How to take a little time to add time to your life...

I try to read an ensign article or words of the prophets daily to keep my soul and heart in harmony with truth...at least for a few moments :).   Today, I opened up to the most recent First Presidency message by Elder Eyring in the Ensign called "Recognize, Remember, and Give Thanks." ("Felismerés, emlékezés és hálaadás")  These are normally pretty short, and are the words of men we recognize as inspired with God's message for us in these latter-days...I figure I should keep up to speed :).

A phrase caught my heart this morning: "It is easy for us to become mechanical in our prayers of gratitude, often repeating the same words but without the intent to give our thanks as a gift of the heart to God."  "Guilty as charged," I ruefully thought.  "Mechanical" describes my prayers all too often :S!  But I had never thought of giving our thanks as a "gift of the heart to God."

The Holy Ghost brings back memories of what God has taught us. And one of the ways God teaches us is with His blessings; and so, if we choose to exercise faith, the Holy Ghost will bring God’s kindnesses to our remembrance.

You could test that in prayer today. You could follow the command “Thou shalt thank the Lord thy God in all things” (D&C 59:7).

I tried it...it was amazing.  It was like my mind jumped from blessing to blessing and I felt my heart get lighter and lighter.

 You could try [expressing gratitude] as you write an entry in your journal. The Holy Ghost has helped people with that since the beginning of time. You remember that the book of Moses says, “And a book of remembrance was kept, in the which was recorded, in the language of Adam, for it was given unto as many as called upon God to write by the spirit of inspiration” (Moses 6:5).

President Spencer W. Kimball (1895–1985) described that process of inspired writing: “Those who keep a book of remembrance are more likely to keep the Lord in remembrance in their daily lives. Journals are a way of counting our blessings and of leaving an inventory of these blessings for our posterity.”²

As you start to write, you could ask yourself, “How did God bless me and those I love today?” If you do that often enough and with faith, you will find yourself remembering blessings. And sometimes you will have gifts brought to your mind that you failed to notice during the day but that you will then know were a touch of God’s hand in your life.

I pray that we may make a continuing effort in faith to recognize, remember, and give thanks for what our Heavenly Father and our Savior have done and are doing to open the way home to Them.

I don't believe that doing this takes time out of our lives...I believe it gives time back to us.  It takes away from us the time-consuming tendency to dwell on what we don't have, what is going wrong, and why things aren't working and gives us the perspective of what God is doing in our lives to make things possible.  It is powerful.  It is enabling...and it only takes a few moments :).