Emma: The Pressure of Expectation in LDS Culture

Emma says she was raised by “nearly perfect parents,” which became both a sort of stepping stone and a stumbling block as she reached adolescence. This podcast interview contains a candid discussion about the dangers of cultural expectations in the LDS faith, especially for adolescents. With beautiful insight, Emma tells her story of how learning to navigate through the difficult years leading up to her mission helped her deal with even more difficult challenges on her mission. She talks about how the lessons she learned about how to deal with cultural pressures helped her distinguish between God’s expectations and cultural ones. Ultimately, the tensions she faced helped her recognize how to use the Atonement of Jesus Christ in order to close the gap between the ideal and the real.

Further Reading in Faith Is Not Blind:

“Working through … opposition is the only way to develop authentic, well-tested spiritual maturity. That is why John Milton couldn’t ‘prize a cloistered virtue’—a virtue that ‘never sees her adversary.’ True faith is not blind, or deaf, or dumb. Rather, true faith sees, and overcomes, her adversary.”

(Faith Is Not Blind, Chapter 1, “Faith Is Not Blind. Or Deaf. Or Dumb,” p. 6)