On Anger and Getting Older ~ By Angela C.

I recently experienced the last day of my 20s.

I wanted to make sure my day was full of things that were of value to me in my 20s that I wanted to continue to place value in as I entered a new decade of life. The day consisted of scripture study, journaling, yoga, and service. It also felt really important to make it to the temple, but for whatever reason I made it there much later than I had planned.

As I was walking in, I saw a couple, who I assumed were not members because of how they were dressed and the fact that they weren’t carrying temple bags. The gentleman half of this couple was very apparently angry.

“Are you a member of this church?” he vehemently asked me.

“Yes,” I responded.

“Can you tell me why they won’t let me in? We are Catholics. Devout Catholics. I’ve been all over the world and visited temples, mosques, churches and cathedrals. And every religion lets me in to their houses of worship to see what they do. You will not. Why?”

I began explaining that things in the temple were very sacred, the recommend process, etc. But nothing stuck. He was too angry. I directed him to the missionaries sitting across the parking lot, but he was too mad and said he was in too much of a rush to talk to them. We were able to strike up a little bit of a conversation over some common ground (they were from the same place I served my mission), but he was still angry that he couldn’t go into the temple and kept repeating his same arguments.

It was hard not to think about this man even once I was in the temple. The more I thought it was interesting and sad that his anger from something he felt was only fair that he participate in was actually keeping him from (many steps down the road) participating in that thing. He could have listened to what the missionaries had to say, he may have found it of value. He could have gone home and listened to more missionaries. He could have made covenants that lead him into the beautiful building that at that moment he could only admire from the outside.

But instead he walked away from all of that because his anger kept him from understanding.  My thoughts quickly turned inward, at the anger I had experienced—at God—during the last year of my 20s.

After two years of trying for our first baby, my husband and I found out a few months ago that the process was going to be much more involved and much more expensive for us than for most people. It was a major loss for me. A loss that needed to be grieved. And with grief comes anger (and denial and bargaining, and all of that other fun stuff… but I had been stuck on anger for a little too long). I was angry about not being able to be part of something that I thought it only fair for me to be a part of. I was angry because I couldn’t understand how everyone around me was entering the “big beautiful white building” of motherhood, but I had to take extra steps to get there.

But I’ve realized that anger doesn’t serve me.

In fact, just like that gentleman outside of the temple, it may be getting in the way of what I want most.

Anger is a completely valid, understandable response to hurtful things. And it’s okay that I felt angry. It’s okay that the gentleman outside of the temple was angry. But holding on to that anger does not serve either of us.

My greatest goal in life, and part of why I want to be a mother so badly is that I want to be an instrument in the Lord’s hands.

There was a woman I met on my mission who one day in Relief Society compared that same desire to a favorite cup that you always pluck first if you see it in the cupboard. She said “I want to be the Lord’s favorite cup.” (Of course, cup in Spanish also means vessel so it was slightly more poetic.)

I want to be the Lord’s favorite cup. I want him to always choose me for important things that I’m capable of. I want him to fill me living water daily.

And he can’t do that if I’m angry.

It can’t happen if I’m preoccupied with sadness. It can’t happen if I spend all my time contemplating my trials or why I can’t “go in the building.”

But I’ve noticed that as I exercise humility, the Lord gives me opportunities to serve—to nurture and care for His children.

So I decided to leave that anger—that doesn’t serve me—in my twenties, and to fill my thirties with service.