The Cost of Winning

3 days without a wife.

Well, I don't mean to steal any NYC thunder by making a post and everyone is excited to see Melissa's new NYC post but thought I'd make a post anyway.

First can I say I have such an awesome wife? I've always known that but now that she is gone I didn't realize how much I need her and how much she has changed my life for the better. (Do I hear a Wicked Musical song in the background?) Anyway I know some people think its dumb to (in sacrament meeting or on a blog) to let everyone know how much their spouse means to them but I want everyone to know how much I love my wife.

I really wanted to share with everyone this book I read. I've actually read it three times it is so good. It is a quick read and it has really changed my life.

It is called "The Cost of Winning: Coming in first across the wrong finish line"


It is written by Dean Hughes, husband of Sister Kathy Hughes, former General Relief Society President. He is an English Professor at BYU. I taught him and his wife (or they taught me) at the MTC when I taught Senior Couples when they went on their mission after she was released.

I won't give away too much of the book but basically it was written mostly to the LDS population about how to differentiate between "Mormonism and Christianity" and how both of them are good but that we sometimes lose the focus of being Christians by being Mormons and putting programs before people.

The title speaks volumes about how we race to be the best mom, the perfect spouse, the best gospel doctrine teacher, the best bishop (or aspire to be one) and how we "have" to do a billion things and lead these crazy lives to be the "best we can be!" at the cost of being better than others. What I love the most is how he shares how he learned these things the hard way and went through these things himself which makes it very non judgmental and very far from being "holier than thou"

I've probably given too much away already (even though you have to read the examples he uses) but my favorite chapter is called. "Looking Good vs. Being Good" He uses the example of people getting up in testimony meeting and share only their good experiences and the best part of themselves and we all sit in the audience and think we aren't as good as that person and get depressed about our imperfections when in reality they have just as many imperfections. It is very easy to get caught up in not necessarily in what the Jones have in our culture but what the Jones do. He teaches us that what matters most is who we are and not what people think of us or think we are.

Anyway that is just the tip of the iceberg of this awesome book. You could easily read it in a day and it is a book that has been very life changing for me and felt it was important to share with the people that I love and care about.

I would be more than happy to let anyone borrow it anytime or you can buy it on Amazon. I think its around ten buck (7 bucks plus 3 or 4 for S&H) Make sure you click for the other prices through Amazon otherwise they sell it for 18.