“Protect the Private Moments,” For the Strength of Youth, Apr. 2021, 22–25.
Protect the Private Moments
My dad taught me the importance of using my time to do good things rather than just avoid bad things.
Photograph by Cody Bell
When I was 13 years old, my family lived on property in Granger, Utah, and every Saturday morning, my brother and I would get up early to start our chores. On one particular Saturday, my chore was to mow the lawn. We had a pretty big yard, so I had to get up extra early to get everything done before it got too hot.
As I was putting the lawn mower away in the shed after I’d finished, I heard the door to the back of our home close. I looked up and saw my father motion for me to come over and sit with him on the back porch steps of our home. We sat shoulder to shoulder, admiring the beautiful sunrise, as I waited for him to speak to me.
Looking to the Future
After a while he asked me, “Son, tell me about what you want to do in your life. What are your goals? What are your thoughts about the future?”
I told him my goals and dreams, including things like amazing sporting accomplishments and becoming an attorney. When I finished, he said, “That’s wonderful. You can accomplish anything in this life with our Heavenly Father’s help.”
Then he said, “Son, there is something that I would like to talk to you about, and I want you to know that I have prayed about what I’m going to share with you now. And I have prayed that the message I will give to you will be imprinted on your soul.
“What I am going to say to you will greatly affect how you deal with the challenges and the heartaches you will certainly face in your life. And it will come to influence how you face the successes that you have in your life more than anything else that I know to say to you.”
Dad’s Advice: Protect the Private Moments
He paused, and I curiously waited to find out what this amazing piece of advice would be.
“Protect the private times of your life,” he said. “You know those moments of your life when you think, ‘There’s no one else around, nobody else knows what I’m doing, and nothing that I’m going to do during this moment will have any negative effect on anyone else’? You know those times?
“What you do in those moments, during these private times of your life, will determine the level of confidence you will have before God and men. It will determine your ability to concentrate and focus on difficult and complex challenges in your life more than anything else I could teach you. And it will have more to do with how you grow and raise your own family and how you strive to draw near to our Heavenly Father than anything else I could say to you. Son, protect the private times of your life.”
I listened carefully to that advice. And just like he said, that moment became locked in my mind and in my heart. Those words are forever imprinted on my soul.
Building My Testimony
As I reflected on what my dad taught me, I realized that my father was not only referring to the importance of staying away from things like pornography and misconduct. He was advising me to fill those private times with positive things. About a year after that conversation, I finished reading the Book of Mormon on my own for the first time. And I came to receive a witness by the Spirit, in a private moment, that the Book of Mormon is the word of God. And I was able to make the connection between the importance of it being the word of God and this being the Lord’s Church.
In those private moments, I gained a testimony that the prophet of my youth, President Spencer W. Kimball, was a mouthpiece of the Lord. And it is on that foundation that I have continued to know that each prophet after, including President Russell M. Nelson today, is the Lord’s chosen, called, and anointed mouthpiece to the world.
For me, those private moments have been the foundation on which my testimony rests.
Working to Improve
Since that morning on the back porch steps of my childhood home, protecting the private times of my life has meant not only doing those things that guarded each moment against error or sin but filling those moments with spiritually and physically uplifting activities. Some of those include listening to good music, praying, reading the scriptures or other wholesome books, and physical exercise. I try and fill those private times with a focus on developing my talents and working on my hobbies. I have found that doing so brings me lasting joy rather than momentary happiness.
During my youth, as I worked on protecting the private times of my life, I made personal goals in areas where I wanted to improve, such as setting goals to read the Book of Mormon, improve my race time in the 400-meter run, serve a full-time mission, and attend a university. I strived to use the time I had to progress and develop my skills. Setting and striving to achieve those goals has blessed my life with better physical health, strengthened testimony, inner peace, and lasting joy.
I am so grateful for the advice my father gave me all those years ago to protect the private times of my life. I know his counsel has helped me to confront the challenges of life and feel the confidence of knowing that I have a Father in Heaven who loves me and to whom I can go during sweet hours of prayer, all during the private times of my life (see Doctrine and Covenants 121:45–46). As you protect those moments in your life and fill them with wholesome, uplifting activities you will see and feel our Heavenly Father’s blessings of peace, increased confidence and lasting joy pour into your life.