It is the skill of interpretating what you see and applying that interpretation to your life and the lives of others.

Napoleon Hill and W. Clement Stone
Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude
pp. 105

How often do we support or even applaud those who have succeeded? Even if it came at our own expense. Do we offer true congratulations or do we enviously shrink from the moment wishing we had done so well.

Lloyd Newell
The Spoken Word
March 21, 2010

Sometimes we have thoughts of optimism, courage, and devotion, thoughts capable of changing our lives. A certain kind of idea in the mind sends a tingle through the emotions and quickens the whole personality. Thoughts are carriers of ambition and power. They can rejuvenate us and put us on our feet with a new lease on life.

Sterling W. Sill
The Best of Sterling W. Sill
pp. 59

Learn a relaxation technique that works for you. Your creative imagination can be "preplayed" and "replayed" best when you are relaxed, because the left-brain dominance is less intense and the right-brain is receptive to your visual and certain audio suggestions.

Denis Waitley
Seeds of Greatness
pp. 72

A series of studies published in prestigious medical journals over the past decade found that practitioners of meditation report significant decreases in pain, anxiety, depression, blood pressure and other physical symptoms--allowing doctors to decrease medication and doctors' visits.

Amy Saltzer, MD
Bottom Line Tomorrow
March 1997, pp. 3

"One of the few ways to deal with a highstress situations that you can't escape," says Dr. Samuel Shem, author of The House of God, "is to make fun of it." Humor helps us cope because it instantly removes us from our pain.

Allen Klein
The Healing Power of Humor
Prologue, pp. XX

Little Jane, just out of bed one morning, was crying as though her heart would break. Her mother came hurrying to ask, "Jane, what in the world is the matter?" Sobbing, she answered, "I was just thinking, I'll have to put on my clothes every day as long as I live."

Mary C. McNew
Reader's Digest
August 1971, pp. 113

Perhaps the most important part of self-management is financial management. This means that you are 100 percent responsible for achieving your financial independence. And this is possible only by your saving and investing part of your income every single paycheck.

Brian Tracy
Nightingale-Conant's Insight
pp. 18

As a general-insurance broker, I received a phone call from a woman who asked if I wrote policies for a certain insurance company. I replied that I did. "Well," she said, "my little girl was hit over the head by the little boy up the street and we had to rush her to the doctor to get the gash in her scalp sewed up. The boy's parents were insured with your company, and the claim was settled so promptly and generously that I want to take out a policy like it before my little girl hits him back."

Elmer G. Stark
Reader's Digest
August 1971, pp. 79-80

We have the power to enjoy, even create, beauty in our everyday circumstances. Joy comes in so many different ways, and a generous measure of it lies within the grasp of every person. . .Happiness then becomes our conscious choice. Life becomes what we choose it to be.

Lloyd Newell
The Spoken Word
March 16, 1997

To support others is not only our responsibility, it is also our greatest opportunity, for we are all in the same boat. In one sense we all rise and fall, sink or swim together. We share in every man's success, we live a part of every man's life, and we die a part of every man's death. A common need, a common interest, and a common destiny bind us together.

Sterling W. Sill
The Best of Sterling W. Sill
pp. 53

It was our son Andy's fifth birthday, and my husband and I were getting ready to take him out for a movie. I told Andy to pack a snak for himself in my purse to have during the show. I assumed he'd put in a granola bar or cookie. Later in the theater, Andy leaned over to me and whispered, "Mom, may I have my ice-cream sandwich now?"

Lawana Blackwell
Reader's Digest
August 1990, pp. 164

We need to learn how to look at our world with fresh eyes--seeing the opportunities that lie all about us, but simultaneously looking into the future for the chances that are there.

Napoleon Hill and W. Clement Stone
Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude
pp. 100

Self-management means getting things done through yourself. It means standing back and looking upon yourself as a bundle of resources out of which you want to get the highest possible return. You need to organize, manage and motivate yourself as if you were your own employee.

Brian Tracy
Nightingale-Conant's Insight
No. 114, pp. 17

I was pregnant with my fourth baby at the same time my neighbor's dog was about to have her pups. Thinking that now would be an ideal time to explain how babies came into the world, I brought my three boys to see the birth of the puppies. Months later, when I had my baby, my husband brought our sons to the hospital to see their new brother.

While we were all standing at the nursery window looking in, our threeyear old asked, "Are these all ours?"

Claire Shattuck
Reader's Digest
October 1985, pp. 48

A hug is a perfect gift--one size fits all, and nobody minds if you exchange it.

Ivern Ball
Reader's Digest
November 1985, pp. 27

The best measure of a man's honesty isn't his income-tax return. It's the zero adjustment on his bathroom scale.

Arthur C. Clarke in Omni
Reader's Digest
November 1985, pp. 27