Entering Orbit

I have been thinking lately about transitions. I was talking with a really good friend about how transitional periods are so rough--you feel like you are in limbo and aren't sure what to do or what plans to make. Then as we kept talking I realized that life is one great big transitional period between pre-earth life and post-earth life. Like President Packer says we are in Act 2. And yet I also realized that the very fact that we feel so battered and unstable in transitional periods is because we are usually in the initial stages of entering a new sphere or orbit in our lives.

I have always been fascinated with space travel and have a very small hobby pretending to understand astro-physics and mechanics. As an astronaut will tell you, entering orbit is not a pleasant experience. There is a lot of friction, pressure, heat, and shaking going on before they enter their next sphere: earth. As we feel pressure, and heat, and friction and a whole lot of shaking, would it not make sense that those very actions are preparing us and changing us so that we can function in the next sphere? If we are going in the right direction it would seem that we would feel some resistance from adversarial forces that don't want us to keep progressing. My very naive understanding of Newton's Third Law is that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. We are in motion and we are going in the right direction, but there is always something that will resist. So maybe instead of freaking out we should accept that we are going to have a bumpy ride and find comfort in the fact that we must be doing something right. :) Here are some other thoughts that build on these mind meanderings of mine:

"You were taught and prepared for the circumstances you would personally encounter in mortality. . . .Your memory of premortal life would be kept from you to show you how to live. Our Father's plan for salvation in this life with the opportunity of returning to Him would be called the gospel of Jesus Christ." (Elder Scott "Truth Restored" Ensign Nov. 2005)

"In the premortal council at which we were all present, [Jesus Christ] accepted our Father's great plan of happiness for His children and was chosen by the Father to give effect to that plan. He led the forces of good against those of Satan and his followers in a battle for the souls of men that began before this world was formed. That conflict continues today. We were all on the side of Jesus then. We are on the side of Jesus today." (emphasis added, Elder Wirthlin "Christians in Belief and Action," Ensign, Nov. 1996, 71)

"If we look at mortality as the whole existence, then pain, sorrow, failure, and short life would be calamity. But if we look upon life as an eternal thing stretching far into premortal past and on into the eternal post-death future, then all happenings may be put in proper perspective." (Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Spencer W. Kimball, 15).