followHIM - Doctrine & Covenants 58-59 Part 1 • Sis. Whitney Johnson • June 2-8 • Come Follow Me

Episode Date: May 28, 2025

What is disruption and how did it affect the early Saints? As Sister Whitney Johnson explores the theme of disruption in personal and spiritual development and examines what is required to be “anxiously engaged.”SHOW NOTES/TRANSCRIPTSEnglish: https://tinyurl.com/podcastDC223ENFrench: https://tinyurl.com/podcastDC223FRGerman: https://tinyurl.com/podcastDC223DEPortuguese: https://tinyurl.com/podcastDC223PTSpanish: https://tinyurl.com/podcastDC223ESYOUTUBEFREE PDF DOWNLOADS OF followHIM QUOTE BOOKSNew Testament: https://tinyurl.com/PodcastNTBookOld Testament: https://tinyurl.com/PodcastOTBookWEEKLY NEWSLETTERhttps://tinyurl.com/followHIMnewsletterSOCIAL MEDIAInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/followHIMpodcastFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/followhimpodcastThanks to the followHIM team:Steve & Shannon Sorensen: Cofounder, Executive Producer, SponsorDavid & Verla Sorensen: SponsorsDr. Hank Smith: Co-hostJohn Bytheway: Co-hostDavid Perry: ProducerKyle Nelson: Marketing, SponsorLisa Spice: Client Relations, Editor, Show NotesWill Stoughton: Video EditorKrystal Roberts: Translation Team, English & French Transcripts, WebsiteAriel Cuadra: Spanish TranscriptsAmelia Kabwika: Portuguese TranscriptsHeather Barlow: Communications DirectorIride Gonzalez: Social Media, Graphic Design"Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise" by Marshall McDonaldhttps://www.marshallmcdonaldmusic.com

Coming up in this episode on Follow Him. When I think about disruption, which I talk about frequently, this idea of personal disruption, I describe it when I'm in the workplace as a deliberate process of self-innovation. So I'll say it again. Disruption is a deliberate process of self-innovation. You're choosing to rewire your brain. You're stepping back from who you are currently into who you can be, but if you really pull it down to its studs, what is that? That's repentance. Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of Follow Him. My name is Hank Smith, I'm your host.

I'm here with my co-host, John, by the way, who I will describe thus, with a cheerful heart and countenance, not with much laughter, for this is a sin, but with a glad heart. So John, there's part of that that is really accurate, a cheerful heart and countenance, not with much laughter, for this is a sin. I think that means mocking people, John, and you don't do that. You don't do that. We may need to talk about that part. Yeah. I think a lot of people might have a question about that part. I hope that doesn't come up at my judgment. John, we are joined today by our friend Whitney

Johnson. Whitney, thank you for being here. Happy to be here. We are excited to have you. I've been looking forward to this for a long time. John and I have known Whitney from our days speaking on the road a long time ago, but now we speak on the road, but we stay home. Kind of an odd thing that we do. John, section 58 and 59, we're finally in Missouri. Tell me what you think of. I know, Hank, one of your favorite topics is expectations that are not met. And they walk in, this is Zion, this is Zion? This is the place? It's kind of like, it's not like, that's part of this whole backdrop is what were we expecting and what did we get?

You are right on there, John. The Lord knows, because very first, right out, he says, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, let's talk about what's gonna happen. Whitney, as you've prepared this, what do you want to do today? What are we going to learn? I really like the idea of picking up on the expectations. I want to share with you a framework around learning and growth that I think will be very useful in thinking about the experience that they had in independence. I also want to share with you some thoughts that I have around repentance using personal disruption, so a framework of disruption

and how I think about change in a secular environment, but then compare it to what we've got in terms of our spiritual sphere. I want to talk a little bit about the experience that Edward Partridge had, his calling and how he felt so deeply inadequate. And I want to talk a little bit about that experience and how that applies to us. This is set up to be a perfect episode. I love these two sections. Now John, you and I both know Whitney. Can you introduce her?

We have quite a guest this week. Yes, we do. Hank, I thought I know Whitney. Can you introduce her? We have quite a guest this week. Yes, we do. Hank, I thought I knew Whitney and I saw the bio and went, wow. And then I got really excited because I thought I have to ask her about this. Whitney graduated from BYU in music and served a mission in Uruguay. And I just have to stop because my son, Timothy, is in Montevideo West mission as we speak. Oh, wonderful. Of course, when I was there, it was one mission. It was all of Uruguay. Yeah.

What a beautiful place. Recently just announced in general conference at Temple and was it Rivera? Yeah, and Rivera Uruguay. Very exciting. Now there's something else I'd love to talk to you about. Whitney is one of the leading management thinkers in the world. She's the CEO and co-founder of Disruption Advisors. She actually founded this Disruption Innovation Fund with Clayton Christensen. Now is that the same Clayton Christensen who wrote The Power of Everyday Missionaries? One and the same. I had the privilege of working with him for about 10 years. It was really cool. The first time I saw Clayton Christensen, I went, wow, he looks a lot like Elliot Christensen,

who was one of my young men's leaders when I was a kid. And it's his brother. This is too much fun. She has a Disrupt Yourself podcast. Her guests have included Simon Sinek and Brene Brown. She lives in Lexington, Virginia. Her husband is a professor at SVU and they serve in a YSA stake. They have two children in the process of launching. They enjoy watching K dramas. I saw your bio and I thought, what is a K drama?

John, you don't know. I don't know. So during the pandemic, because there was nothing to watch on television, my daughter said, hey mom, let's watch this Korean drama. We watched it. It turns out that we watched one and then we watched another one and then we watched another one and then we

watched another one. They're just great stories, great character arc development. It's what we do as a family. It's not Hallmark. It's better than Hallmark. It is. It's better than Hallmark. John, I can't believe you haven't heard this. You are missing out. No, I didn't know they were K-dramas. I did know there was this, yeah, this thing with these Korean dramas. I didn't know they were K-dramas. I did know there was this, yeah, this thing with these Korean dry. I didn't know they were K-dramas. And I drive a Hyundai. Okay, I gotta go on. Now, my favorite part here is that her family loves growing raspberries, blackberries, strawberries, and making homemade jam. When you get to the Celestial Kingdom, I hope to be there. They're going to say, welcome, here's a bowl of raspberries.

Because I think raspberries are just celestial fruit. They taste so good, don't they? They do. And you might as well throw a little ice cream on them. Whitney, thanks for being with us today. Happy to be here. Oh, wonderful. Now I just have to throw in a quick personal note, Whitney, that you're out there at SVU. That has a piece of my heart out there. You would think it would be called Buena Vista, Virginia.

It is not. It is Buhner Vista, Virginia. It is one of my favorite places. I just need to do a shout out to the Knight family, Glade, Kathleen, and Megan, who's my age, we were pen pals when we were kids. I love SVU. There is a spirit of place that is unmatched, really, anywhere else. It really is.

It's a very special place. When you're here, almost everybody who's here feels like they've been called to be here, just like had a spiritual impression of, I need to live in this city. I need to be affiliated with this university. And now we have President Corden, who was the former young women's general president as the president of the university. It's amazing. And I think of it, I often quote John Denver. He's a general authority, John. I don't know if you know Elder, Elder Denver. Elder Denver?

Yeah, Elder Denver. Where is he from? Just kidding. He said in one of his songs, he's going home to a place he'd never been before. And that honestly, I went out there just graduated from high school. That's how I would describe it. Going home to a place I'd never been before. When Matthew, my son Matthew, went on his mission to Charleston, West Virginia, my wife cranked the stereo in the Sequoia driving to the MTC singing Almost Heaven West Virginia at the top of our lungs on 8th North. I was getting a

little teary. I'm getting old so I had a hard time singing along. That's the Charleston West Virginia mission but one of his areas was at SVU. Matthew served there and he would text me on PTA, hey dad, we had lunch with Robert Millett today. We're like, what? That'd be fun. I'd like to have lunch with Robert Millett. Whitney, if you see Bob around there, tell him hi, he's been on our show quite a few times. Tell him we love him and miss him, please. I will do that. Absolutely. I'm going to read from the Come, Follow Me manual. The lesson is called Anxiously Engaged in a Good Cause. When the elders of the church first saw the site of the city of Zion, Independence, Missouri, it was not what they expected. Some thought they would find a thriving,

industrious community with a strong group of saints. Instead, they found a sparsely populated outpost, lacking the civilization they were used to and inhabited by rough frontier settlers rather than saints. It turned out that the Lord wasn't asking them to just come to Zion, he wanted them to build Zion. When our expectations do not match reality, we can remember what the Lord told the saints in 1831, ye cannot behold with your natural eyes for the present time the design of your God and the glory which shall follow after much tribulation. Yes, life is full of tribulation, even wickedness, but we can still bring to pass much righteousness

for the power is in us. That's wonderful. Now, Whitney, would it be okay before we turn it over to you if I quiz John a little bit? John, we are about halfway through the Doctrine and Covenants. We have asked almost every guest, how did we end up in Missouri? John, I have to see if you've been listening. John, I have to see if you've been listening. Give us the John, by the way, summary of how we got to Missouri and what leads to Section 58. It's so fun to look big picture. One of the things you helped me see, Hank, was there's a bunch of New York saints. There's Colesville, there's Fayette, there's Harmony.

Then four missionaries are called to go to the borders of the Lamanites. On the way they stop in a little place called Kirtland, or I've heard it called Mentor. Harley Pratt says, I've got a friend here, I want to go visit him and that friend is Sidney Rigdon. They sit down with Sidney Rigdon and he says, okay I'll take your book and I'll see what claim it has upon my faith. And he decides to read the Book of Mormon. He is convinced of its truthfulness about the number I remember is 127 saints joining the church. Because of persecution, some other things happening in Colesville and those other places, the Lord says, go to the Ohio. Well, they go to the Ohio.

Now here's the part that always surprised me Hank when I learned church history It doesn't take very long after these people uproot Everything and their lives and their stuff and go to Ohio and the Lord says actually Zion is in Missouri. Oh You're about a third of the way there. Not even that you're about a fourth of the way there. There's no email There's no roads highways freeways to get there. It's a tough time because the church kind of has two headquarters as they're trying to get started. And I think we're going to talk about Edward Partridge today to go be a bishop

over there in Independence. And as we start, they're walking in going, I love the intro in the manual. It's not a pre-built Zion. You have to build it. How'd I do, Hank? Excellent. I think Dr. Ut from last week, she would be very proud of you. So Emily, if you're listening, you might need to shoot John a message and tell him congratulations. Whitney, thanks for putting up with that. I think it's something like 13 or 14 sets of missionaries have arrived in Missouri in August. I can't imagine. This is what the Lord gives to them when they get there. Whitney, with that, how do you want to approach

the text here? The way for me in terms of studying the scriptures is I like to read it and then see what experience I'm having with it. In particular, look at what do I know, what have I learned from a secular perspective that starts to intersect with the scripture so that I can liken the scripture to myself. What I thought might be useful to do as a starting point as we think about this experience that they're having, the expectations management piece, is to share with you a framework that we typically share with the businesses that we consult with and advise on when they're trying to manage through change. The framework is called the S-curve of learning.

For those of you who are not familiar with this S-curve of learning, the S-curve itself is sometimes known as the adoption curve. It was originally popularized by a man named Everett Rogers back in the 1960s. He used it to understand how quickly an innovation would be adopted. What we then did when I was working with Clayton Christensen at the Disruptive Innovation Fund is we would use the S-curve to understand, okay, how quickly will an innovation be adopted? And does it make sense to buy this company as an investment or not? As we were applying this in investing, I had this insight, this aha, that we

could use the S-curve to understand what growth looks like and what it feels like. What it does, it answers three questions. Number one is, why is it so hard to start something new? Number two, why once you do start, does it become easy? And number three, why can you be really good at something and feel like you can no longer keep doing it? Here's what's going on in your brain when you're doing something new, like going to Independence, Missouri. Your brain has this hypothesis of what is it going to take for me to get from the bottom of this curve to the top of the curve.

It's running this predictive model. When you are at the first part of the curve, what we call the launch point, you're running this predictive model. Most of your predictions are inaccurate about what it's gonna look like. So that expectations gap, because those predictions are inaccurate,

dopamine, which is a chemical messenger of delight, it drops. So the experience you have is you feel overwhelmed, you feel discouraged, you feel frustrated, you feel impatient. You can feel like an imposter. You can feel like I thought this was a really good idea. And now I'm not so sure. This is the experience that they were having. What's fascinating though about the launch point of the curve is that when you're there, growth

is actually happening very very quickly. Mathematically it's happening at its fastest, but it's not apparent, it's not obvious. So you can't see it and the experience that you have is growth feels slow. Now there's two other parts of the curve. I'll walk through those really quickly and then we'll come back and focus on the launch point of the experience that we're having. You've got that launch point where growth feels slow. Then at some point, if you stay with it and you say, yes, I am going to build Zion here, you're going to hit a tipping point. We heard Malcolm Gladwell years ago popularize the concept of a tipping point where you move

into the sleek steep back of the curve. What happens here is growth is now not only fast, it feels fast. What's happening with the dopamine is because you're having upside surprises, emotional upside surprises, the dopamine spikes because your expectations are starting to get beat because your predictive model is working increasingly. You know what to expect. You know how to build the community. You know where the streets are.

You know everybody in the community. So it starts to feel really comfortable. Okay, this is home. That's you have the launch point where growth feels slow. You've got the sweet spot where growth is fast and it feels fast, and then you get to this place called mastery, which is a very interesting place because what's happening here is that you figure things out. Your predictive model, it now works. It's like a computer program that you've debugged. It works, but you're no longer learning at this point. The dopamine, you're not getting

very much of it. You now have a dilemma because on the one hand, you really like being at the top of that S curve, master of all you survey. So you really like being on your mission, but you've now been there for 23 months. You really like being an expert in university, but now you're a senior. You like being an expert, but because your brain needs more dopamine, it needs to continue learning, you have a dilemma. Do you stay here and stop learning or do you jump to a new curve? One metaphor that I like to use is to think about mountain climbing. I've never climbed a mountain, but I think this metaphor is very apt. A mountain climber will tell you that any altitude above 28,000 feet is known as the death zone.

You're so high up, your brain and your body will start to die. When you are at the top of an S-curve, you're no longer learning. Your brain and your body literally start to die. And so you need to jump to the bottom of a new S-curve. And that's what the cycle of growth looks like. Now, as you think about it, you're probably seeing some parallels. What happens in the church? Every time you start to feel like, I'm really good at being a young men's teacher. I've got this. I'm a great primary teacher. Oh, so good at playing the piano in young women's. Great. Let's disrupt you. Let's go give you a brand new calling.

For me, when I think about the S curve, now, this is obviously not what I teach in a secular setting, but the inside baseball for me is that this is a way to think about eternal progression. We grow and then we plateau and then we grow some more and then we plateau and then we grow some more. That's a framework that I use to help me think through when I'm doing something new, when it feels uncomfortable, when it feels awkward, when I'm in a new city like Independence and I don't know what it looks like, I'm at the launch point of the curve and it normalizes the experience. It's very, very helpful. Back to your question about expectations, at the launch point there's a super big gap between what is and what

you thought it was going to be. Moving along an S-curve is a dopamine management exercise. The launch point, your expectations are too high and the sweet spot, they're kind of in an equilibrium and maps through, they're too low. So sometimes God gives you a new calling, says, go to a new city, go to independence because we need you to learn something new. Let me pause there for just a second and see if you have any quick observations or comments before I continue. Whitney, as I heard you explain the S-curve model, I thought of a quote that I rarely get to use, but I love it.

This is Edmund Hiller, first man to summit Mount Everest. And this is what he said, While on top of Everest, I looked across the valley towards the great peak, Makalu, I think that's its name, and mentally worked out a route and how it could be climbed. It showed me that even though I was standing on top of the world, it wasn't the end of everything. I was looking beyond to other interesting challenges. Bingo. Isn't that great? Like I got up there and I'm here.

Yeah. Okay, what's next? Yeah. And it's beautiful because growth is our default setting. Heavenly Father wired us to grow. We talk about the growth mindset, which we all have until we don't have it. But if you understand this model, it helps you do the thing that you know you're wired to do and just get through some of those places that feel a little bit bumpy.

Just yesterday, I was talking to my kids about this pattern on my mission. As soon as I felt comfortable in an area, I'd get transferred. And there would be a new challenge or a new calling that would go with it. You have articulated that that's what the Lord does on purpose. Hank, once again, you've found exactly the right person to talk about this. This disruption is here's an expectation. Not so fast, my friend. You're disrupted and it's part of a growth process. I love this. Yeah.

Whitney, can I ask you a question then about their expectation? When John gave us this tree, he's right on that they had some pretty high expectations for what this was going to look like. Then the Lord seems to, I don't think he's trying to discourage them, but maybe, guys come back to me here. If you read verse 3 you cannot behold with your natural eyes For the present time the design of your God concerning those things which will come here after and the glory which follows Yeah, good things are coming after much tribulation Is that the Lord trying to set expectations for them?

That's a great question. Their timeframe was different, right? They were saying, so God, you promised us something and we got here and I want it in the next minute. He's saying, no, you're going to get it, but I'll give you your toy in an hour. There was a big mismatch.

We're so young. In addition to thinking about this basic model, the church at that time was basically a startup organization, like a startup company. They had this grand audacious idea. It's anchored in heavenly visitations. You've had this disruptive invocation with Joseph Smith. I think about what must that feel like for us?

And I was trying to think of like a modern day Whitney example. And I think it might be something like, I've gone to the Richmond temple because that's our temple, even though we really want one here, Heavenly Father. I'm feeling the spirit and then I'm on the way home. I get in an accident. I get a speeding ticket and to top it all off, when I get home, there's dishes in the sink. It's just hard. In addition to which, I think they probably had PTSD. Lehman Copley has this vast acreage. He invites them onto their land, and then he kicks them out. Now, okay, let's put this for what does that feel like for us. Imagine that, Hank, you've invited John over to your home. Come to our home. We're going to feed you.

And in the middle of the night, you wake up his family, you throw him out of your house, probably uttering some sort of curse words, or you've got a job where a boss says, we want you to work for me. Then they fire you. They had PTSD. So not only did they have this, it wasn't what they expected and the timing that they expected. They'd had a lot of missteps or setbacks and they had PTSD. I find myself feeling a tremendous amount of compassion for them of the experience they were having and questioning. So they get there and they say, wait, wait, wait, wait, what? You told us to be here. Now this feels terrible. I was rereading Elder Packer's Candle of the Lord. Here's the quote that he says, the spiritual part of us and the emotional part of us are so closely

linked that it is possible to mistake an emotional impulse for something spiritual. I want to tie this back to the S-curve. When you're at the launch point of a curve, you are going to feel uncomfortable. So you can start to say, this isn't feeling very good. Hmm, did God really tell me to be here? Because this is feeling really uncomfortable. Maybe I shouldn't be on a mission. This feels bad. But one of the things that we have to end up sorting out is this is where our faith comes in. This feels bad. But one of the things that we have to end up sorting out is this is where our faith comes in. This is where Elder Hollens casts not away, therefore that confidence comes in is to be able to say, okay, you told me to be here. You said it's going to look like this. It feels bad

right now. So the S-curve helps you with that. But I'm going to have the faith, like you said, that eventually my eyes can't see it, but eventually it's going to be what I want it to be. How often has that happened in life? By the way, John, I'm going to invite you over soon just to see if you can experience this. Let's try that. Yeah, let's act that out. But how often does that happen in life?

This is going to be great. Then I hit a lot of difficulty. You want to think I'm going to be faithful. I'm going to see it all the way through. But you're right. All those thoughts come in. Maybe this was never right in the first place. Should I've really taken that job?

Should I've moved to that new city? Should I've really married that person? We had that spiritual confirmation. Then it gets really rough or it's not turning out the way we want. And we start to question. This framework allows you to tap into the emotional piece that's happening the neurological piece So you can tease out or disentangle the emotional with the spiritual piece That's great. I remember four years ago

We started with doctrine and covenants You can read a verse of scripture many times and not have it grab you, and then one time you read it and it grabs you. And verse three, it just grabbed me. I think this is such a great verse. You cannot behold with your natural eyes for the present time. God has designed this? I love that God has a design concerning those things which shall come hereafter. When we talked Old Testament, what does Joseph say when his brothers, he says, God meant it for good. God had a design the whole time. That's a verse that says the same thing. I look at all of the Beatitudes that just sounded like Jesus was in opposite land. Here's all these people that come to here. Well, actually,

it's not the well-off and the rich and the independent actually blessed Are the poor in spirit? They're like what? Yeah, bless her to the meek. Wait, what is he talking about? When Jesus said blessed are that's the present time for they shall be that is the hereafter Here's a present reality. Here's a future possibility That verse capsulizes those two things. Verse three has become one of my favorites in the Doctrine and Covenants because you get disrupted. Then what do you do? Yeah. And you know, it's interesting. I was thinking about what you just described, the design your God concerning those things, which have come here after. And then Elder

Rasmund's talk recently about by divine design. I thought I would share a personal experience that happened not too long ago. It's been very interesting for me because in my patriarchal blessing, I've always been taught to guard against both discouragement and disappointment. The one that I really had always focused in on was discouragement.

I was in Arizona visiting my mother. She's quite old and frail, and her life is going to end in the not too distant future. I found myself contemplating and talking to her my own mortality, which I think you do especially with your parents. I had gone to the temple and as I was sitting in the temple, I had this thought because I think sometimes when your life is about over, you can go to this place of what might have been. If this had happened, if I'd lived here, if that had happened, then things might have been different.

I had this thought, I think it was obviously a prompting from the spirit, which is that disappointment is a temptation just as much as discouragement is. When you think about the idea of appointment, so you are appointed to something, you're appointed to go somewhere, you're appointed to do something. When you disappoint it or you talk about how things should have been, then you're almost saying you're not trusting God. I have a wonderful favorite quote, Stevie Wonder, because I have to

quote Stevie Wonder, who said that you can bet your life in that and twice its double, that God knew exactly where he wanted you to be placed. I found myself as I was contemplating these verses and this experience that they were having to be willing to say, I'm not over there, but where I am is right here. I'm on the launch point of the S-curve in independence. And that in its own way, to use a bad pun, is very liberating. We have an interesting perspective here that obviously the saints then don't have. As we're

reading this, we know the next eight years for these people is going to be time after time after time of difficulty, trial, pain, disappointment. As we're reading this we're going, guys are you hearing him? There's gonna be much tribulation. I find it interesting that we almost have the point of view of the Lord here knowing the future. Mm-hmm. Which is so in some ways cavalier of us, isn't it? They're in the middle of it. It's rough. If you were to talk to them right then, they'd say, well, no, this is going to be great. You almost want to cover your eyes. No, this is going to be really hard. John and Whitney, this is a lifelong question.

Give me whatever you got here. I occasionally get asked. I'm sure you do too. Why does it have to be so hard? Why so much and the Lord seems to explain the glory which shall follow after much tribulation for after tribulation Come the blessings and he gives a list of all the great things that are going to happen anything come to mind when When a young person especially as we get older we get a little more you know what I can see the blessings that have come from hard things I've spoken of this family before John but I know a young couple with little children little daughter who has leukemia and here they are trying their best to live the gospel and raise a family and they have this happening to them you know they are faithful as can be these two,

but I can see that sometimes they would think, why does this have to be so hard? I don't have a good answer. I think about some people that I'm close to in my family because it is so hard, it is very difficult for them to have faith because they feel like God doesn't care. This is where your faith really has to anchor you and you have to make a decision. We used to live in Belmont in Massachusetts and

there was a family there. So we're sitting inside Sunday school and this man said, his name is Greg Sorensen, he said, I choose to believe. I choose it. When it comes to these situations, it is so hard. I think the only thing that we can come back to is that we get to this place where we're going to choose because we've had enough witnesses that God is there, that he does care, that there is a plan. We hang on to that with every piece of ourselves that we can, but it's still really hard. I'm wondering if there was a little boy named Jacob who had a brother named Nephi who may have said, Dad, Lehi, why does this have to be so hard? And out came 2 Nephi chapter 2, one of the greatest chapters in the book of might have joy, not 24-7. There's opposition and that joy will come. But man, that is one of the great eternal questions. And I think Joseph Smith's going to ask it in Liberty

Jail in section 121 and 22 and 23-2. One of my heroes, and John, I know she's one of yours well, is our producer, Shannon Swanson. When her husband, Steve, passed away, he's the one that is our founder. We talk about him often. Shannon and I were talking and of course, she is just devastated by this and through tears, she would tell me over and over, I trust the plan.

I trust the plan. I am heartbroken. I am hurting. I will not turn on my God. What does Nephi say, John? I know in whom I have trusted. Whitney, we have people listening who, the stories we get. A woman told us, I was listening to your show when the police told me that my daughter had been killed in a car accident. I was listening to your show because my dad took his own life and you're going, how do we help?

My younger brother, he took his life 10 years ago, a decade ago. Always believed in the resurrection. I'd always believed that there was life after death. I remember talking to his friends, most of whom are not people of faith. And this has happened on many occasions of talking to people and just looking at them and saying, I know that you don't believe that there's life after death,

but I can tell you with every part of my soul that I do, I believe that you'll see them again. So if you don't believe it right now, just hang on to what I believe. That's what I would say to the people who are listening is if they're not believing, if you're not feeling it right now, hang on to our feeling and our belief because God is there. I'm always inspired by the words of Job, though he slay me, yet will I trust in him. Yeah. I'm not there yet. I aspire to be.

Well, the next thing I thought would be interesting to talk about is verse 27 that says, Verily I say men should be anxiously engaged in a good cause and do many things of their own free will and bring to pass much righteousness." I think we all love that verse, but I did find myself reflecting on this verse, and I wanted to share a few thoughts with you. The first one is thinking about that word anxious. I came across an article not long ago in a wonderful magazine called Wayfair Magazine. Have you seen that magazine? Mm-hmm. Yeah. Oh, it's splendid.

There was an article by a man by the name of Stan Benfell, who is a professor at BYU, and he talked about anxiety, how it can be crippling when you're anxious, and I'll kind of paraphrase him here. He says, when you're struggling with anxiety, it's like a fly, right? It's always there, it's hovering, it's a thorn in the flesh.

He said, when you're experiencing anxiety, you can sometimes feel like you're a coward and a narcissist because whenever you think about doing something new, your mind starts to think about all the bad things that can happen. You're afraid. And sometimes you feel like you're a narcissist because you have such a hard time getting out of your head that you can't think about anything else. But then he made this really interesting observation that was powerful and comforting to me.

He said that the very best way to carry the cross of anxiety is to be a member of the church, to be an engaged member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And he said part of that is because in the church you have callings, like being a bishop. He was the bishop right after Matt Holland, who's now Elder Holland, and he said, I'm sure many people were disappointed when I was called, but I had a bishop. He was the bishop right after Matt Holland, who's now Elder Holland, and he said, I'm sure many people were disappointed when I was called, but I had a calling. And I felt like that idea of cast not away there for thy confidence, God had called me to do this. I'm ministering to this sister or I'm doing X, so I have a specific job to do that makes it easier for me to be anxiously engaged. Now, I know we're supposed to do many things of our own

righteousness, but I think this might fall into the category of commandments, not a few. Here's what I want you to do. But then within that lane of your calling, then I need you to go out and be anxiously engaged. Then he also said because of the anxiety, he often will rely more fully on the Lord because it gets into a situation. He's like, I don't know if I can do this. I certainly know how I have felt that way as well as dealing with anxiety. I will rely on the Lord more than I might have like, I've got this. I'm really good at this. I will pray and pray and pray and ask him to help me.

I wanted to talk a little bit about that word anxious and anxiety because I think a lot of people experience anxiety. I wanted to address that within this part of engaged. Then on the engaged part, you know, in the context of hiring people in our company, you want people who are going to surprise and delight. That's anxiously engaged. People who show up and you're like, wow, I didn't expect that. Wow, I hadn't thought of that. Wow, you did that. I think that that's a beautiful example of what anxiously engaged looks like in the workplace. And we've all been in callings with people where they went above and beyond. Those were some of my

reflections on this. And then back to what you said earlier, John, about this idea of we were made to act and not be acted upon. I believe in that firmly. The power of our agency, we oftentimes have so much learned helplessness, but the reality is that sometimes there's anxiety harder to do than it sounds like it is on the face of it. I got kind of excited when you talked about you have something to do. Hank, when you and I were in Young Men's, we had to memorize a really long theme called be prepared. And that was it. And I struggled with that for about a month and a half, finally got it.

But I love the Aaronic Priesthood quorum theme today. I'm a beloved son of God and he has a work for me to do. Even if we're just that, it's awesome. He has a work for me to do it because in there you've got purpose, you've got value, you've got affirmation. So I like that and being anxiously engaged, it may be think also of President Nelson defining it for us so simply, the greatest thing you could ever do to gather Israel, anytime you do anything that helps anyone on either side of the veil take a step toward receiving essential baptismal and temple ordinances, you are helping to gather

Israel. And it gives us something to do. And I love how simple he made that. Primary kids can understand that. It's interesting hearing you say that because this idea of anything that helps someone move along the covenant path. I've thought frequently about the work that I do. Yes, I do work and I get paid to do it, but when I oftentimes at its depth, at its core, I feel like, and I have had spiritual impressions that really what I'm trying to do is preach the gospel in a way that people can hear it. It's like meeting people where they are. In a way that they

can hear it, I like that. You're changing. You can make progress. I remember I had someone say to me a couple years ago when I was putting together the S-curve framework and thinking through this idea, a colleague said to me, Whitney, it's interesting how you make these vast intuitive leaps. Then you try to find the research that will back it up. And I thought, yeah, I make vast intuitive leaps because Heavenly Father gives me these little gifts. Here's this idea.

Here you go. I love you. And that's one of my love languages. On a side note, Whitney, when you talk about you speak mostly to secular audiences, I remember the first time I ever spoke for a business. A member of the church said, come speak for my business. I said, oh, I don't do stuff like that. They would not like me. He said, no, no, no, stuff like that. They would not like me. He said, no, no, no, this will work. Change a couple of things. You'll be great.

I was so nervous. I was so nervous. I don't think I slept the night before. I stand up and I start teaching some of the things I learned in my doctorate program. They seem to be more receptive than the Latter-day Saint audiences I had spoken to. I went to the back and I was talking to some. One woman was crying. She said, you made me cry. I'm

so sorry. I think you're right. People yearn for these principles. You teach them in different settings. They're principles that take people towards God, towards truth. Because it's a little bit of that thing of a fish doesn't recognize the water. Because we swim in these eternal principles. I think that's what it is. It's a pearl of great price we don't see. All the things that we know and feel, the orientation that we feel because of the gospel, we don't always value it.

Not in the way that someone who's never heard it before. Now when someone says, hey, we don't always value it. Not in the way that someone who's never heard it before. Now when someone says, hey, we can speak for my business. Sure. They're more thirsty for for things like this. John, I don't know where I got this. It might have been Alex Baw, but he pointed to verse 26. He talked about the word slothful. Do you remember what he said? He said there can be only one good reason God made the sloth to be an example, to be an example to us. Because if you've ever held a sloth or watched a sloth,

maybe if we ask the Lord, what does that mean? He would say, oh, I actually made one of these so you would know what not to be. Now there's gonna be someone who emails us and says, ask, actually, sloths are the greatest. So sorry if I'm offending a sloth lover out there. I'm confident that you are. I think at one point, my daughter bought a stuffed animal sloth. So just prepare. And they are adorable.

They are. They are adorable. They have to be. They hug you. They hold on to you. They wouldn't survive evolutionarily if they weren't adored. I know. Right, yeah. Someone's just gonna hold on to them and keep them safe. Slothful, slow, so slow. I can't get you to do anything. It seems early on that the Lord is helping them along,

helping them along, helping them along, but he wants them to start getting some momentum themselves. I loved what you said earlier, stay in your lane, stay in your stewardship, but move, move. The other word in here is engaged. And the only reason I key on is because I work at BYU. That's a word we talk about quite a bit. I got engaged. I got engaged. Right. I got engaged last weekend. I got engaged. The one thing I've noticed, maybe it's this way everywhere, but especially at BYU, is that engaged people are obsessed with their engagement. It's all they think about. It's all they talk about. They can't focus on anything else. And none of us did that, of course. I never did that.

I like those two comparisons. Yeah, that's good. Don't be a sloth. Remember how you were when you were engaged? That's what we want, that kind of passion. Whitney, before we move on from this point, you said learned helplessness. I'm not sure everyone at home would know what that is,

but I think it's an important point. Can we stop just for a second and you teach us about learned helplessness? I think learned helplessness happens where you're in a situation. I think oftentimes it happens when you're growing up or you're in the workplace. You try to do something and you sort of get smashed down. No, you can't do that. It doesn't make sense.

You're too big for your britches, et cetera. You get to the point where you're like, oh, I guess I can't do it. You sort of stop trying. You give up. You think, oh, it isn't possible for me to do it. You've learned to be helpless. We do see that a lot and that's why surprise and delight in the workplace is so surprising because people will say, well, I'm not happy at work. We'll do something about it. Oh, I don't know if I can because my boss might not want me to or there's not time.

And there's all this helplessness where people have completely ceded their agency and it goes against everything that we know. And yet it happens a lot. Oftentimes it happens or the root of it is because when we were very young we had lots of situations where we tried to do something and we got somehow reprimanded or discouraged from doing it and so we started to give up. I feel like I truly feel I can do nothing about this situation when actually the reality is you can do a lot but I've convinced, I've learned that I have no power.

I came by my helplessness naturally. It was a gift that I just received. You didn't have to learn it. No, I didn't have to learn it. I teach it to others now. You have a PhD and learn to help others. I teach to others. I ask them to enroll and they just won't do it. They said they don't know how. Hanks heard me talk about this before, but the day before I went to the MTC, my dad was, take the truck, go up to Kmart, get this many bags of manure, put it in the wheelbarrow, haul it into the backyard. I was out there doing that for a good part of the day. The day before, I know, shouldn't we be out

to Burger King or something celebrating or shouldn't you be buying me neckties or something? No, get out there and get to work. I don't know if that was the design of my father. to work. I don't know if that was the design of my father. I so appreciate that work ethic. I really do. And it also made me think I could get to the MTC so I could get some rest. That is so funny. Sometimes I felt like my dad just said, hey, move that railroad tie. Why? I want it over there. Just do it. Yeah. Now I think he was making me too tired to send. I think that's what it was.

That's a good strategy. Wear you out. It's a good strategy. Thanks Whitney. Thanks for walking us through that. I think it's an important thing that we might even see it in our own children, in our efforts to protect them. We might teach them that they can't act. They don't have the power to act.

What I'd love to do next is talk about Edward Partridge. Could you give a little bit of the background of like who he was, how he joined the church, what he'd been called to do, how he was struggling in his calling, including maybe even an excerpt from his letter to his wife Lydia? calling, including maybe even an excerpt from his letter to his wife, Lydia. I happen to know from previous experience that Hank loves Edward Partridge. There's people that are in the spirit world that I'm best friends with, but they just don't know it yet. They don't know it yet. Edward Partridge is one of those.

When I see him, I'm going to hug him and he's going to say, who are you? What are you doing? Edward Partridge to me is not just amazing because of the individual he is. To me, he represents a member of the church in this early period who is not as well known. He's not Brigham Young. He's not Joseph Smith. He's not Emma Smith. He's under that level, I guess you might say But he works and works and works and sacrifices and gives so does his wife Lydia if Sherrilyn Farns were here if she's listening Sherrilyn. She has done the work really on researching the partridges She wrote a great thesis on the family. It's called Fact, Fiction and Family Tradition, The Life of Edward Partridge, the first bishop

of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Edward Partridge, we've covered this in another episode, so I won't go into it as much as I want to. He is one of those early converts in the Kirtland area when the four missionaries come through on their way out west. He is basically elected by his community. He is that trustworthy to go meet Joseph Smith. They said, Edward, we trust you. Go meet him. Come back and tell us what you think. He's baptized. He's done really well in life through his own hard work as a hatter. I think he's been a member for four months and he's called as the first bishop of the church.

Every bishop out there just breathed a sigh of, oh, no manual. John, you've served as bishop. He's not only bishop like ward bishop, he's also presiding bishop. He's all of them over the temporal affairs of the church. He's part of these sets of missionaries that go to independence. How would you guys like this? Everyone else gets to go home except for a few of you. You get to stay in Missouri.

I think it was McLean Heward, Dr. Heward, who told us that Edward and Joseph got in a pretty heated argument over Zion. And you can imagine, Edward's like, I can't do this. I can't do this. And Joseph is saying, I think, you think I chose this? And they go back and forth. It ends up being okay. They end up apologizing and forgiving one another and becoming better friends.

Whitney, the letter you referred to is in saints. There's a link for it in the come follow me manual. It's a short excerpt, but I get emotional looking at it. He writes to his wife, Lydia, who thought he was going to come back from Missouri, but she's actually going to go there to live with him. He writes, I fear my station is above what I can perform to the acceptance of my Heavenly Father. Pray for me that I may not fall. Oh, he's so good. I noticed that the Lord tells him to repent of his sins. If the Lord is telling Edward Partridge to repent of his sins, what would he say to

me? Oh man, if I said should I repent of my sins, he'd be like, we don't, it does not look good, brother. Thanks for asking that, Whitney. Yeah, and that's what I wanted to pick up on because I really wanted to give my reaction to that experience that he had. And it's interesting because I've heard over the years, many people talk about getting new church callings and saying they feel like they're not up to that calling. I don't know that I've generally felt that way, except for when I was on my mission, I probably felt like I wasn't up to it. I've definitely had callings where I remember I called in the Stake Relief Society presidency and I was like, I can do it, but I don't want to

do it. So I had that experience. Also, I guess the reflection for me on this and hearing him talk about that is, so if we go back to Doctrine and Covenant section 29 verse 34, where the Lord says all things are spiritual to God or to me, and thinking about one of the things that I learned most from Clayton Christensen, people will say, what did you learn from him? And I learned many things, obviously. But one thing that really stayed with me is he did not separate the secular from the spiritual. He took his secular life to church in terms of his academic prowess and prodigiousness, but then he also wasn't afraid to bring his spiritual life into the workplace.

And that was really meaningful for me. I think I'm reacting to this right now in that letter in particular because I'm currently writing another book. I have felt very prompted to write this book, but as I look at the spiritual and personal growth that's had to take place in order for me to get to the point where I have the POV that I need to write this book, to write it in a way that I want. I feel like I am experiencing tribulation, tribulation in the sense of self-doubt. Can I really do this? Am I really up to this? So I found myself really connecting to and relating to what he said. Also the idea is that maybe God doesn't give us development opportunities through our church callings. Maybe it's through our work. But if

all things are spiritual unto God, it doesn't matter. It just matters. He's going to give you that development opportunity. All things are equal to him. Maybe it's a church, maybe it's a home, maybe it's at work, but he is going to push us and stretch us. I think that if we don't have those experiences where like, I don't know if I can do this, we're not going to be humble enough. And I remember someone said to me years ago, one of the reasons that life needs to be hard, which goes back to the question that you were asking or posing earlier, is that God loves us enough that he wants us to reach out to him. And if it's not hard, we won't. Some people are that humble,

most of us are not. So that was something that really struck for me. And then also I wanted to talk about, go to repentance, where, like you said, you said to him, repent not of his sins, which are unbelief and blindness of heart, let him take heed lest he fall. I wanted to focus on the idea of repentance for a minute. Again, back to secular versus spiritual is when I think about disruption, which I talk about frequently, this idea of personal disruption, I describe it when I'm in the workplace as a deliberate process of self-innovation. So I'll say it again.

Disruption is a deliberate process of self-innovation. So I'll say that again. Disruption is a deliberate process of self-innovation. You're choosing to rewire your brain. Yet, if you're stepping back from who you are currently into who you can be, but if you really pull it down to its studs, what is that? That's repentance. President Nelson calls it metanoeo. Am I pronouncing that correctly?

You are, are. Okay. And where he says, when Jesus asked you and me to repent, he is inviting us to change our mind, our knowledge, our spirit, even the way we breathe. So I say this in a reverent way, but I really believe that God is a fan of disruption because what he's really asking us to do when we're venting is to disrupt ourselves so that we can come closer to him. I guess one other quick idea on this, it's a little bit of a segue but still I think it's powerful for me, is I was thinking about the Prophet Joseph as a leader. One of the things that we're finding in our research is that people want to change

but they also crave stability. Like they crave stability at a ratio of 10 to 1. So we want more of that. Because of our negativity bias, we tend to focus on what isn't working. But one of the best ways to stabilize people is to bring them along, to communicate with them. Here's where we are right now. Here's where we are on the S card. Here's why we're doing this. So there's all this purpose. But one of the things that the Prophet Joseph did so beautifully, so generously, was that he was continually willing to say, oh Edward, you want to know what the Lord thinks? I'll ask him. Sydney, you want to know what the Lord thinks? I'll ask him. He was saying to

them, come along on this journey with me. Here's how God feels about you. Here's what he wants you to know so that they felt communicated with in a way that it felt stable enough and anchored enough that they could go on this grand audacious S-curve that was terrifying and thrilling all at the same time. I'll pause there and see what thoughts are coming up for you all. I've noticed Whitney in my experiences with the Lord, he really likes repentance. It seems whenever he is in scripture, that's his first topic, faith and repentance.

Then when I ask questions, I would like to know this big answer and this big answer. I usually get something like this back. I love that question. Can we focus in on repentance for just a little while? If disruption is repentance, I'm right with you. The Lord is a fan. What was the definition again? It's a deliberate process of self-innovation.

Right. I'm in a comfortable place. Hey, I'm going to sit here for a little while and then no, let me reflect. Let me look in what's possible in me. What can I do differently? God will tell you really gently, super gentle. Yeah. Wow. And it's both scary and wonderful. And sometimes when the Lord is telling me I need to repent, no, he means repent in a more stop doing that, stop thinking that way. But I still can't get off the idea of why does life have to be so hard. And if don't mind can I quote Elder Holland here? It's allowed on our show. It's allowed on our show. He expanded on something that Elder Maxwell had said. He said, with apologies to Elder Neil A. Maxwell for daring to modify

and enlarge something he once said, I too suggest that, quote, one's life cannot be both faith-filled and stress-free, it simply will not work to glide naively through life, saying as we sip another glass of lemonade, Lord, give me all thy choicest virtues, but be certain not to give me grief, nor sorrow, nor pain, nor opposition. Please do not let anyone dislike me or betray me,

and above all, do not ever let me feel forsaken by thee or those who I love. In fact, Lord, be careful to keep me from all the experiences that made thee divine and then when the rough sledding by everyone else is over, please let me come and dwell with thee where I can boast about how similar our strengths and characters are as I float along on my cloud of comfortable Christianity. So good. So that's from a talk called waiting on the Lord. Was that 2021, Hank? I think that was during COVID. I love that because I remember hearing him say that and thinking it was helpful because I think about, let's go back to Emma Smith for a second. How would I feel if I were in the celestial kingdom, which I want to be.

And she's there. And I hadn't had experiences that tested me as much as possible. I think we would be embarrassed. Like we shouldn't be here. Yeah. Wow. Whitney, can I ask you a disruption question? Sure. Later when the Lord speaks of repentance in verses 42 and 43, I wonder if I'm seeing some

parallels with what you've been saying. Behold, he who is repented of his sins, the same is forgiven and I the Lord remember them no more. I like that idea of disruption. Move forward. We don't have to hang on to the past. Let's move forward. Then this one. By this she may know if a man or woman are pence of their sins, they will confess them and forsake them. In disruption, is it the idea of I finally confess, I finally see and acknowledge I can do better, I can be different? And then the bravery, I guess, to leave the comfortable place and forsake it? It's total bravery. If you want to go back to the idea of an S-curve, when you're disrupting yourself,

you're basically at the top of an S-curve. Because when we talk about an S-curve, I was talking about in the context of growth, but you can be on an S-curve where you're super comfortable. It may not be a good S-curve, but you're comfortable. So when you disrupt yourself, you are jumping to a bottom of a new s-curve in freefall. Yeah, that's super uncomfortable for sure. Another thing that I find myself frequently saying is the price of a new and better self is your old self. Remembering that that old self served you. It served you and it's who you are giving away that old self, jumping to a new S curve. That is scary and it is painful to give up that old self to be a different person. The price of a new self

is your old self. Is your old self. I like what you said too about confess. When I read confess I was like, and I go tell everybody what I did. And sometimes that's appropriate, but sometimes it's not. I like how you describe that as confess may just be, I see it. I struggle too. I acknowledge it. I'm aware of it. I accept that I'm in this place. So good.

Coming up in part two of this episode. I'll give a keynote. It's like 45 or 50 minutes. And when I finish with the keynote, or during the course of the keynote, I'll talk about using I am statements to help people change. I'll say this offhandedly. You know, it's notable to me that Christ, whose name was I Am, those words have tremendous creative power. So when you say I Am, you're invoking this creative power.