Musings, Miracles, & Mayhem: Parable of the Bread

I decided to make some bread and pizza crust today. Everything was going fine--ground my wheat, quinoa, buckwheat and spelt. Put my other ingredients in my mixer with the freshly ground flour and began to let it mix.

It's about a 1 1/2 hour process--start to finish. This is how my bread usually looks. It's whole wheat with other grains and apparently that type of bread is prone to cracking, but I assure you, it is delicious and moist and healthy! I'm working on the aesthetics.

Here's where the problems started tonight:

I had 3 young observing children sitting on my counter--a major distraction.

I added wheat too hastily, so I had to rectify this by adding more water. A lot more.

After I about had it right, I realized I forgot a really important ingredient: salt. Uh-oh. )Salt helps to control the yeast, not to mention, add flavor. Pretty key in this recipe.)

I added some more water with partially dissolved salt to it, and then had to add more wheat. I soon discovered that I had added too much water from the previous mistake. So I kept adding flour.

Because of the amounts I was adding, I figured that I needed more honey and oil.

Can you tell this was becoming a disaster? I had made so many mistakes in my recipe.

I thought about trashing it and starting over, but I kept working with the dough to make it work. I ended up baking it, and it turned out fine (mostly) though it tasted slightly different, but definitely still edible. Because of all the extra water and wheat, I ended up with an extra loaf of bread and a really large pizza--luckily, there's 8 people in my family to eat up the extra.

I realized how much of this relates to life. We venture out to accomplish something, or are simply trying to make it through today, and so many things go wrong. We make a lot of mistakes. Thankfully, we can start over or we can fix the mistakes we've made. Obviously, as with the bread, it would have been better to not make the mistake in the first place. You may be filled with regret, guilt and sorrow, but you may turn it all into happiness, peace, joy and learning.

How often are we distracted by the world?
How many times do we forget to do something really important (like add a key ingredient, perhaps)?
Do we over compensate in another area in our life to make up for something lacking, only to have to go back and fix the original problem (my water and wheat)?

No matter what we've done wrong, there is ALWAYS a way to rectify it. An apology, a change of direction, a change of heart and healing through the Atonement. Sometimes, you may need a complete do-over; other times, you just need to fix what you've started. It is NEVER too late to change, and you have never gone too far to repent.

"However late you think you are, however many chances you think you have missed, however many mistakes you feel you have made or talents you think you don't have, or however far from home and family and God you feel you have traveled, I testify that you have NOT traveled beyond the reach of divine love. It is not possible for you to sink lower that the infinite light of Christ's Atonement." -Jeffrey R. Holland

I LOVE this quote. I think it is perfect. Have faith and keep becoming better every day. It's a process, not an event. Here's another quote to illustrate my point:

"Seek heavenly guidance one day at a time. Life by the yard is hard; by the inch — it's a cinch. Each of us can be true for just one day — and then one more, and then one more after that, until we've lived a lifetime guided by the Spirit, a lifetime close to the Lord, a lifetime of good deeds and righteousness." -President Thomas S. Monson