Hello, wherever in the world it is that you are. We're grateful to gather virtually with you here today, particularly on September 11th, as has already been mentioned, and this tender day when America pauses to once again reflect on the great price of freedom that has been paid in this generation, which of course reminds us of the price of freedom that has been paid for many generations. Like Brother Clausen mentioned, I am Jenny Taylor. My husband and I have seven children. We met on a blind date in college and proceeded to chase our dreams to follow what we thought life would hold for us. And just like most of you, I'm sure, have found in your own life, life very rarely holds what you think it has in store for you. And there have been twists, and there have been turns, there have been ups, and there have been downs. But through it all, we've been able to rely on our faith and our Savior, Jesus Christ, and also our commitment to this great country, to the cause of freedom everywhere, not just here in America, but around the world. It's what motivated my husband and his service, and it's what continues to motivate me after his loss. So today I've been asked to speak a little bit about ministering to those who have lost a loved one. I plan to do so by sharing a little of my own story, story of my family, and also drawing on some of the experiences I have had in the last couple of years as I feel the Holy Ghost has been guiding me to know how to not only give, but receive help in times of need. It all began on the Provo campus of Brigham Young University. We hardly had much of anything at all in common, except for the fact that we were all incoming freshmen at BYU, and we were all on the waiting list for on-campus housing. You could easily claim that it was only by mere circumstance that we ended up being roommates. But 22 years later, I promise you that all five of us would tell you it was anything but a coincidence that brought us together. We all made it through all four years of the university. We all graduated with our bachelor's degrees. Some of us went on to get master's degrees. Some of us went on to serve full-time church missions. Each of us got married. And between us, we have a dozen and a half children. In fact, these roommates of mine were instrumental in helping me meet my husband on that blind date when we were college students. The five of us have stayed in touch throughout the years. Even though life has taken us in different directions, we've helped each other face those ups and downs when life hasn't gone the way we thought it would. And so it seemed only fitting for us to plan a reunion when we reached 20 years after that freshman year of 1998 that first brought us all together. So here we were, the fall of 2018, trying to find a date and a time that would work for us to leave our 16 combined children, drive from our homes, and meet together to get caught up and reminisce about the good old days at the Y. I had seven children. My baby wasn't even one. My oldest was not even a teenager. There was a lot of work to do at home in our garden. I was always behind on housework. And it really just felt like more work than it was worth to try to leave overnight. But my mom and my mother-in-law could see how I needed a break. And so they offered to watch the children and really encouraged me to go to this reunion with my college roommates. It was Friday, November 2, 2018. I hurriedly cleaned the house all day long, then attended my eighth grade daughter's debate competition at her junior high. I got all the kids home and settled with grandma. And then I caught a public transportation train from near my home in North Ogden, Utah to near BYU's campus down in Provo. I had about an hour and a half's ride. And I spent that time writing in my journal and reflecting. 2018 had been a really difficult year. A lot of things had gone wrong, a lot of things had been very hard, and the world for me felt upside down. I feel like a lot of people now feel the same way in 2020 as we battle the coronavirus and the pandemic and how everything seems to be on its head. But maybe I got a little bit of a head start because that's how I already felt two years ago. It had been an exhausting 10 months of that fourth deployment my husband was on. And so I enjoyed a little peace and quiet on that train ride. I had my journal, I had my pen, I had my thoughts. And I was really looking forward to having a few hours with my girlfriends. I met up with my roommates too late for dinner, but just in time for dessert. After we finished our ice cream, we headed to the rental condo we had secured for the night. One of my roommates had even brought balloons and BYU blew donuts to celebrate. We stayed up talking way too late. And I actually went to bed feeling a little bit guilty because anytime it had my turn to talk as we got caught up, I kind of only complained. I talked about how hard it was to have my husband deployed, how tired I was, however well I felt. Our home had had a plumbing problem that had completely gutted the house. We had to find temporary housing for seven months and I just couldn't keep my head above water. The young baby was still nursing in all the demands of a newborn, but I also had the 246-810-12 year olds to take care of as well. I just kept telling my roommates how grateful I was. This deployment was almost over. It was almost over. It was November. The holidays always go very quickly. January was around the corner and we'd reached the end of this one year deployment. The last thing I said to my roommates before I went to bed that night was that I was so grateful my husband was almost coming home because there was absolutely no way I could do another day without him. I woke up early the next morning, which is kind of irritating when you're a mom of seven kids and away for the night. The last thing you want to do is wake up early. I lay there in that rented bed thinking, oh, I could have slept in. I had a choice to make and I realized it in the moment. I could roll back over and fitfully try to fall back asleep.  So I got up. I rolled out of that bed. I fell to my knees and said my prayers and then got out my scriptures and my journal. I felt a lot of clarity, clarity I hadn't felt in that whole first 10 months of running through that deployment. Peace and stillness. I felt the spirit of the Lord with me and guiding me and preparing me that we can do this. We can get through these next few weeks and months. And my phone rang. I looked at the phone and it was my mom calling, which made absolutely no sense. My mom was the one who had insisted I leave the kids and go get away for a minute. She knew I needed a break. She promised me she'd take care of everything. Oh, don't worry about it.  Because why else would my mom be calling first thing in the morning? Nothing could have prepared me for the words she said next. Jenny, she said, wherever you are, you'd better drop to your knees. There's two army officers here and they say they need to talk to you about something. My knees and my stomach simultaneously hit the floor as my body began to go into shock. Of course the officers wouldn't and couldn't say anything over the phone. And so we agreed that they would begin traveling south from my home and I would begin traveling north from Provo so that we could meet somewhere in the middle. We decided upon the headquarters building of the Utah National Guard. I hung up the phone, found the one roommate who was also awake and said to her quite bluntly, Brent might be dead, I need a ride. And with that, my college roommate of 20 years and I loaded up in her minivan for the beginning of what can quite reasonably be described as the most unexpected journey of my life. That was almost two years ago. Almost two years ago that I received the official army notification team and the news that my husband, Major Brent Russell Taylor, had been killed in action while on a ruck march in Afghanistan. This man had survived four deployments to the Middle East and they killed him on a hike on a Saturday morning. The journey of the survivor is an ongoing one. There is absolutely no one-size-fits-all approach and people are never done grieving. Words like closure and moving on have no proper place in discussions about losing a loved one and asking, how are you? With just the right amount of sugar in your voice and tilt in your head, isn't likely to yield very honest results. I'm not a professional counselor or grief specialist and I certainly don't claim to speak for everyone who's ever lost anyone. But today I have been asked to share with you a little of my own grief journey and what has been done or said by those who have genuinely sought to minister to me and my family during our time of loss. Let's talk about what happened, what helped and what didn't help. Maybe on another occasion we'll have the opportunity to talk about the many lessons I've learned about receiving help. Let's look for a moment at what took place in the first two hours, two days, two weeks, two months that have somehow now brought me to be on the cusp of finishing the first two years without my husband by my side. By the end of that first two hours I had sat down with that notification team. We had received word that my husband's parents' notification team had found and notified them. We were trying to track down his siblings including five brothers who are also members of the National Guard in different states. We made plans for what we needed to do next. I think I signed some papers and all I really remember was pacing a room and suddenly realizing I hadn't eaten anything that morning. My strength began to fail and I asked for something to eat or at least some juice to drink. A number of soldiers in that National Guard building scrambled around trying to find something to give me and they brought me a juice box. The kind with a little straw on the back that you poke through the hole. I remember drinking it almost desperately knowing my body needed some kind of sugar to at least stay on my feet and the irony hit me as I was sipping through that straw while simultaneously drinking from a fire hose. By the end of that first two hours I was back in a car that was not my own back on the road with that notification team to go tell my seven young children that their father would never be coming home. By the end of the first two days I was on my way to Dover Air Base where I would receive the remains of my husband back onto American soil and the country he loved so dearly. We were on the ground less than 36 hours and the sun never shone once while we were there. We arrived when it was dark. We left when it was dark. The fog was thick and heavy when my husband's body arrived in the middle of the night. By the end of the first two weeks we had made it through the viewing and the funeral service for my husband. I sat at his graveside and watched my mother-in-law and all seven of my children received a folded American flag shortly after I received the one that had been folded from being on top of my husband's casket. By the end of the first two months we had faced our first round of firsts the first holidays, the first birthdays, the first memories, the first moments that all come with such a heavy weight after losing someone. In our first two months we hit Thanksgiving and Christmas and also the first birthday of our youngest baby girl. Now somehow we're still standing and we've made it to the point of almost exactly two years. The kids are all two years older and two years taller. Sometimes when it seems like time has stood still and my husband died just yesterday I look at these beautiful little faces and realizing time has not actually stopped. We're all two years closer to that sweet eternal reunion to which we all look forward. I'm often asked how are we doing? How are the kids, how's life treating us and what does grief really look like?  We write notes on the side and launch them into the sky saying hi to daddy. Sometimes it's a bunch of silly kids overwhelming me just wishing dad could be there another day to hear their laughs and see those cute faces. Sometimes it looks like the end of a really hectic day of trying to get the kids to school, trying to get the kids to brush their teeth, do their homework, stop fighting, practice the piano and sit down to the dinner table even if dinner is just hot dogs and mac and cheese. Sometimes it looks like a group of kids with their cousins attending their first Memorial Day event where their father is in one of those boots being memorialized. Sometimes it looks like all of the memories in my mind, all of the sweet precious moments that time can never erase but also time can never repeat. And sometimes it looks like this. Sheer and utter devastation. Loss, heartache, despondency. And a reminder that every dream I ever had seemed to die the day my husband was killed. Most of us don't know what to do when we're faced with grief and we really don't know what to do when someone we love is faced with grief. And so sometimes we do nothing. We're worried we might say the wrong thing or do the right thing or do the wrong thing or make it harder or maybe offer an offense which we didn't mean to. We're all eager to help and yet we don't know how. We get paralyzed in our fear that we might inadvertently actually make it harder and so we kind of dance around it and go about our day. One day several months ago I was trying to figure out what to say, what to do, unsure myself of what message I might be able to share. I don't remember the details surrounding the time and the place of what it was I was saying but I remember finding a scripture passage that spoke directly to my heart and I feel it's very applicable here. In Mosiah 18 verse 20 we read the words of Alma the Elder as he has been teaching the gospel, baptizing hundreds and organizing people into separate bodies or groups. He tells those he has called to minister to those people that they should preach nothing, save it were repentance and faith on the Lord who had redeemed his people. Repentance and faith on the Savior who redeems us. We all know that grief is a process more than an episode but have you ever considered how the grieving process can be strikingly similar to the repentance process? In the Bible dictionary we learn that the root word of the word repentance as used in the New Testament takes us to a word that actually means a change of mind and a fresh view about God, oneself and the world. It's not that exactly what the grieving process entails to have our minds changed, expanded, enlightened, to exercise our faith so that we can have a fresh view about God, about ourselves and our uncertain future and about the very world around us that feels so foreign in the middle of that grief. I'd like to take a few minutes and share with you a few fresh views that the spirit of the Lord has led me to see. I pray that the same spirit will be with you and with me as we consider how these fresh views can help us in our efforts to minister to those in extremists. First, let's take a look at the well-known story of the New Testament sisters, Mary and Martha. Everybody knows the story of Mary and Martha. Women particularly know the story of Mary and Martha and sometimes Martha gets a bad rap because while Mary was faithfully sitting at the feet of Jesus, Martha was covered about, worried about dinner, worried about cleaning up and really worried why no one else was helping her. And we all know that Jesus lovingly reminded Martha to choose the better part and we all know that sitting at the feet of Jesus is the better part. But we've gotta back up a little bit and pay attention to what I call the Martha matters, the temporal affairs, the things that really do need to be done because we do live in this world, even if we know our spirits and our eternal beings and of another world. I am mortal. The weight of grief is physically exhausting. If you ask anyone who's lost a loved one, they will likely tell you how surprising it is, how physically tiring it is to grieve. I don't have the energy I used to have. There's days when it feels hard to do the simple tasks. That's why we end up with hot dogs and mac and cheese for dinner because sometimes I'm not sure I even remember how to cook. The little things, the day-to-day things, the things that you might say don't really matter in the long run and yet they sustain us in the short run. Kind of like that juice box I needed shortly after finding out my husband had been killed. Juice boxes don't really matter in the eternal scheme of things, but my mortal body needed nourishment. And so if you really want to help someone who is grieving, whether it's a loss, a loss of a job, a loss of a dream, going through a struggle with an illness, other things that we all face in life, one of the best things you can do is maybe make a list of all the Martha matters, all the things, all the to-dos, all the mortal tasks that we need to do because I know the most important thing is to sit at the feet of my savior. I know the most important thing is to love my children, to nourish them, to care for them, to listen to them as they cry because their father's not here, to referee their arguments when their grief turns into anger. But I don't have a lot of energy left to sit at the feet of the savior if I've got to try to cook and clean and mow the lawn and fix the sprinklers and figure out carpool and pay the bills and try to discover my husband's password so I can get into some of the online accounts that I know nothing about. So when we look to serve and to minister, I think our default is to minister spiritually because we're choosing the better part and we know that spiritual ministering really is very important, the most important, eternally important. But if you find someone who's struggling and you can take some of those Martha matters off of their back, if you can take the weight of all of those to-dos, if you can take those temporal tasks out of their hands, you've now freed them up so that their energy can choose the better part. I don't want someone else being the one that comforts my children, though I appreciate the support. I don't want to exhaust myself in the tasks of the day and have nothing left for them. Some things are hard to delegate in a home, especially a grief-stricken home. But somebody else could mow the lawn. Somebody else could take out the trash cans. Somebody else could bring in dinner so maybe it's not hot dogs and mac and cheese again. There are ways that we can help minister by freeing up the spiritual energy of those who are grieving. Now let's look at the Good Samaritan, another famous biblical story. We know that many people passed by the injured man. They were too busy, too much of a hurry, or maybe just too ideologically or politically separated from him to be bothered with helping. And then comes the Good Samaritan. He stops, he takes the time, he physically lifts the burden, he puts the man into his cart and he takes him to get further care. He tends first to the immediate need and then he lets the innkeeper take it from there. I think there's a lot to learn from that Good Samaritan that obviously we can't pass by when we see someone suffering. We can't just look the other way when we know there's pain and heartache. But we also don't need to feel like we need to do it alone. That Good Samaritan picked that man up and then he knew he had other tasks to attend to. We don't know what they are, but whatever it was, the Good Samaritan then recruited the help of the innkeeper and said he would make sure that the expenses were covered. We can recruit the help of those around us. As a chaplain or a bishop or a Relief Society president or grandma, you can't carry everyone's burdens alone, but you can become a connecting point to those who want to help because people do want to help. Something in our human soul wants to help another human soul who hurts. And perhaps you can be the Good Samaritan that not only offers what you can, but helps direct traffic when others say, I wish I knew what to do. We truly mourn with those that mourn. Now that we have a biblical basis, I want to share a few actual phrases that have been said to me and my family. Phrases, they're pretty common in times of grief. Phrases that I know mean well, but maybe we can have ears to hear and have a fresh view, a fresh view about what we say and how we say it. A fresh view about how we help because I know we want to help. Our hearts are in the right place and a time of grief is not at all a time to take offense or to worry that someone did or said the wrong thing. And so we can trust the Holy Ghost to be our greatest translator from the desire in our heart to help and the needs on the ground to actually meet that help. Grit with grace, you've all heard it. I picture grit with grace as being this really strong woman who's also beautiful and elegant. And that's really not at all what it is. Grit, grit is hard work. Grief is hard work. Morning is hard work. Repenting and trying to come up with a new view about what God might have in store for my life. A view that is so different from the view I had for the first 39 years of my life. And so we need that strength, we need that grit. Looking at another root of another word we commonly see in the scriptures comfort, comfort isn't just a console. Comfort means cone forties with strength. We comfort each other by strengthening each other. Maybe we strengthen each other physically first. We make sure there's food on the table. We make sure there's nourishment in the body. We make sure there's rest for the weary. And then we remember that the real grace isn't elegance or beauty, but it's the grace of God. I can have grit with grace because the Holy Ghost will comfort me.  Christ can lift me up and with his love and his care I can be ministered to by angels who might just be my next door neighbor or friend. We often comfort someone who's lost someone by reminding them that they're in a better place. I know my husband's in a better place. It's a beautiful place, I think of it often.  My body will probably give out. Maybe there'll be all kinds of things wrong and with modern technology I'll probably live till about 110 and that makes me really tired. I know my husband's in a better place. I still wish he were here. We need to be careful when we talk about how great it is on the other side because it makes it feel like happiness is only available there. The scriptures teach us that men are that they might have joy. We use the phrase often time and eternity. We can live happily ever after and here and now. I know my husband's in a better place but he's also part of me every day. The day after he died I was given a blessing by a former bishop, a bishop who had known Brent, who had loved and served our family for years.  He helped me repent of my heartache. Not that heartache is a sin but I mean repent as in heal and come to see a fresh view. In that blessing he taught me that my husband's purpose had not changed. Sure he's in a different place but his intent is still here. His influence is still here. His purpose as a husband, a father, a son, a brother, a bearer of the holy priesthood of God did not change in the moment he died. And neither did my purpose as his wife, as the mother of our children, as a sister, as a friend and as a beloved daughter of God. I know he's in a better place. I know I can also be happy in this place and I long for the day when once again we will get to be in the same place. But your best days are ahead. My stake president is a wonderful man.  Right after my husband died he kept reassuring me that my best days are ahead. Happiness is ahead. That happiness I just spoke of that I just said we are to have joy, your best days are ahead. The only problem with that is I don't like thinking that my best days are ahead without my husband. I don't like thinking that the path guide might guide me on isn't the path I always thought he was guiding me on. Now that doesn't mean that I can't learn and I can't grow. But in the moment it's sometimes very overwhelming in grief to think of the future. And a day, a week, a month, a year, a decade can feel very scary and frightening. So I have a good friend, one of those college roommates who reminds me that I just need to focus on today. My best days can be ahead and behind. God doesn't work in linear time. I can move forward with my husband. He's right there with me in every step I take. But I can also let future Jenny worry about the problems of the decades to come. That's what my roommate has taught me, that future Jenny can take care of that problem. Because hope of course is looking forward to things. But sometimes in grief it's hard to look forward because looking forward feels very scary and very alone, very uncertain and unsure. So we can have the promise that our best days are ahead, but we don't ever have to leave behind the days behind us. We can take one minute, one hour, one day at a time, and the spirit of the Lord will be there. Heaven must have needed a hero. God's calling home the best of us because he's organizing armies to get ready for the millennium. These are all true statements and can even be backed up in the Doctrine and Covenants. I know that in that better place my husband's doing great work. I know his best days are ahead of him as well, and that the Lord's not letting him twiddle his thumbs while he waits for me to reach 105. But I don't believe for a second that God intentionally took my husband home because he was shorthanded on the other side. He's got George Washington. He's got Moses. He's got Noah and Marona. He's got every single Nephi that ever lived. I think he could have left Brent here. My kids need a hero. It's easy to argue that those seven children are a little more shorthanded. And so we need to be careful when we try to encourage and I see the intent, but it's almost as if we're trying to erase the grief or we're trying to make it better. We're trying to put a band-aid on it. We're trying to make it go away. I know heaven has a lot of work to do. I know I still have a lot of work to do here. But it's okay to feel like I wish you were here.  It's okay to trust that God doesn't cause all the problems in our life, but sometimes he lets mortality unfold. He lets those trials come. He doesn't necessarily make everything happen for a reason, but God can make reason of everything that happens. Let me know if you need anything. Give me a call. You got my number, right? We sometimes say that and we mean it. We genuinely do, but that is a really overwhelming statement if you're me with seven kids and my husband just died. Because I need some of everything and I can't think of a single thing right now. If you ask me what do I need? We're good. I don't know. It might be better for those of you who are counseling those who are grieving to maybe keep out a notepad, a little list somewhere. When you think of something you need or something that could be helpful, an errand run or a task done, maybe jot it down. So then when someone asks, hey, do you need anything? You actually have something to say. But perhaps the better way to ask that question would be for you, the helper, to think of some things you think that person might need and then offer a couple choices. Hey, would it be more helpful if I ran to the grocery store for you or picked up the kids from soccer? Somebody who brought us dinner a couple of times, each time before she brought it, she would ask, do the kids feel more like ham and potatoes or do they want chicken and rice? And instead of me having to come up with what I think we want or think we need or feel like I'm imposing by being picky, she gave me choices, simple choices. Let me know what you need is overwhelming. Would A or B be more helpful is a simple way to do that. Finding closure and moving on. Who in the world wants closure for an eternal family relationship? Whether it's a marriage, sibling, a parent or a child, I'm not looking to close that door. I know there are doors I need to continue to walk through, but I certainly have no intentions of moving on without my husband. I plan to move forward with him. Everything I am today has been affected by the 15 years we were married and lived together and served together and were separated by deployments and brought children into the world and figured out the broken sprinklers and what's gonna be for dinner. We don't need to move on as if we're closing that door. We often use the phrase a new chapter in our story. We can turn that page, but you don't start mid-chapter. All of those early chapters build up to the chapter you're on. And so when you move forward onto the next chapter, you're helping to see everything behind you is still with you, and there are great things ahead of you. Holidays can be really hard. Days on a calendar have such a weight to them when you've lost someone, and I have no idea why. My husband died on November 3rd, 2018, and so the entire last week of October in 2019 was a disaster. We were emotionally anticipating hitting that milestone of one year, remembering every last October what we were doing before we found out what happened. Those days can be so heavy. If it's a military death, days like 4th of July and Memorial Day can feel especially heavy. Birthdays, anniversaries, Christmas, Easter, family traditions, those moments that used to be so happy and fun and full of life, just remind you that your loved one is not here anymore. But this is one of the easiest ways you can minister. These are one of the easiest things you can do because there's actually something you can do. A holiday, a birthday, an anniversary is the perfect day to make a little phone call. Maybe send a text message, drop off a treat on the door. If you're not sure what kind of treats they like or what kind of things they enjoy, probably social media will give you a clue into their lives. Maybe you can find a post somewhere about the person before they passed away, maybe a place the family used to enjoy eating or a place they would go to recreate or a movie they liked or a pastime they had. Maybe there's a special game they played. And you can take that to them with a little note, a little card, because what that does is lets that person know you're mourning with them. I really dreaded Memorial Day after losing my husband because not only am I mourning the loss of my own husband, but I'm mourning the loss of hundreds of thousands of brave men and women who have given their lives for my freedom, and that feels very heavy. But this past Memorial Day, I feel the Lord helped me find a fresh view. And instead of feeling the weight of so much loss, I felt the support of so much shared mourning. Everybody remembers the fallen soldier on Memorial Day.  Maybe they'll remember in one of our children's birthday and say, I bet this is hard for those kids. And so instead of feeling alone and forgotten and sad, those days are nowadays, I know other people will remember with us. And again, that shared grief becomes grief that's more easy to bear. I don't know why we use the phrase an elephant in the room. I don't know why we talk about eating an elephant one bite at a time. Who in the world wants to eat an elephant? But when someone we love dies, there is an elephant in the room. We don't know what to do. We don't know what to say. Maybe you run into me at the store. And of course, you know that my husband's died, but you don't wanna say anything because it might make me sad or maybe it'll be uncomfortable. And so maybe you just pass by and don't say a word. But the truth of the matter is, whether you say anything to me or not, I remember my husband died. And whether you bring him up in conversation or not, I'm probably thinking of him in the back of my mind. And even if I cry a little if we talk about him, it's okay because as you talk to me about him, I know that means you love and miss him too. And it doesn't have to be a doctrinal sermon. It doesn't have to be the big strong moments of how we influenced your life. I wanna hear your memories. If you know someone who has passed away, tell their family your memories. There's people who went to high school with my husband. I didn't know him at that age. There's people who grew up with him in scouts. I was never there. I never went to Iraq or Afghanistan with him. I love hearing stories about him. Don't hoard the memories you have of someone else's loved one. Don't hesitate to talk about that person. Don't be frightened by emotion that might come up. It's healthy, it's healing, and it's an expression of love. Don't worry about the elephant in the room. Just embrace it. So what about the kids? How do you help those sweet, beautiful kids? I kinda feel like I'm on a Ferris wheel and each of the children is one of the cars. Sometimes they're going up and doing well and sometimes they're coming down and hitting rock bottom. And yet it seems to go in a cycle. And so I become the center spoke that's doing cartwheels all day trying to keep up, trying to pay attention to the needs, trying to read the personalities, knowing that children will grieve differently and at different times. My oldest daughter, who was in eighth grade when my husband died, is now a seminary student in school. They had a great lesson about prayer. She came home and she said, yeah, but mom, I prayed every day. I prayed every day that dad would be safe. And that didn't work out. Or Ellie, my little seven-year-old who was five at the time. The other day at dinner I just said, hmm, I wish dad were still alive. And my cute little Jonathan, who's four, but was two when we lost my husband, is really excited about the resurrection because he knows daddy's gonna come back. We talk about it, daddy will come back. Jesus will bring daddy back. And so the other day he asked me, hey mom, when dad comes back with Jesus, do you think daddy will push me in the swing? Yeah, buddy, daddy will push you in the swing. Kids have different levels of comprehension and all they really crave is normalcy, something that feels normal. My oldest daughter opted not to go to Dover with us to get my husband's body. She just wanted to go back to school. She just wanted to be with her friends. She just wanted to be somewhere that felt safe and predictable, and that's okay. I don't force my kids to talk about their dad. I don't force them to grieve or tell me the depths of their soul. But when they talk, I listen. When they bring things up, I validate it. I talk with my daughter about how yeah, sometimes prayers don't get answered the way we think they will. We know there's miracles. We hear all the time of someone's in an accident and they're cured of their paralysis or the bullet just missed him or the car stopped just in time, and sometimes not. And again, we talk about how it's not necessarily that God makes everything happen for a reason, but trusting God to make reason out of everything that happens. Letting those kids grieve, letting those kids mourn, and understanding that those kids also have to face their own repentance process. They also have to come to understand a fresh view about themselves, about God and the world. As parents, we want nothing more than to shield our children from anything hard or hurtful or sad. But that's not our job. President Nelson, in our recent conference address, I remember the video in Sister John's talk. He was asked, is it hard to be the prophet? Do you remember his response? Of course it is. I'm not sure that's what I expected him to say. Is it hard to be a widow with seven kids? Of course it is. Is it hard to be a child whose father died and more? Of course it is.  Is it hard? Of course it is. But President Nelson continued, of course it's hard. Everything that helps us become more like our savior of Jesus Christ is hard. Because we come here as mortals, and we're learning to become eternal. We're learning to become perfect. We'll be learning to come even as he is. Of course it's hard, but the Lord loves effort. And so when you're helping children who are grieving, try to give them a little bit of normalcy. Again, if you know what their favorite treat or can be or activity is, that's an easy way to help a child let some of those walls down. Maybe while you're playing soccer, they might open up and talk to you. Because probably if you sit them at the counter and try to force them to, you're not gonna get anywhere. Normal family interactions. It's tempting when a child is suffering to spoil that child. To give that child everything, to buy that child everything, to take that child everywhere fun. And that can have its place. We've spent a lot of time trying to create good memories. Again, our best days are ahead. But really what kids need is just normal opportunities to interact with families. What's really been helpful for us is when my children who were old enough to go play with friends or hang out at their friends' houses, when those friends have called and said, hey, can Megan come with us to this movie? Can Lincoln come eat dinner and play Monopoly with our family? Nothing big, nothing grand, but a chance for those children to interact with another family.  And widows are wonderful people. There's a lot of faith in people who've been through that kind of loss. But as a daughter of God, I still need interaction with families, with couples. My children still need good fatherly figures and preacher leader examples in their lives. For some of those light-hearted things like playing soccer in the backyard, or maybe my children will develop a relationship with an adult that's not me, someone they feel that they can trust and open up to. So when you're watching out for those kids, just spend some time with them. Meet them where they are. Don't force them or push them to where you think they ought to be. And certainly don't worry that it's your job to take away the trial God sees fit for them to face. Which brings me to the fix it versus face it conversation. When you're trying to minister to someone, remember it's not your job to fix it. That's Christ's job. Our job as we minister to each other is simply to help each other face it. You can't fix the fact that my husband died. Even if at some point I remarry, even if I live happily ever after, even if I win the lottery tomorrow, that didn't fix anything. The savior fixes, the savior heals, the savior compensates with blessings, the savior makes us whole. But we can help each other face it. And maybe today what might help me face it is help cleaning the house. Or something to eat when I get so busy that I forget to take care of my body. Maybe a play date for the little kids so I have a peace and quiet moment where I can kind of collect my thoughts. We're here to help each other face it. Let's go back to those sisters, Mary and Martha and their brother Lazarus. Think of the grief they must have felt when he died. They called for Jesus. They told him to come. They knew Lazarus needed him. They knew he was dying and yet Jesus didn't come. Think of that grief, think of that weight, think of that heartache. It was enough grief that even Jesus himself wept. But Jesus knew he was going to raise Lazarus from the dead and you and I all know that he raised Lazarus from the dead. We know how the story turns out. So why was Jesus weeping? I believe he was weeping because of the pain of Mary and Martha and those who love Lazarus. He's weeping with us for our mourning even though he knows he really can fix it and heal it and make it whole. He doesn't brush it aside and say, oh, if he just had more faith, he wouldn't cry. He embraces us in our sorrow. He weeps with us and then he comforts or strengthens us to be able to carry on. What if Lazarus never died? For Mary and Martha that would have been a win, right? They would have been so happy to not face that heavy sorrow. But what about you and me? How many of us look to that as one of the greatest miracles of all of Christendom? The raising of Lazarus from the dead. Sometimes our heartache and our tragedy is one of the greatest miracles the Lord uses to lift and teach and give hope to those around us. I remember feeling that way on election day right after my husband died. So many people said, hey, I voted today. I voted, I remembered your husband. Freedom is not free, I'm gonna vote, I'm gonna salute that flag. And I remember in my grief kind of feeling, I'm glad it took his death to get you to do that. And then of course I repent and I'm grateful to know that the Lord can take my trial and help it become a blessing to someone else. Because we know that after Christ proved he could raise Lazarus from the dead, he rose himself from the dead. Easter really is the day that changed everything. Even though November 3rd, 2018, changed everything I look at, all of the details of my life, Easter is the day I cling to. Easter is my holiday of hope. We turn to the savior, we trust in him. We serve him by serving those around us. We help take care of the temporal affairs so that they can focus on the better part and that spiritual need. I think back to that Saturday morning, almost two years ago, the fact that I got to be with my college roommates, ladies who have known and loved me for 20 years.  They love him too. I got to be with them. I got to have a few minutes to gather my own thoughts before having to tell my children. I got to be strengthened by a community that wept with me when their mayor died. And I got to feel the power of the Holy Ghost helping me to change my mind when I think this is such a horrible, awful thing as I learn to have a fresh view about God, about myself, and about the world around me. I'm grateful for my savior, Jesus Christ. I'm grateful that he is able to make reason out of all things that happen. I'm grateful that he is able to use our heartache and our tragedy to lift and heal and provide hope to those around us. And I'm grateful that even though he has all power and all understanding and all wisdom, he lets us minister to each other. When we minister to those who have lost a loved one, we truly are ministering to those in extremis. And when we face extreme loss, extreme heartache, and extreme despair, Christ sends us extreme hope, extreme love, and extreme promises that through his atoning sacrifice, all will be made well. And we truly will live happily ever after, here and now, and with him and our families on into eternity. I leave this testimony with you, with the great love of my savior, Jesus Christ, in his holy name, amen.


So mission while we're here really we end up getting called up really state-to-state so the state of California calls up the state of Nevada and asks for additional firefighting resources and so we come out and this is a pretty yearly thing that will come out and help out California if they need additional support and So we train for firefighting in Nevada as well all year similar to the same training program California has so we're out here doing well then fire suppression so water buckets we tied a hook it up to the cargo hook underneath the 60 and Whatever the firefighters on the ground need to they need water placed along the fire line to get dozer's time to work in fire line to Help them work with hand lines that they're working in and get some water to cool things down all of that Whatever the ground crews out there on the fire line need we help support them with it So we've always had a good relationship with California Guard and Whenever they need support we're more than willing to help out. They've come over and helped us out in the past So us being in such close proximity kind of a sister state like to do help each other out Think just the fact knowing that we're here and supporting our community is part of our job That's the National Guard something. We enjoyed doing is supporting our community. It's an important mission because really We've and you can ask most people that have been firefighting Those ground crews sometimes just need the extra help and because they need that extra help You can have it where they're trying to throw away. They're trying to throw away Brush or they're trying to cut down trees. They're trying to throw away Firewood that people have stacked up against their house And what we can do is we provide them those extra couple minutes or that extra water to where those spot fires don't start Or something that is on fire We can quench it enough time that they could put a lineup around it or they could possibly save a home Or things of that nature. So we bring that to the fight to buy them extra time and We've helicopters. I know plenty of time We any of the buddy that's been fighting fires to save numerous houses with helicopter drops timed at the right time So that's where it really pays off


Heidi Ganal is the GOP's gubernatorial nominee in the state of Colorado and much like her GOP peers She's trying to gin up hysteria over what's happening in schools, but unlike her GOP peers She's not necessarily hyper-focusing on CRT or LGBTQ plus books that she wants to ban rather. She's focusing on Cats or should I say students that she is alleging or identifying as cats and to make matters worse Schools 30 of which her campaign has identified are Accommodating these cat identified students according to her now. It's not happening Obviously, but this is what she says according to LGBTQ nation who reports in a radio interview last week Ganal said that schools are tolerating students identifying as cats She said in a recent debate with gain incumbent governor Jared Polis that she had received over 100 messages from parents Across Colorado mentioning the issue in their schools Her campaign also released a list of 30 schools where such issues had allegedly occurred Though the list didn't detail specifics about the incidents themselves the Denver Post reported quote as a candidate for governor But more than anything as a parent my concern is that distractions like children dressing up in costumes at school Detract from the reality that 60% of our kids are not performing at grade level Ganal said it's tragic that we are failing our children We need to make them our priority now It's ironic that she says that because rather than proposing solutions to improve the Colorado school system rather than trying to Allocate more resources to teachers so that way they're not having to use their own resources to purchase school supplies She's simply just trying to gin up outrage about something. That's not even happening in schools Now on September 6th. I actually posted a really lengthy video talking about a Relatively similar myth to this now to my knowledge. Ganal has not explicitly claimed that Schools are going so far as to accommodate cat identified students by placing litter boxes in restrooms However, I do believe that what she's saying stems from that original conspiracy theory Now I'll link you to my full coverage of this down below But if you don't want to watch that and you just want the TLDR version this myth essentially originated from this December 2021 video posted by Midland Public Schools yesterday. I heard something And I was stunned and today I am equally stunned and a little bit upset Well, not a little bit a lot of it upset furious. I would even use that word, but I Want to talk to about the fact that and I know this is going on nationwide So it is not just for your for this board, but our community needs to understand that the agenda that is being pushed through our schools is Just my opinion, but somewhat nefarious when it comes to some of the Activities so let's talk about fury furries It was addressed by a child a couple months ago that they are put in an environment where there are kids that are that Identify as a furry a cat or a dog whatever and so yesterday I heard that at least one of our schools in our town has a in one of the unisex bathrooms a litter box for the kids that identify as cats and I am really disturbed by that and I I will do some more investigation on that I know what's going on nationwide. I know it is it's part of the agenda that's being pushed I don't I don't even want to understand it But I think that people need to be aware of it because I am really upset as a parent that my child is put in an environment like that So because one concerned parent in Michigan claimed that she heard one school put litter boxes in the restrooms Well that went viral it blew up lives of tiktok shared it And then the conspiracy theories sort of died down within a couple of months after the schools came out and said No, this is not happening But the myth kept getting revived because presumably somebody saw that video again for the first time They echo that same claim on social media that claim then blows up and goes viral And that's the new evidence that this is happening again And this is how the myth keeps getting revived politicians are echoing the same claim and it just It won't die.  I just think that it's stemming from this whole conspiracy theory Now this is not happening. It's not happening and it doesn't seem like ganal is curious enough to investigate herself She's just taking these parents word and rather than contacting school officials because this is a potential governor She's just repeating what they're saying It's ridiculous and of course schools once again have had to come out and state the obvious No, there are not students who are identifying as cats and we're not trying to accommodate said students who are identifying as cats It's so preposterous denver post explains officials for denver public schools cherry creek schools aurora public schools And colorado spring school district 11 all denied having any issues with students dressing up as cats Or other animals two statewide organizations representing teachers and administrators Criticized ganals claims and said they had never been made aware of such issues either randy barber a spokesman for boulder valley school district Which is included on a list ganals campaign provided of schools where students dressed like animals said he was unaware of any Such issues quote the concerns being generated by the republican gubernatorial candidate are baseless He said the claims are exhausting for educators said brad miles the executive director of colorado association of school executives His group along with the colorado education association Described the claims as false both groups said no educator administrator or district had ever reported issues Similar to ganals claims now that same individual who was just quoted went out to make a really good point He said look We are just trying our best to give students some semblance of normalcy after living through two years of a pandemic Which is still going on but you know schools are back open and we're trying to make things The best that we can do right and we have to take time out of our day to investigate these claims and then report back to parents when they're false they're bullshit and Yeah, so all of these Conservatives who are complaining about the lack of in-person learning throughout the pandemic now when school is back in session across the country They're making matters worse by coming up with these bogus claims by not even trying to investigate this themselves I mean if you're a parent and you hear this claim on social media What's stopping you from calling the school you are a parent you can call the schools You don't have to just echo the same thing that you hear in social media. Ask them. I'm sure that they'll talk to you I'm sure the principal or whoever Will say okay. Well, you know, I haven't seen this but we'll look into it and we'll get back to you They're willing to work with you But they just don't want to do that. They just repeat what they hear and it's like a game of conspiracy theory telephone Now some of the school districts who were involved who were on that list that ganals campaign put out They were trying to do their best. They said look, okay, some students were wearing headbands with cat ears But that's just like the style they they sell headphones Um with cat ears that doesn't mean that they're identifying As cats nor does it mean that the school is going out of their way to provide litter boxes for students who wear Headbands with cat ears. I mean It's a it's a non-issue. It's it's a nothing burger and another school district was like Well, I mean we did have to ban students from wearing dog collars because that kind of became a thing It was their style in the school But I mean the fact that they banded dog collars should prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that they're absolutely not trying to accommodate Students were identifying as cats and dogs. Look in my main my main video where I talked about this Go watch it. I explain how this is all hysteria primarily over trans issues right because the whole Joke on the right with comedians and whatnot is that if I can be A girl if I was born a boy Then I can identify as anything including an apache attack helicopter So what's stopping students from identifying as non-human species? And it's just not true by trying to pretend as if students are identifying as cats Well, this further legitimizes this hysteria over trans issues because well, you know, maybe your kid isn't trans but maybe they're A trans species is and they're identifying as cats and ignorant conservatives take that as evidence that we should hide away trans people Because they're influencing Our children to become cats when it's just not happening So once again, this story has popped up It had to be debunked and I'm sure within a couple of months once again We'll hear from a republican who says I heard that there's litter boxes in restrooms at one school Like it's not going to die. It's not going to go away It's going to keep happening and schools are going to have to continue To respond to this bird brain claim That cats and schools or that students in schools are identifying as cats on its face These parents should be Smart enough have at least enough common sense to assume seems a little bit implausible But if I care enough I'll look into it, but that's not happening And so they're contacting republicans and these are becoming political stories It's got to stop but it won't because unfortunately This shit works for republicans. So, uh, we'll see if it works for ganal here Up yours I let her have her way I let her have her way


Just how effective are face masks at reducing the spread of COVID? The easy answer is that if you spend time with someone who has COVID or you're infected with the virus, wearing a face mask is better than not wearing one. But as you might expect, the science of how effective masks are is a little more complex, especially when you take into account different types of masks and how they're worn. The good news is that there are some useful science-based rules of thumb here, but before we get to these, it's worthwhile going over a couple of basics. The first is that the risk of becoming infected with COVID increases with how much viruses in the air you inhale and how long you're exposed to it. Reduce either and you reduce the risk. And the second is that not all masks are created equal. Some, for instance, let more airborne particles through than others. A simple cloth mask, for example, will never be as effective as an N95 respirator. Just as importantly, leakage where the edge of the mask fits against your face matters, and some masks leak more than others. The more air that passes between the edge of a mask and your face as you inhale and exhale, the less effective it is. But just how big a difference does all of this make? Are we talking really subtle effects here or night and day differences? As with most things, the answer is it depends. Fortunately, though, there's pretty solid science to help decide on the pros and cons of wearing something you bought on Etsy, for instance, versus an N95 respirator. Imagine, for instance, that you're hanging out with a friend and one of you may have COVID. If neither of you are wearing a mask, the chances of infection increase substantially over time. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention defined a window before the risk becomes substantial as 15 minutes. This isn't strictly based on science, but it is useful for estimating increases and decreases in possible risk under different circumstances. From here, for instance, we can begin to explore how much longer you can hang out together with some degree of safety if one or both of you are wearing a mask. First off, imagine that just one of you is wearing that Etsy cloth mask. That'll give you an extra five minutes over CDC's 15-minute rule of thumb. This increases to an extra 11 minutes if you're both wearing cloth masks. Replace these with surgical masks now and you extend your extra time by 45 minutes. Things are definitely looking up at this point. Of course, this does depend on you both being good mask-wearing citizens. If one of you takes their mask off, we're down to 15 minutes of extra time, which is better than nothing, but not great. Things get a lot better with a Nyush approved respirator, something like an N95 respirator. With both of you wearing one of these, you get an impressive 6 hours and 10 minutes of extra time. Even if one of you takes their respirator off, you're still looking at over an hour before COVID transmission becomes a serious issue. But the gold standard here is a fully fit tested N95 respirator. This is one where you've been trained to use it properly and tests have shown that you can put it on without it leaking.  Of course, there are compromises to be made for this level of safety. Wearing a respirator for 24 hours isn't everyone's idea of a life well lived. Thankfully, fit tested N95s are designed to be used for work shifts in hazardous places rather than round the clock. Perhaps more usefully here, if you're wearing a fit tested N95 respirator and the other person's not wearing anything, that CDC recommended 15 minute window extends to two and a half hours. And if the other person is wearing an N95, even one that isn't fit tested, that goes up to a massive 12 and a half hours.  But whatever you decide to wear, far better that you decide based on evidence rather than habit, assumptions or simply peer pressure. For completeness, here's the full set of estimated times before the infection risk becomes serious for different combinations of mask wearing. Be warned though that it comes with a really important proviso and that is that these are just rough estimates and the most important takeaway is the size of the differences, not the precise numbers. For more information, please do check out the links in the blur below and as always, stay safe.


I think men and women get a bad rap when it comes to dating, mating, or relating these days. In many cases, men get a rap, bad rap, that they're only in it for the sex. And women get a bad rap, I think, because they're only in it for status. And what I mean to say is a lot of people in the Red Bill community talk about the fact how many women only are seeking the top of the top kind of men. They're looking for that Prince Charming, if you will. And they're bypassing so many good men. And I think that's the complaint with men. And women have a valid complaint because men can be rather non-intentional, particularly in the midlife category. And for those of us in midlife, I always say it's after baby making years and before retirement. So why is it, why is this worth knowing that people get a bad rap? Because the thing is statistically speaking, let me just be clear, for those of us again in midlife, the odds are against us in actually finding a really agree, a really compatible partner. The odds are against us. And yet good people are meeting all the time, falling in love, getting engaged, getting married, moving in together and that sort of thing. So it does happen. The question becomes not do you, how it's not about you setting yourself apart from other people. I think the real issue today is being more realistic, pragmatic and intentional. That's right, realistic, pragmatic and intentional. Now you might be saying, well, why does this relate to the topic? Never say this to a guy, five things guys hate. Well, we have to address the bigger problem in relationships to these days. It's really hard to meet somebody that you're aligned in. It's hard to meet someone that you're aligned with where your values are similar to one another and you have lifestyles that can blend with one another. And certainly is this person even emotionally mature enough do they have the relationship skills to be in a significant relationship? So if we don't address that deeper problem, it doesn't matter what you say to a man, you're not going to, you're gonna find yourself going out on date, after date, after date, after date. Now, what's the solution to all this folks? I screen this at my top of my lung, first and foremost be your best self in the sense of recognizing that each human being has childhood wounds, they have traumas. And for those of us in midlife, we have adult traumas, especially if we've been divorced or have had several significant relationships in midlife. All of those relationships come with them an unraveling of a tapestry of a life you might have built with someone only for it to fall apart.  So first and foremost as a woman, you're gonna wanna do some healing. Now, in addition, you're gonna most likely want to find somebody who also has done some healing. Now you have to be careful because while it's beneficial to go to therapy and I'm a big proponent of therapy, oftentimes people still aren't actively healing if they're not doing the progressive work in between therapy sessions. That can be very problematic, but I don't wanna get into that too deeply. What I wanna address before we get into these five things men hate to hear is if you're a woman who has a capacity to attract men. And what I mean to say is if you have a plethora of opportunities, if you have plethora of men interested in you. And by the way, from what I understand men swipe at 60% of dating profiles compared to women who only swipe at 5% of profiles. So if you are getting activity, it's more important to do a better job screening for these shared values, to screen for if your lifestyles are blendable and more importantly, to ask some of the deeper questions to determine is this person emotionally mature enough to be in relationship? This is what I teach in my private coaching.  And if you need some support with that, here, check out the link to a free discovery call with me to see if working with a coach is right for you. And it's in the link below as well. Because the reality is, is you can have all the first dates you want or not, but let me retract that.  I recently got a message on YouTube about a woman who had an eight week experience, saw the man about a dozen, about 10 times, about 10 times in that eight week period, only to find out this guy is really messed up. And she of course did get physically intimate with them. So I'm here to suggest a different approach than what you've been taught by others and certainly what others are telling you to do. Many of folks are telling you not to get serious early. And what I'm here to say is it's not about being serious, it's about trying to reveal, does this person align to who I am? What is the point? What, just think about it, dating is a period of time where you get to know one another. I think sex should be reserved for those in a relationship, but dating is to decide if you want to explore a relationship with someone and that's the period of time you ask the deeper questions. Is this sinking in? Is this resonating? Please let me know. Okay, so what I wanna share with you today was I saw this topic on another contemporary's channel and I thought to myself, what are the things I wouldn't want to hear, whether it's in the early stage of relationship or in a relationship. So I wanna share with you some of my perspective and then we'll go straight to Q&A. So some of the things men don't wanna hear, I just pulled this up and this is a sensitive subject for me because it's when someone said my ex used to blank, okay? Here's the challenge. While I'm all in favor of talking about previous relationships to get a baseline to see where someone at is at emotionally, in other words, are they still emotionally tethered to a previous relationship? I think it's critically important to find out as much as you can about someone's dating history and relationship history. But the challenge is if you share some of the highlight reels of those relationships, even if it's something that you don't, if your new partner doesn't do what someone else does, it can be rather intimidating for us men and I don't mean intimidated, it just is that if we can't give you something they gave you. So for example, let's say someone in a previous relationship took you on a private jet and you went to Europe or something like that. Now, I know that's the extreme, but I've certainly heard that happen. Certainly lavish vacations or whatnot. And if that's not something we can provide for you, it's going to be somewhat emotionally debilitating for us if we can't give you what someone else gave you. So I'd be very mindful when you're sharing about your past experiences, don't necessarily glorify any of the good things. Certainly bring up the things that's material to the relationship. I think transparency in the dating marketplace is all about sharing things that would be material to any new relationship. That's what you should be discussing about previous relationships. Does that make sense? Okay, good to hear.  Number two, if you say something, and I've heard this before, you don't understand me. You don't understand me. Well ladies, first and foremost, we're not mind readers, but I know I was in a relationship with someone where she had said that not once, twice, several times. And sometimes you have to recognize we, not that we're just not mind readers, but as human beings, we don't know the facets of all the experiences you've had that make you who you are. And when you do spend a significant amount of time with a person, you can begin to get them, but the reality is we don't necessarily understand it from your perspective. Let me give you an example. I was at an Alison Armstrong event. If you don't know Alison Armstrong, I'd highly recommend checking her workout. It's called understandmen.com. My website's Understand Men Now. Actually, my website's my name, Jonathan Asley. But Alison does a little exercise where she asks all the men in the room, when was the last time you felt fear for your life? And they said, if it was in the last month, raise your hand and nobody raised their hand. And if it was in the last six months, raise your hand, none of them. I think maybe one man raised his hand out of a hundred. And then in the last year, it was maybe two men. In the last 10 years, it was maybe a half a dozen men that felt like they had feared their life. And I'm talking about physical fear, not the fear we feel like when we can't support ourselves or something like that. And she asked the women, when was the last time you feared your life? Raise your hand if it was in the last year, all the women's hands were raised. And then I said, if the last six months, all the women's hands were raised. If it was in the last month, all the women's hands were raised. If it was the last day, started the number started to drop. But then she said in the last hour, and 25 to 30% of the women still had their hand raised. See, we men don't know what that feels like. So we don't always, and I'm using that as an example, but we don't always understand what it feels like from your perspective, just like you may not understand things from our perspective. And so when someone says, you don't understand me, that's an insult because we don't, it is even if you've known someone for a year, we don't know how you experience the world. Only you can experience the world. And let me repeat, ladies, we are not a mind reader either. Okay, here's another one. It's annoying when you do that. Instead of judging the issue, offer assistance. Now, what I mean to say, it's annoying when you do that. So, okay, I'll use the toilet seat because by the way, this happens so infrequently, but I will tell you, I get up in the middle of the night, I have to go pee, and sometimes I forget. Well, I'm grateful that Marie doesn't come to me and says, God damn, it's so annoying that you don't put the seat down for me, okay? And that's just such a minor thing, but it does happen. And she says, well, what can we do to, instead of accused, coming at me with judgment or accusatory, she comes at it from a place of how can we solve this problem because it's kind of frustrating to me to fall in the toilet. And by the way, I think it's only happened once in the year that we've known each other, okay? But there's another thing I do that's annoying. And sometimes when there's a disagreement between us or I feel criticized by her, I have a habit of doing what's called tit for tat, okay? I'm not proud of it. This was something my mother did. It's when I feel criticized, I get defensive and I have to say something that's also critical about them. And what I'm grateful is Marie doesn't say, it's annoying when you do that, it's more, how can we resolve this? What is triggering you? What is causing you to do that? And I'm getting better. I'm getting better at this. It isn't until I've been in this relationship, have I found myself in this position of doing tit for tat because I hadn't been in a relationship in a while. So in relationship is when you actually start to have an opportunity to work on those areas within yourself, there's areas of your personality that are somewhat, I'm gonna use the word flawed, but it's not the best of me. Let me just say it that way. It's parts of my personality that aren't the best of me. And I have personality, listen folks, so many of you revere me as like, the quintessential guy. I am riddled with flaws. Let me just tell you something. I'm riddled with flaws. And even within my relationship with Marie, I have my areas that I'm not my best. And she has her areas of not when she's not her best. And when I recognize with that, I don't say it's annoying you do this, I just bring it to the attention and say, how can we overcome it? Okay. Number four, this is something that happened to me. I was with a woman who used to say, leave me alone. Leave me alone. Here's the thing. When you tell that to someone, I mean, tell me if you heard a man say, leave me alone, that would hurt, right? And that would be hurtful. I'm sure you wouldn't like to experience that. So instead of being confrontational, I want to invite just a simple say, you know what, I need a little space in this moment. Is it okay? And not that you need permission, but is it okay with you if I take some space? Not that I don't have the authority to take space, but will you allow me that time to take some space? I think when you tell someone leave me alone and I see this happen, that's a very hurtful thing. I know if you'd experienced it, you'd feel that way. So I want you to be mindful of that as well. And lastly, and this happens to do in the bedroom. And I've had this happen to me before too. When are you gonna finish? Listen, if you've engaged in the act of physical intimacy, but in that moment, you disengage. In other words, you are not engaged in the process. That's an insulting thing to tell someone when are you gonna be finished? I think a better way to approach that is, can we take a break? Is it okay if we take a break? Now, some men are very single focused in the bedroom. I mean, once we start that mission, we have to, we go till there's a blast off, if you will. But I think that's a much kinder thing to say than something like, when are you gonna finish? That feels, I mean, certainly to some men, they're very selfish in the bedroom and they could really care less. But for men like myself that are emotional and that have a sense of emotional IQ, we may not be in tune to what's going on. And certainly, sometimes in the physical act of having an orgasm, you can be self-centric. That's a very common thing, but it doesn't necessarily mean you're a uncaring person in a relationship. But I think to say something like that, an easier way to approach that would be, can we take a break? So I could have come up with a dozen, two dozen things that men and women don't like to hear in relationship. I think the most important thing is I wanted you to approach this conversation from, how can I say something in the most loving way to my partner? How can I say something the most loving way? And Marie and I talked about this in our most recent video versus accusatory and confrontationally, okay? All right, well listen, I hope you got value from this. If you did, please post a comment below. If it resonated with you, please hit that like button. Please share this video. Please subscribe to my channel as well. And in the links below, you can schedule a discovery call with me, join my group and all that other good stuff. So it's time to take questions. And if you have a question of me for me, ask, write the word question, then post the question there after. Or you can purchase a Super Sticker Super Chat. All the monies from the Super Sticker Super Chat goes to the Connor Asley scholarship, or Scholarship Fund, the Connor Asley, wow. I just had a blank. It's a Connor Asley foundation where I've, I'm not, it's not a true foundation yet, but I'm donating to causes in his name, like the Hoffman Process Insight Institute, Seeds of Love, that sort of thing.  And there's a picture of my son, Connor. He's the one who passed away a few years ago. All right, let's jump into it now. I see that Nana wrote a question. Texting stage found on dating site. He texts and asks me everything and I'm open and honest. What do I ask? That's a great question. So what do you want to ask? What matters most to you? I think, first off, you might wanna ask questions centered around your values.  For example, one value is someone's health. Health is a value, okay? Their perception around charity, that's a value. Punctuality, that's a value. I'm just kidding. And by the way, you can Google a list of values. By the way, my nose is scratchy, so please forgive me. I was Googling when a person gets nervous, their nose actually scratches. So for some reason I must be nervous right now. But or it's just, it's a little cool air in here. So about their values, you might ask about their lifestyle to determine if they're blendable with yours and certainly emotional maturity questions. And that's something I help clients with, design the questions based on your personality to ask in the early stage of dating, okay? Hope that helps. Dee says, not a question. Just wanna say that my ex always asked me when I was going to put the toilet seat up for him. You know, I kind of wonder about that too. Is it supposed to be a one-sided type of transaction or should the woman put a toilet seat up for a guy? I think the smart thing to do is always put the seat down and also put the cover down as well. And I'm certainly getting better at that for those that are commenting on that. All right. Spark says, a real man will say, okay, baby, and leave you alone. Later you can come back and say sorry, then you can talk. Again, I don't like the framework of saying leave me alone. That's accusatory. I like the idea of I need to take some space. Are you good with that? Okay, are you good with that? That might be a better, just a softer way of approaching the conversation. All right. Allison says, oh, and she's one of our members here. Just wanna give a shout out to Allison. It's the absence of honesty and integrity. I don't agree with making such a sweeping statement like that. It's all down to individual values and standards. Okay, Allison, I'm not sure specifically what you're addressing. I do agree that sweeping generalizations don't is, okay, I'm in agreement that you can't put everything in one box. That's absolutely true. You have to look at individual situations. At the same time, we can traditionally say that for the most part, this is true. For the most part, I'm not saying any, by the way, nothing on my channel is about absolute truth. I'm here to just spark conversation. So I appreciate, and again, I don't know specifically what you're addressing here, but I will say this, there is a distressing lack of honesty and integrity in the dating marketplace. It's just, it's a distressing number to see. It's not an absolute thing, but it's a distressing thing. So thank you so much for bringing that up. I appreciate that. And Marie goes on to say, Maria, why are there so many dishonest people? What's alarm, that's alarming to me. So here's the thing, my thoughts on that. I think there's a significant percentage of the human population, or at least the population here in the United States who happens to be single, which happens to be, I believe something like 127 million singles in the United States that are over 18 years old. I think there are a lot of people that just lie to themselves and are unconscious to their habitual patterns of being self-centric. I think the real issue here is many people, and this is true of you ladies as well. I think so many women as well as men can be incredibly myopic and self-centric. And in that, they are deceptive to some degree, but I don't believe it's intentional. I think it's a subconscious thing versus a conscious thing. I think men can be selfish in the area of wanting sex before really building trust with someone. I think men can be very selfish in that way. I think women oftentimes give their power away to men. Sadly, I see this habitual problem where women give their power away to men. And sometimes when you have a little bit of chemistry with someone, you will accept almost to the form of abuse from someone. I don't mean true abuse, but close to abuse.  And I'm not a big proponent of that either, but that's on the woman, not on the guy. So anyway, Maria, thank you so much for that. I appreciate it. All right, let's keep going here. You have a question, right? Okay, Wanda has a question. Can you become physically attracted to someone if they lose a lot of weight because they want to, because of their health problems to be healthy if chemistry wasn't there before? That's interesting. I've noticed that, yeah, when I've noticed with women in particular, when a man has lost weight, she finds him to be more attractive. There's probably a symmetry to his body when his waist measurements aren't greater than his chest measurements. And I think with women as well too, I think we can find, oh, I know an example of a friend of mine who went out with a woman. Oh, this was about a decade ago. And he thought, and she admittedly opened, she was a bit overweight and he wasn't attracted to her. And then she went on a real health kick for herself and she had lost 20 pounds.  I'm a beautiful woman to begin with anyway. And not that I'm not suggesting he rejected her because of that, but certainly when he saw her a second time, he was like, wow, she looks fantastic. I think when we, when humans are in a healthy physique for themselves, they become more attractive. Not to suggest that it's solely about weight. I just think healthy looking people just seem more attractive is all. Now you can have someone that looks healthy and they're a chain smoker, a drug addict and be unhealthy on the inside. So health isn't just something about appearance. It's also what you consume within your life as well. And health is also not just physical health, there's emotional health as well. So those are all factors I think that play in a part. So Wanda, thanks so much for that question. I really appreciate it. All right, let's keep going. How to tell some question, how to tell someone they're having an annoying habit like chewing with their mouths open. I wish Marie was here. She's the master at bringing up things that annoy, that can be annoying and how to address it in a very loving way. She's a master at that. So, you know what, I'm stumped at the moment. For some reason, I'm feeling a total block on how to say that in a loving way. I think if someone, well, okay, like how would I address that with my son? You know, if it was my, I'm thinking of my son for a moment, not that he chews with his mouth open, but if he did something like that, I'd say, hey, sweetheart, not that I call my son sweetheart, I'd say, hey bud, can I share something with you that has to do with etiquette? And, you know, my son likes to get advice from me because he sees me as someone he looks up to, kind of thing, so I might frame it that way and then share what's going on. Okay, now, that's someone who's in somewhat of a subordinate position to me, not that he is a subordinate. How would I address that with someone who's my peer, if you will? I'd say, I'd ask it from the point of our, you know, how do I do this in a, I'm trying to think of how to say this in a loving way because I don't like necessarily pointing something out, but okay, maybe I'd ask it this way. Can I ask you a question? Do you believe someone who chews with their mouth open is a good thing, you know, or something like that? You know, like proper etiquette. And then they would say, yes. Well, then I'd wanna find out why they think so, yes. But if they say no, you might simply then say, by the way, did you know this is what you do? I think that's my, I'd start with a question, be curious and then see how they respond. That's the way I think I'd approach that one. So RG, thank you so much for that question. That one felt like a stump though because it's sometimes, you know, bringing up the touchy subjects, you know, and I'd always start with something positive you appreciate about the person to start and then end with something you appreciate. Okay, Evelyn says question. Talking to a new man online. We talked last night for the first time. Our bios are very similar. We only talked for 10 minutes, he ended it. I have a deep voice, was that it? All right, so Evelyn, if you watch any of my videos with my beloved Marie, there's a picture of her. She literally has a voice deeper than Cher, okay? Did anyone remember Cher? It was, at first it was a little, I don't wanna say it was a turn off. It felt weird to me. And even, and we spoke just for the record, we spoke about a dozen times in the course of one year before we physically met with one another, maybe not a dozen, I'd say eight to 10 times. And I always found her voice to be a little weird to me. And then when we even met in person, but by that first time we were in person, it didn't no longer feel weird to me. Listen, I think men with high pitch voices might sound weird to a woman, a deep voice for a woman to a man might be weird. Could that be the reason why it was only 10 minutes? Possibly, I know sometimes in the span of two minutes, I have been, I once talked to a woman on the phone and within two minutes I'm like, oh, I gotta get off this phone call. She is grating on me. And it was not her voice. It was the energy behind her voice that bothered the heck out of me. It's possible, you may not be what, maybe we should schedule a discovery call.  I know I experienced that within two minutes.  Her energy, and I'm not suggesting this with you Evelyn, but her energy was almost antagonistic. And so it wasn't the voice, it was the energy behind the voice, okay? All right, thanks so much for asking that question. The current girl says, I call BS, I love dad bonds. Again, everybody has their preference, but I will say this coming back to losing weight, which was the original question. I do believe when people look healthier, they tend to be more attractive. That's not an absolute, that just tend, they appear, it is a sign of health, okay? When someone is slimmer, it's a sign of health and they look more attractive, okay? That's just a perception, it's not an absolute. Okay, I wanna thank Mary Chin for becoming a new member. Thank you so much, I appreciate that.  All right, Hallison says, Marie has a beautiful husky, sexy voice, I love hearing her speak. You know, I think we're gonna do a lip sync to sunny and share, because we do have to amplify and use Marie's voice in that, when I say have to, but I think it'd be fun that I record a video of us doing a sunny and share song. Hopefully on June 1st, when we go out with the family to celebrate, Connor and Connor, Connor's birthday, Connor who passed away was May 24th, Colin's birthday was June 7th. So we're gonna celebrate both their birthdays on June 1st. Just to get a chance to get a family gathering going. So anyway, yes, I do believe Marie has a great voice. All right, Evelyn says, I am self-conscious about my voice, afraid it is turning guys off. Okay, well again, it's possible it's the energy behind the voice and not the voice itself, but I'm gonna assume you've had several relationships in your life, several boys. I'm assuming you've at least gone on a few dates in your life and those men liked you. So it's not the voice, that's a story. Now that could be for some men, it could be absolutely a problem for some men, but guess what? Just like with Marie, wasn't a problem, it was just weird. But now I love her voice for who she is. So just remember, you can't really say or do the wrong thing to the right person. You can't really say or do the wrong thing to the right person. All right, let's see if we, hey listen, looks like we don't have any more questions. Oh, here's one, men like my accent because I'm Californian living in Australia. So I'm gonna, let's talk about accents for a second. I think accents for some people can be a turn on and I think accents for some people can be a turn off. Now usually if it's an accent to turn off is because if someone's from another country and English isn't their second language, it can be difficult communicating with one another because especially those that weren't raised here in the United States, they may not know the colloquialisms, they may not know some of the jokes and things like that. So it's not the accent that could be a problem. It could be that there's a different perception of the world if you come from another country. I think I went out with a woman who had an Australian accent. I thought it was very sexy and English accent I thought was sexy. I told Marie she has an accent but she really doesn't but I told her she has one just because she has a sexy boy. So Kristen, thanks so much for bringing that up. Hey folks, I'm gonna wrap up early. My younger brother's coming to visit. So we're gonna hang out for the evening. I just wanted to do a quick shout out to share my perspective on some of the challenges we face in relationship and also some of those things that men and women do that can be kind of annoying and how to approach it in a more loving way. Listen, if you find value in my work, please hit that like button, please share this video. Please subscribe to my channel. And again, if you'd like some support learning how to vet for emotionally mature men, check out the link to a free discovery call with me. Check out my group called Midlife Love Mastery. I've got my dating vows below. I've got the naked divorce content there, a free gift. So check it all out. I'd be honored if you follow my work more. So I'm gonna wrap up this video as I always do.  I'm gonna reach into the camera and give you a hug of love if that's okay. I'm asking you to turn to someone, a pet, a teddy bear pillow and give inner them a hug of love because hugs are a great source of love. And let's face it, we can all use more love in our lives. I wanna thank Allison, I appreciate the comment and Pam and Kristen and Mary Chin, our new member in Wanda and Evelyn and Corgi Goro and Mary Ann and let's see, Body Electric Supplement and Jennifer and CeCe and RG and Gigi and D-Fas Foss. Thanks so much, have a fab evening. Be well.