Where my story starts...

Now the joy of Ammon was so great even that he was full; yea, he was swallowed up in the joy of his God, even to the exhausting of his strength; and he fell again to the earth.  Now was not this exceeding joy? Behold, this is joy which none receiveth save it be the truly penitent and humble seeker of happiness.                               -Alma 27:17-18

While I was serving an 18-month mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, I came across this scripture, that I have quoted above, from the Book of Mormon.  For most of my life I have always heard that happiness is a choice.  We choose to be happy or we choose not to be, but in my life happiness has not always been that easy for me to "just choose" and I struggled with that idea, until I came across this scripture.  

In context, Ammon, a man of God, and a missionary, has been out sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ with those who didn't believe.  He was preaching to the Lamanites, a group of non-believers that persecuted the Nephites (the believers.)  They would murder the Nephites, simply because they believed, but as Ammon taught them of Jesus Christ, and of His unceasing love and mercy, their hearts were softened and they became converted.  They turned to God to repent of their many sins and upon feeling the healing power of God's forgiveness, they made a promise to God that they would never again pick up their weapons of war, theat they might not fall back into their prior sins.  They changed their name and called themselves the Anti-Nephi Lehi's.  Well, it didn't take long for the other Lamanites to turn against these new converts and they came to attack them.  Ammon, knowing the promise the Anti-Nephi Lehi's had made to never again pick up a weapon of war, pleaded with the King to bring his people to live with the Nephites.  Understandably, the King was very hesitant to go live with the Nephites, because before they had become converted they had killed many of the Nephites, but eventually the King agreed, that if it was the will of the Lord, they would go live with the Nephites, so Alma prayed to God and received the answer that the Anti-Nephi-Lehi's should indeed go to the Nephites.

Well, Ammon, had a very good friend, Alma, who he hadn't seen in some time, and as Ammon led the Anti-Nephi-Lehi's to the Nephite city, he was reunited with Alma.  And that is were this scripture comes in.  Ammon was so happy to be reunited with his friend Alma, and to see that he was still strong in the faith, that his happiness literally consumed his physical strength and he passed out.

Now, if you're like me, when I first read that, I kinda laughed to myself.  I thought, what kind of happiness would be that intense, that it would cause you to pass out.  Well, right after having that thought, I read the very next verse, and the meaning was so clear to me, in that moment, that I want to share it again.  Alma 27:18 reads:

Now was not this exceeding joy? Behold, this is joy which none receiveth save it be the truly penitent and humble seeker of happiness.      

It was as if the writer just knew that thousands of years after writing this, some silly girl would read the previous verse and ask that exact question.  And then, this was the profound part for me.  He answered my exact question.  Yes indeed, there is a joy that is so great, but this kind of joy is only found by those who are truly penitent and humbly seeking happiness.  It was that one word, "seeking" that caught my attention.

All my life, I have wanted real and pure and lasting happiness, but it was never like a light switch for me.  I struggled to try to "choose" it.  But seek happiness?  Well, that changes things.  To me, seeking, implies a journey.  It means to go out and look for something.  To me, it encompasses the good and the bad, the ups and the downs.  To me, it meant that I could FIND happiness even if I couldn't just flip an internal switch.  And so, this my friends is the reason I have started this blog.

I am on my journey of seeking happiness in every single day.  

I have been home from my mission now for almost 6 months.  I miss my mission every single day.  Sometimes, it's all I can do to not just break down and cry as I long for that time in my life, but my very wise mission President, gave me some sage advice as I sat in his office, two days before I was to return home.  He said to me, "Sister Orton, it has to end.  It's part of the plan for you to return home."  And so, as hard as it was to leave my full time mission behind, one chapter of my life came to a close and another began.

These past 6 months have been some of the hardest of my life.  I have struggled daily to find purpose to my life.  It took me almost 5 months to get a job and once I did find a job, it was not one I wanted, in fact I kind of hated it.  I have struggled to find the peace and joy I had as a representative of my Savior.  I have struggled to keep the righteous routines and holy habits the mission helped me to develop.  I have struggled to retain the sense of individual worth I had finally found.  I have struggled much more than I ever expected to when I got home and it sent me spiraling into an emotional black hole.  A hole, I didn't know how to get out of.  I thought I had lost all happiness, that I wouldn't be able to find the same peace again, but then, I was reminded of the journey I should be on continually, to SEEK happiness.  I was reminded, that happiness doesn't always fall into our laps when we want it to,  I was reminded, that as hard as life can get sometimes, there is still joy to be found.  There is always joy to be find.

So, this blog, this is going to be my way of recording my journey.  It's going to be my way of acknowledging the joy that I find in my life, and it is my hope, that if anyone out there reads this, that they too can find joy in their journey, as hard and dark and dismal as life can seem sometimes, I KNOW there is joy to be found, but action is required.  And today, I am choosing to act.