I love the mote/beam
principle. President Monson told a
perfect story that illustrates this perfectly.
It was the one about the
lady who would look out of her window every day at her neighbor’s laundry. Every time she would look out of her window
she would see her neighbor’s dirty laundry.
Then she would criticize and complain to her husband about her neighbor’s
incompetence that could never manage to get her laundry clean.
I see that this perfectly
illustrates this principle because that’s how it is when we look at other
people’s faults. We see theirs and not
our own. Last summer when I was going to
a family reunion, I saw certain faults in my family that I thought they needed
to change. When I inquired of the Lord,
He told me that these were the things I needed to do for them first even before
they did for me. Later I saw that I was
the one with the dirty window. It was
very humbling. This has also happened
several times with either my friends or with my husband. I know other people think I am being too
critical of my self when I say so, but I really just feel I am being
honest. I have been a hypocrite most of
my life, and maybe I still am to some degree.
It goes back to the saying that “we see the world not as it is but as we
are”. If our window is dirty we will see
that the world is dirty. This is our
beam. Conversely, when we start becoming
very honest with ourselves when we look inside our hearts, we can not help in
the light of the Savior’s love to recognize our own darkness and ask Him to
take it out of our hearts. If we are
looking honestly at ourselves, we will be so much more understanding at the
human failings in others. I love this
part about Gandhi. I watched this movie
last weekend and he often spoke of his own weaknesses that gave him compassion
for others. I believe this is a quality
of a true leader: self honesty and disclosure.
It is something sorely lacking in the world today.
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