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Chill Out

by Darrin Lythgoe

Do you ever get so angry you feel like you’re going to explode? Does it seem to happen all too often? Losing your temper is not a great feeling, and it’s not healthy spiritually or physically. The following advice might help you keep your cool, as well as your friends and your sanity.

Quick Relief

Next time you feel yourself beginning to overheat, try one of these remedies. Sometimes it’s best to channel your energy into something else.

• Count to ten. Or from 100 to 1, backwards, or to 20 in Spanish. Whatever it takes.

• Go for a walk. Sometimes it helps to remove yourself from the scene.

• Read an uplifting book with a happy ending. The scriptures will do nicely.

• Listen to calming music. It’s supposed to soothe the savage beast, and when you’re angry, you just might feel like one.

• Sing a hymn, or just hum one quietly to yourself.

• Squeeze a rubber ball, or some other small, unbreakable object.

• Look for some humor in the situation. This might be easier than you think.

• Look on the bright side. Is there anything good, anything at all, that might come from this?

• Go wash your hands. This might sound strange, but for your efforts you’ll receive a nice distraction, a few moments alone to think, and very clean fingers.

• Think of a scripture or a favorite quote about staying calm.

• Go shoot baskets, run laps, or really tee off with a bucket of golf balls.

• Take a few deep breaths and think twice before you lash out. You don’t want to say or do anything you don’t mean or might regret.

• Ask yourself if it could be your fault. Are you to blame for whatever has you fuming? Do you know the whole story? If other people are involved, always give them the benefit of the doubt.

• Talk to someone about how you feel. It helps to get bad feelings off your chest, and a friend may have some good advice, or at least a different point of view.

• Think how Christ would react to the situation. What would he do?

• Say a prayer. Ask your Heavenly Father to help you relax and do the right thing.

Whatever You Do, Don’t …

Some actions might seem helpful at the time, but really only make things worse. So whatever you do—

• Don’t swear or take the Lord’s name in vain.

• Don’t take your own frustrations out on people, pets, or breakable objects.

• Don’t look for revenge.

• Don’t develop bad habits, like overeating or going shopping, whenever your temper flares.

• Don’t hold a grudge.

• Don’t use “the silent treatment.”

A Few Good Questions

Here are three good questions to ask yourself when your temper flares:

• Is it really worth my continued attention?

• Do I have a good reason for being upset?

• Can I do anything about it?

If the answer to any of these is no, don’t waste your time worrying. If there is something you can do to help, don’t get angry, get busy.

What the Scriptures Say

Before you lose your temper, take a look at what the scriptures say about it. For starters, try: Matt. 5:44 (Love your enemies); D&C 64:10 (Forgive all men); Matt. 5:39 (Turn the other cheek); 3 Ne. 11:29 (The spirit of contention is of the devil); Prov. 16:32 (Be slow to anger).

Dominican Beehives

Greetings from the Beehives of Barahona, Dominican Republic! They’re shown here with their families and with full-time missionary Sister Lisa Robbins, who has been relaying information between the Dominican Beehives and the Beehives of her home ward in the Colorado Springs Second Ward.

According to Sister Robbins, these girls do their best to live according to the teachings of Christ and to share the gospel. For individual service projects, one girl is teaching an elderly woman to read, and another holds classes for children in the neighborhood who can’t attend school because their parents are too poor to buy them the required student uniforms.

As a group, the Beehives teach neighborhood hygiene classes that have resulted in requests for discussions from the missionaries and eventually baptism. One Beehive was the only member in her family until her parents came to one of her health presentations. One thing led to another, and eventually the rest of her family joined the Church. If there’s a particular lesson everyone has learned from all these activities, it’s to “Never underestimate the power of a Beehive” when she’s working with the Lord.

Girl’s Best Friend

Anthonette Pearson, 14, and her German shepherd puppy Kemper go just about everywhere together—shopping malls, restaurants, parks, etc.

Anthonette is “socializing” Kemper, so he can train as a seeing eye dog when he is 18–20 months old.

When the time comes, it will be difficult for Anthonette to give up her buddy. She’s house-trained him and taught him certain commands as well. “I’ll be giving away a piece of my heart,” she says, “but I’ll also be giving the gift of sight to a blind person.” She knows it’s worth the effort.

Anthonette lives in Chatsworth, California.

Christmas in June

It took about six months of planning, but the gifts the youth of the Menan Stake, in Idaho, started at their youth conference in June were signed, sealed, and delivered by Christmas.

They made toys and other things for the Deseret Industries to give to needy families at Christmas. They made doll blankets, doll furniture, jump ropes, bags of building blocks, animals and corral fences, wooden puzzles and games, villages painted on canvas, a crib-sized quilt, and one queen-sized quilt.

The youth were excited to have the Christmas spirit last half the year.

She Came a Long Way

Vai Keodara didn’t even speak English until she was 11 years old, yet she was chosen as salutatorian and speaker for her class at Morse High in San Diego, California. Vai was born in Laos, forced to flee that country with her family, and lived in a Thai refugee camp for three and a half years before her family made it to the United States.

When she started school in California, she was in the lowest reading group in the fourth grade. For two years she struggled, but with hard work, she finally made it to the top of her class and skipped a grade. “I never made a goal to get straight A’s,” she said, “but I did make a goal to do my best.”

“My parents were always encouraging me, and I also give a lot of credit to the Church, for it inspired me to accomplish good things and to realize that knowledge is important in this life and in the life to come.”

Vai serves as chorister for sacrament meeting in the 22nd Branch of the San Diego California East Stake. For a Laurel project, she taught Laotian children to write and speak their parents’ native language so their culture could be preserved. She plans to study medicine in an effort to continue helping people throughout her life.

The Champions of Kiribati

Far off in the middle of the Pacific, near the Equator, you’ll find a group of 33 small islands known as the Republic of Kiribati. Of the 78,000 residents who live there, 400 are students of Church-sponsored Moroni High School on the island of Tarawa.

“The Young Warriors” are the school’s pride and joy. That’s the school’s championship basketball team, made up of sophomores and juniors. They started practicing in March for the national tournament in July. When the time came, not only did they beat all the teams in their own division, but they were challenged by the teams in the upper division, and beat all of them, too. That cinched the national title.

In Kiribati, people seldom use surnames, so here is a list of the winners as you would know them. Back row: (l–r) Tauati, David, Jonathan Shute (an American teacher), Birate, and John. In the front row are (l–r) Maraeru, Pakaa, Temaati, Eddie, and Been. They’re all winners, both on and off the court.

Photography by John Luke