hello everyone welcome to follow him favorites This Year John and I are going through the Old Testament looking at a specific question from each week's lesson so John this week we are in the Book of Joshua and we hear over and over in this book The Lord saying to Joshua be of good courage meaning don't get discouraged don't get discouraged but as as life continues I've noticed that's easier said than done sometimes to not get discouraged so John R follow him question this week is how do you keep from getting discouraged how do you do what the Lord has asked and be of good courage John Europe you're a pretty positive guy I've known you for a long time and you're positive and you don't seem discouraged all that often how do you do it good acting when they think that well during the time when Gordon B Hinckley was the president of the church Sherry do said something once liked if you're ever around present Hinckley a lot and she was cuz she wrote his
 biography you will hear him say things will work out and then I found a statement in the church news where president inkley said things will work out he said I say that to myself every morning and I started to think about what it might feel like the weight on your shoulders to be the president of the church that what is it the present of church says to himself every morning he says things will work out and that kind of long-term first principle faith in the Lord Jesus Christ things will work out that helps me cuz sometimes instead of saying oh no things won't work out it's more like this is tough right now what can I learn what is the Lord trying to teach me who can I help that helps me and just remember president Hinckley that I just love so much things will work out things will work out so keep going I don't know if that if that helps or not but it did help me for sure. The gospel is optimistic we hear the Savior over and over in the New Testament be of good cheer.
 good cheer almost as if it's a commandment to choose to be of good cheer even to the fact that Jesus said let not your heart be troubled neither Let It Be Afraid wasn't that the very night that is suffering would begin that whole week and for him to say don't be troubled don't be afraid I've overcome the world and it wrote we really do have to take a Long View and when we do things will work out I wrote a book on happiness it's sold dozens of copies mostly to my mom but I learned quite a bit about happiness didn't you write a book called How to be totally miserable we should sell those is a package deal that's so funny you're always telling teens do this do that I tell why don't we just say We'll okay don't be miserable and that was where I got that idea it's sold I think four copies I bought two of those John they were they were really able to focus on is actually what your brain will start to see when I was looking at a specific carded to buy ice
 I've seen that car everywhere when I decided you know I'm not going to buy that car it went away. I don't see that car is often so we may be thinking nothing good is happening around me nothing positive it's happening around me but you can actually train your brain to start to highlight those and you'll see them more and more and more you can do what's called like a gratitude Journal where you try to keep track of things that you're grateful for things that make your day better and all the sudden you'll start to highlight those I remember general conference talk that have an impact on my life was Elder Bednar it's The Tender Mercies of the Lord and he said to start to look for those and those have really impacted my ability to not get discouraged because we know who's on our side I didn't Elder Stevenson say you have the savior of the world on your he loves you no matter what you've done you love you how can you fail so I like what you said they're John about present Hinckley he focuses on who's in charge faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and if we really believe
 but he is mighty to save and that our world is in very loving Shore Hands then I think we can't I think we can follow this commitment to be of good courage or it's going to work out going to be okay he'll help us find a message in our misfortunes to which will go through something hard and it will say you know I'm glad I went through that because I learned this this this and and almost always when you hear people give a talk it was something hard that they went through and how much they grew our learn from it at that is so such a common Seaman all these scriptures we've been studying to here's a hardship but here's what we learn from it and that doesn't mean we don't have the right to feel I don't want anyone thinking o that means I've got to put a permanent smile on my face it doesn't you know you can have bad days you can have bad months or bad week but Dairy should be wilder Scott said those bad times are against a backdrop of a happy life so they're they're not the scenes themselves they're not the focus of my everything that happens to
 but they aren't I can have bad times but the backdrop itself is a is a overall happytime yeah I like that we hope you'll join us on our full podcast it's called follow him we're going to talk more about this how to not get discouraged in what Joshua does throughout his life so we hope you'll join us there and of course join us next week for another follow him favorites