Somewhere, sometime in my younger days I had a lesson on talents.  I can’t remember the exact setting.  I might have been in the end of my Young Women’s era or in the first days of my institute years.  It was, however, definitely a church-oriented message.  The gist of it entailed me praying earnestly for the gift or talent I most wanted in life.

We all have certain gifts already given to us.  But if we apply ourselves and pray with pure sincerity, we can acquire more talents.  I took it to heart.  I came home, knelt by my bed and prayed one of the most heartfelt prayers I have ever uttered.

What did I pray for?

Charity would have been awesome!  I’d love to have the pure love of Christ freely flowing inside me. How I’d like to be a “right action at the right time” type of woman.  We have all seen an example, I’m sure,  of a person who instinctively reaches out to someone with compassion.  The nurturers of the world who can help heal a heart as easily as a scrapped knee.  I know people like this.  I’m a little envious of their gift.  Which I guess means I still have a lot of work to do before I attain it.

Charity would have been an awesome gift to pray for.  But I didn’t.

Ever know somebody who listens?  I mean, actually, truly listens?  To be the type of person who everyone else congregates to for a non-judgmental ally or a shoulder to cry on would be sweet.  I always dreamed of having an open-door policy for my home.  To have the kind of place people just like hanging out in.  Instead, I lock my door using every lock available.  Locked doors doesn’t exactly give off an open-door vibe.

Listening would have been a great choice to pray for.  But I didn’t.

Discipline sure would be nice to rely on.  I have so many projects up in the air that will never touch the ground.  A stack of books sit on my nightstand waiting to be read.  I’d like to blame Facebook.  Or television.  But I don’t think that will fly.  Too bad laziness isn’t a worthwhile attribute because I have that in spades.

Probably should have prayed for discipline.  But I didn’t feel like it.

The gift of discernment would come in handy these days.  To be able to recognize the difference between a wise choice and a poor choice – before I actually choose.  It would be nice to learn the easy way on a few things instead of always taking the hard way.

Did I pray for discernment?  I didn’t even know what that word meant at that age.  So, I did not.

What can I say about the gift of wisdom? Um… Nope, didn’t pray for that either.

Knowledge? Why would an eighteen year old need to pray for knowledge?

Faith? Really wish I would have known this was an option.

So, what did I pray for all those years ago?  I prayed with an intense focus on receiving the gift of humor.  For some reason, and I can’t quite remember what it was now, but I thought humor would be the most important talent to have.  To make other people laugh.  To be able to laugh.  That was it.  I wanted people to think I’m funny.  That would be the highest compliment anyone could pay me. (insert deep sigh here)

Keep in mind I prayed for this 20 years ago.  Twenty years is a lifetime.  The prayer was uttered by a very naïve girl with little experience in the world.

Thinking about it now, I’m not sure why I couldn’t pray for more than one gift.  Maybe I thought that would make me greedy.  Or maybe, I just thought humor would compensate for everything else.

Silly, little girl!