One of our grandsons is learning to drive. He has a learner’s permit and needs to accumulate practice hours before he can get his license. I’ve had the opportunity to ride along with him several times. On one outing, I asked him where his confidence level is on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being great confidence. He said that he is at a five. We took the time to drive to a small town about 35 miles east of our city. The trip includef residential streets, some freeway, and some highway. He did well. It wasn’t his first time on a freeway but it was the longest stretch of freeway and the longest trip we’ve done together. At the end I asked about his confidence level. He said he was now at a seven.
How often do we lack confidence learning something new? How many miles or how many experiences will it take to increase our confidence? How often do we lack confidence because we fear failure or we fear that we won’t do something perfectly? What will help us to keep moving forward?
We see babies when they begin to walk. At first, they pull themselves up next to a chair or a couch and kind of walk along and hold on. Oftentimes, parents encourage them to take a few steps unsupported and to walk toward the parent. When the child falls, they get right back up and try again. Pretty soon, they have “graduated” from infant to toddler and are walking everywhere! [WARNING: Move everything that is fragile out of their reach!]
What can we do to be more resilient like a child? Keep on getting up! Keep on driving! Keep on learning and progressing and growing. Sometimes we might fail. How can we turn that into a learning experience? How can that build our confidence? World famous basketball player Michael Jordan did not make his 9th grade basketball team. He did not give up, he did not quit. He kept learning and growing and became a superstar professional basketball player!
We may not all become superstars, but we can keep gaining confidence, growing and progressing. We can give ourselves credit for the things we’ve done well in the past and build on that. We can always give thanks to the Lord for His help and for the opportunities given to us.
One of our early prophets, President Heber J. Grant was a model of persistence. As a boy, he worked hard to be able to throw a baseball. He worked to improve his grammar and his penmanship. At age 43, he started lessons to be able to sing. President Grant often quoted the following statement, which is sometimes attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson: “That which we persist in doing becomes easier for us to do—not that the nature of the thing is changed, but that our power to do is increased.”
President Dieter F. Uchtdorf taught: “You might spend years acquiring a skill or developing a talent. You might work so hard that it becomes second nature to you. But if you think that means you can stop practicing and studying, you’ll gradually lose the knowledge and abilities you once acquired at great cost. This applies to skills like learning a language, playing a musical instrument, and flying an airliner. It also applies to becoming a disciple of Christ.”
President Uchtdorf continues: “Faith in Jesus Christ is a gift, but receiving it is a conscious choice that requires a commitment of all our “might, mind and strength.” It is a practice of every day. Every hour. It takes constant learning and determined commitment. Our faith, which is our loyalty to the Savior, becomes stronger as it is tested against the opposition we face here in mortality. It endures because we keep nourishing it, we keep actively applying it, and we never give up.” As our faith grows, our confidence grows.
President Uchtdorf reminds us “… that our efforts alone cannot make us celestial. But they can make us loyal and committed to Jesus the Christ, and He can make us celestial.”
“Because of our beloved Savior, there is no such thing as a no-win scenario. If we place our hope and faith in Him, our victory is assured. He promises us access to His strength, His power, His abundant grace. Step by step, little by little, we will grow ever closer to that great and perfect day when we will live with Him and our loved ones in eternal glory.”
May the Lord bless us to continue in faith and to grow in confidence as we strive toward our celestial destination.
1Teachings of Presidents of the Church: Heber J. Grant, chapter 4 Persistence, retrieved January 24, 2026 from
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/manual/teachings-heber-j-grant?lang=eng.
2 Uchtdorf, Dieter, Do Your Part with All Your Heart, General Conference, October 2025.
