The Law of the Harvest

Last week I talked about preparing, acting, and avoiding. I mentioned that in my experience, actions are driven by our emotions. But while emotions cause our actions, what causes our emotions?  Before we get too deep into cause and effect, an anecdote from Stephen Hawking's "A Brief History of Time":

A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the center of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy. At the end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said: "What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise." The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, "What is the tortoise standing on?" "You're very clever, young man, very clever," said the old lady. "But it's turtles all the way down!"

Sometimes we can get ourselves stuck when thinking about cause and effect, but bear with me a moment and we'll try to unsnarl it.  I'm pretty sure it's not actually turtles all the way down.

I would contend that emotions are the effect of something else.  Our inability to control, generate, or choose them is one of their defining characteristics.  How many times have we heard phrases like "I got so mad, I just couldn't help it!"  "I want to love him back, but I just don't feel it."  Phrases like these give us a clue: emotions drive our actions, and we cannot choose them.

Why can't we choose them?  The simple truth to that question is that we live in a world with actual cause and effect.  We live by the law of the harvest.  You reap what you sow.  "By the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat thy bread all the days of thy life."  "He that is idle shall not eat the bread or wear the garment of the laborer."  "Look unto me in all thy thoughts, doubt not, fear not".  It really is the simple truth that when we take the first step on a road, we have taken the last.  Satan's greatest lie is to try and convince us that we can somehow separate cause and effect; that we can be happy in sin.

This can never be true.

It is therefore axiomatic that cause and effect are inextricably linked.  It is easy to see that our emotions are consequences of our choices, and that we can choose our emotions by choosing the proper causes.  "If ye are prepared, ye shall not fear."  The emotion of peace and freedom from fear is a direct result of preparation.  You can't choose peace, but you can choose to prepare against the coming storm, and peace is the what you will reap.

The first step in finding happiness in this life is to understand that there is a path that leads there, and that we can walk that path by following the Lord's commandments.  Truly, His grace is sufficient for all men.

To summarize:  If we are displeased with any action in our life we can trace that action to an emotion, and that emotion to a thought or behavior that caused us to reap that emotion, generating the action in question.

We walked through these thoughts for a specific reason: I seek to build the case that addiction can be healed and man can walk this earth free from its shackles through the atonement of Christ.  I have done this.  I am living this.  I want to help my brother and my sister.  Walk with me, if you will, and let us see if we can find this freedom together.