This morning I awoke with a feeling somewhat like that when one awakens with the remnants of a pleasant dream in mind. You know the type: it's one where you don't want to move for fear the feelings of the dream will slip away; the further into consciousness you go, the further the dream drifts, until it's just a hint of memory and the peace of the dream is lost.
The feeling I had was not an emotion, but a knowledge. I was infused with the indubitable reality of my worth. It was an assurance not only of worth, but also that I am actually a daughter of God. The thought ebbed through my mind, "You are a daughter of God." And then the thoughts grew stronger, rather than weaker as they do in the case of a waking dream.
I began to think of my own beautiful daughter and her worth, and my husband and his worth, and my boys. Then the thoughts poured in: we all need to be loved because we are, to be cherished because we exist.
How I got there I don't recall, since I don't remember dreaming anything in the night. All I do know is that this knowledge felt like the last piece of a puzzle sliding into place, but precariously. I got down on my knees again and again after getting out of bed, thanking the Lord for the epiphany and pleading with Him to help me not to let it slip away. The first thought I had was that I wanted to transmit the feeling to everyone I love, to infuse them with the love that I felt and to strengthen each one of them for their individual struggles and trials to come. It occurred to me that if we could all feel this love, all of the time, no one would ever want to hurt anyone else again. There would be no sin, because all pride and selfishness would disappear. We would understand that pride is useless, and that when we sin we inherently hurt everyone, in one way or another, ourselves included.
As the morning passed, many scripture references and quotes ran through my head, relative to the principle of worth, especially the following: “Love is one of the chief characteristics of Deity, and ought to be
manifested by those who aspire to be the sons of God. A man filled with
the love of God, is not content with blessing his family alone, but
ranges through the whole world, anxious to bless the whole human race.”
Joseph Smith, Jr.
On my run, I pictured a sea of humanity, all gathered together in a mass, and I thought, "all of those people are equal in worth to me and we are all children of God". All my life I've sung "I Am a Child of God", and repeated the words, "We are daughters of our Heavenly Father, who loves us, and we love Him..." Nothing from what I've ever been taught changed for me--what changed is that I finally inhaled. I finally got it, it finally became real in my mind this morning.
So what does this mean? It means the lens of my perspective has changed. Having a clear view of self-worth enables one to clearly see the worth of others. It's impossible to separate the two; it's what the Savior meant when He gave the command to "Love thy neighbor as thyself".
Understanding worth means walking the solid ground between self-degradation and self-aggrandizement. It means giving those who need it, including myself, the benefit of the doubt. It means being slow to judge and quick to forgive.
The gift of this epiphany means that I humbly acknowledge that I am indeed "less than the dust of the earth". In a seeming paradox, this same awareness gives me the surety that I am God's child, and that because of His grace He knows me and loves me beyond my ability to comprehend, despite my nothingness.
The feeling I experienced this morning may not remain with me continually, but now that I have seen, my perspective has changed. I will continue to make many mistakes, but hopefully this knowledge will aid me in doing more of what I know to be right. I know now that Gods' love is not separate and distinct for each of us, but it is universal and all-encompassing; when I choose to sin and thereby hurt another, I choose remove myself from the circle of His love and to shut myself out from receiving all of the love that he Has to give. "Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God'; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love." 1 John 4:7-8
