General Conference

Twice a year there is a General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. The conference consists of five different sessions lasting two hours each, spread out over Saturday and Sunday. During the conference, the Church leadership speaks about issues and topics relevant to everyone today.

As a child I didn’t particularly enjoy General Conference. As I’ve grown older, however, I’ve begun to look forward to it. The speakers are all carefully selected. The audience is the 13 million members of the LDS church worldwide (although I have no idea what the average viewing audience is) and anyone else who wants to watch and listen.

My Moleskine notebook is full of notes and insights that struck me as I listened to conference this past weekend. I’m looking forward to re-reading them.

One noteworthy insight came from an address given by Elder Boyd K. Packer to the men of the Church. He advised that we don’t get so caught up in the technical that we ignore the practical. I’m fairly passionate about life balance, and this statement caused my ears to perk up. Yes! While it’s important to know and be proficient at your chosen career, it’s just as important to have people skills, to change a bike tire, to build a fire while camping, to solve unstructured questions.

Also (from a different speaker) Gross Faith – Fear = Net Faith