While telling her story, she told us that after she was found, her mother gave her the best advice she had ever been given before. Her mother told her that these people had taken 9 months of her life away that she will never get back and "the best punishment you can give him is to be happy". She understood that by re-living the 9 months over and over and constantly worrying and thinking about it is still giving her captors time of her life she will never get back.
This advice is so applicable in everybody's lives, not just for her situation. Satan is in our world and he is trying to get us to follow him. And sometimes we do, because we are not perfect. But we cannot let that stop us from progressing. We have to move on. And just like for Elizabeth Smart's captors, the best punishment we can give Satan is being happy.
Satan wants anything but happiness for us. So when he sees that we are happy and moved on from past mistakes, it kills him. This is a strength for us to defeat him. We will mess up. It's part of life. But the Atonement allows us to repent and move on. And when we repent we have the spirit with us, so naturally we will become happier.
It is most likely that everyone isn't going to have the same experience as Elizabeth Smart, but we all have our struggles and battles and problems and trials. We all feel like we can't move on. We all feel like we want to give up at times. But I promise you that those words are coming from the devil. Our Heavenly Father believes in us and He knows what potential we have. He has provided us a way to find the ultimate happiness in life!
We are in a constant battle against Satan. But we have the resources to defeat him. In the end, we will win! Show him how happy we are in our life.
I know this says 'woman', but this applies to everyone! We don't want Satan to have power over us!
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