Rockstar Advertisements

These are the advertisements that I created for my Communications 230 class at Brigham Young University. My group's product was Rockstar Energy Drinks and our objective was to diversify Rockstar from the other types of energy drinks.

English Blog Assessment

 This semester at Brigham Young, I've had the opportunity to attend a Freshmen English class. In this class, I was asked to make a blog and post periodically. I've greatly enjoyed the assignment and have used it as a way to share some of my feelings. It has helped me to realize my thoughts and share them with others.

If I had the chance, I'd do it again. In fact, I'll keep this blog going and continue to build a portfolio.

It's a Beautiful Life.

 I'm sitting here in the CougarEat listening to a jazz band play Christmas songs while I eat a scrumptious Turkey sandwich. How could life get any better?

I think most times I fail to sit back and "smell the roses." I have such a blessed life and I should be happy all the time.

Procrastination

Procrastination is the name of the game.


Although we may think we're keeping up during the semester, we fail to realize the work load that comes at the end.

With projects, papers, and finals, as University students, we find ourselves over whelmed at the end of the semester. Even the best of students aren't perfect at doing their work beforehand, because throughout the semester, we had a constant pace of work. Not anymore. The time has come for the overhaul.

The time has come for Finals.

Sorry, I don't have much time for this post. I need to go finish a project...

Philmont Finished

            The breeze swept my face lightly on that mild summer day, as we continued the gruesome hike across the New Mexican mountains. The day was a beautiful one, garnished by birds chirping and the sounds of authentic wildlife. A ninety mile hike had never seemed so hard, and yet so peaceful. Fortunately, water bottles were available and none of us were deathly ill, yet.

Our scout troop from San Antonio, Texas had decided two years earlier to go to Philmont High Adventure Camp. We had prepared over those two years for a two week hiking extravaganza that would soon kick our butts. Averaging 7.5 miles with a 40 pound backpack would prove a lot harder than it seemed.

             In our troop, there were 5 scouts and 3 leaders that attended, all ranging in ability and athleticism. Some were marathon runners while others played the trumpet. One was a weight lifter while another was an accountant. From San Antonio to Philmont, we drove from 700 to 10,000 feet above sea level in elevation. Altitude sickness would be a key player in the trek.

“Bishop, I’m not feeling too good,” is never a phrase that a boy wants to hear from his father, especially at the beginning of a 90 mile hiking adventure. I sat by idly and listened as my Dad and my bishop who happened to be a physician spoke. Mumbles came, and at the end, I heard the words “altitude sickness.” My father suffered the whole trek with a sickness that couldn’t be cured. One day ended up especially bad.

            We had been hiking since five a.m. and now it was noon. The Sun was beating down and one of the scouts had wimped out, refusing to go any further with his backpack, so the rest of us split up his stuff and carried his pack for him. The steep incline of the mountain had seemed especially difficult this day, as we had no downward hike. Brandon and Marshall had gone ahead, leaving me about 100 yards back and the rest of them close behind. The water supply had been exhausted and we found ourselves in a bit of a tight spot. I was all alone, walking and thinking of girls left at home. Time seemed to stand still as I reflected on my sixteen year old life...

               ...Where were the others? Reality set in as I found myself completely alone. Looking up and down the path, I could see no one. I couldn’t catch up to Brandon and Marshall, so I decided to backtrack down the mountain to find the others. After about ten minutes of descending, I found them. They were towards the side of the path with what looked like a tarp covering one of them. As I walked closer, I found that my dad was on the ground under the tarp. His eyes were closed and I knew something was wrong.

                “What happened to my Dad,” I asked with a trembling voice. Bishop Parsons spoke up, “he is... well...” My mind raced for the worst. Had something tragic happened? Was he still alive? Reality set in as the bishop finished his sentence.

                “He is resting from the altitude sickness, but we are severely out of water. Do you have any?” My mind raced as I thought about my primary water supply. “I don’t have much, but you can have it.” The few ounces I had left ended up moistening my father’s dry and chapped mouth. (Later that night, upon looking through my backpack, I would find two unopened nalgene bottles full of water.) After waiting by his side for what seemed like at least an hour, the other leader suggested we wake my Dad and move on.

                We started up the mountain and were met by Marshall and Brandon, who had turned back when the lack of our presence was noticed. By this point, I was carrying my backpack with that other kid’s stuff and most of my father’s pack. I was downtrodden and weak. I felt close to fainting and couldn’t have continued, had it not been for Brandon.

“Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Brandon had come back for us and showed his compassion by taking most of my load. He had literally lifted my burdens. I no longer had to imagine an application to that scripture, but had an actual experience.

               Brandon had been my personal Saviour on the mount. I came to love both him and my Messiah a lot more that day as Brandon delivered water to my father. Brandon had shown a Christlike love that I will never forget. My father recovered and the day was saved. Peaceful times came once again to Philmont.

Family and Philmont

 This is my unfinished personal narrative.

    The breeze lightly swept my face on that mild summer day, as we continued the gruesome hike across the New Mexican mountains. The day was a beautiful one, garnished by birds chirping and the sounds of authentic wildlife. A ninety mile hike had never seemed so hard, and yet so peaceful. Fortunately, water bottles were available and none of us were deathly ill, yet.
    Our scout troop from San Antonio, Texas had decided two years earlier to go to Philmont High Adventure Camp. We had prepared over those two years for a two week hiking extravaganza that would soon kick our butts. Averaging 7.5 miles with a 40 pound backpack would prove a lot harder than it seemed.
    In our troop, there were 5 scouts that attended and 3 leaders, all ranging in abilities and athleticism. Some were marathon runners while others played the trumpet. One was a weight lifter while another was an accountant. From San Antonio to Philmont, we drove from 700 to 10,000 feet above sea level in elevation. Altitude sickness would be a key player in the trek.
    “Bishop, I’m not feeling too good,” is never what a boy wants to hear from his father, especially at the beginning of a 90 mile hiking adventure. I idly sat by and listened as my Dad and my bishop who happened to be a physician spoke. Mumbles came, and at the end, I heard the words “altitude sickness.” My father suffered the whole trek with a sickness that couldn’t be cured. One day ended up especially bad.
    We had been hiking since five a.m. and now it was noon. The Sun was beating down and one of the scouts had wimped out, refusing to go any further with his backpack, so the rest of us split up his stuff and carried his pack for him. The steep incline of the mountain had seemed especially difficult this day, as we had no downward hike. Brandon and Marshall had gone ahead, leaving me about 100 yards back and the rest of them close behind. The water supply had been exhausted and we found ourselves in a bit of a tight spot. I was all alone, walking and thinking of girls left at home. Time seemed to stand still as I reflected on my sixteen year old life...
    ...Where were the others? Reality set in as I found myself completely alone. Looking up and down the path, I could see no one. I couldn’t catch up to Brandon and Marshall, so I decided to backtrack down the mountain to find the others. After about ten minutes of descending, I found them. They were towards the side of the path with what looked like a tarp covering one of them. As I walked closer, I found that my dad was on the ground under the tarp. His eyes were closed and I knew something was wrong.
    “What happened to my Dad,” I asked with a trembling voice. Bishop Parsons spoke up, “he is... well...” My mind raced for the worst. Had something tragic happened? Was he still alive? Reality set in as the bishop finished his sentence.
    “He is resting from the altitude sickness, but we are severely out of water. Do you have any?” My mind raced as I thought about my primary water supply. “I don’t have much, but you can have it.”

New Approaches to Advertising

Flash mobs are the cool new thing.

Advertisers could use this technique to enhance their public relations.

This one was to the Sound of Music.




They can be used in any different way, but more importantly to us, as advertisements. Take this one for example. It could've been used to promote the movie Ghostbusters.




There are many new social media examples, but this one could trump them all if used correctly.

T-Moblie took the charge and put out this mob flash that they tagged their name onto:




Pretty fun stuff.

Now to start planning one for the BYU campus...

Advertising Ethics

Approximately how many advertisements do you see each day? What would you guess? 20? 50? 100? According to the Media Awareness Network, each and every day, North Americans are exposed to 3000 ads! (http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/parents/marketing/advertising_everywhere.cfm) This includes advertisements that are on shirts, billboards, toothbrushes, and bicycles, just to name a few. We are surrounded by advertisements everywhere we turn. In the room in which I now sit, I can’t count the number of visible advertisements. With all these persuasions around us, we are brought to ask, “Is it ethical?” Does advertising fit the American standard and do those advertisements we see and hear inhibit our ability to choose? In this scholarly research paper, I intend to point out some of the negatives and positives to advertising, and show my audience why advertising is indeed ethical.

Many people consider advertising as a means whereby dishonest people can connive their way into an unsuspecting victim’s head and place little triggers that go off when this victim sees a product or service. These people have an excellent point. Advertising, especially soft sell advertising, is meant to help consumers to have a positive view of a company, also known as the company’s brand. Advertising is persuasive. There is no getting around this fact. Persuasion is probably the main objective of advertising.

Not only is the main objective of advertising to manipulate the viewer’s mind, but oft times the advertisers are wicked people. Most of them do not have standards and therefor, the advertisements take the blame. With such a greedy world, it is hard to find advertisers with morals, so we get ads that contain scantily-clad women, drugs, and inappropriate content. We find problems today that would have been unthinkable 50 years ago. With the debauchery of our society, we see things that not only would be indecent to the LDS population, but also to the general public.

As with every profession, there are people that have low standards, and then those that rise above the scum. The key is to find those people and then help them to become more influential. Advertising is not evil or unethical in itself. There is also much good that comes from advertising, mainly informing people of things they weren’t aware of. How would you know that the iPod was even invented unless you saw a friend using it or an advertisement for it? This is the argument I take sides with.

Let’s take a look at the history of advertising. William M. O’Barr says, “long before America was colonized, commerce flourished in the Old World where various methods were used to promote trade. Notice boards placed outside houses indicated what could be had within. Wine sellers gave free samples in the streets. And actors paraded in the streets attempting to entice onlookers into theatres (http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/asr/v006/6.3unit02.html).” Advertising has been around for many centuries and has played an important role in society. Even our opposition will agree that advertising played an important role long ago. It helped entrepreneurs to show consumers what they had to offer. This helped to establish better communities where free trade could flourish. Free trade is a principle that is associated with Democracies. Communist countries do not enjoy the same privileges that we have here in the United States. Since advertising has contributed to the free trade system, I think it's fair to say that it is partly responsible for the positive government that we have today. We are very blessed to be in a time where we live under such favorable circumstances.

According to the Constitution of the United States, anyone living inside the country has unalienable rights. One of these inevitable rights is freedom of press. In the first amendment, we read “congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” Contained within that law, we see that we have the ability to print and say what we please. Especially in the case of advertising (assuming situations slander or libel is not being used), this right is just that- a right. We are entitled by law to advertise as we would like to. Having established that fact, we still are left to the question, “is it ethical?”

Mike Catherall of American Chronicle says, “On one hand you have an industry bent on persuading consumers to buy things they don't need by prying into their insecurities, reinforcing oppressive stereotypes and pouring gasoline on the fires of capitalism. On the other, you have an industry with a sudden new desire to make the world a better place.

Where these values intersect is the latest boom in the advertising world: ethical advertising. Targeted at Conscious Consumers, ethical advertising taps into the residual idealism and guilt of activists at heart, and Boomers who have rediscovered their romantic 60s values lost or replaced temporarily by vapid consumerism, only to see the light again in their twilight years” (http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/10795). Opportunity for growth and improvement in the advertising world has presented itself. There are chances for things to become as they once had been through wholesome advertising. Companies are taking these opportunities. For example, take Dove. Dove is a company that has made beauty products since 1979 and continues to influence people everywhere. They are owned by Unilever and they have some positive advertising techniques. One of their most recent is the campaign “Evolution”, which has won two awards at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, and continues to influence women and girls around the world (www.dove.com). The campaign is meant to show females that they are beautiful no matter what they may look like. It has helped to build confidence in young women and has also gone against the grain as far as advertising goes. Ads with morals like this are becoming more prevalent as time goes on. Hopefully, we can continue to see an increase in these uplifting ads. One of the ironic things about the Evolution campaign is that Dove makes products that help to beautify women. The advertisement definitely reflects a positive light on Dove and it's brand. This is a prime example of a soft sell campaign. The objective here is not to sell lotion to people right away after they see this commercial. It is meant to shed positive publicity on Dove. Some would even argue that the campaign was a public relations project, and there is a lot to be said for that. Maybe the day has come where advertising is starting to shift into public relations.

One of the main reasons I believe that advertising is ethical is because the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints uses it.

In August 2008, the LDS Church launched a campaign called “Mormon Messages”. These short films were designed to share prophets' and apostles' stories with visual representation. Over time, many have been made and the total viewership has reached over 10 million views (http://beta-newsroom.lds.org/article/mormon-messages-on-youtube-reaching-millions)! Currently, there are an assortment of different topics that you can watch and enjoy. This is a form of advertising for the Church. Missionary work could also be classified as advertising. Without that initial exposure, we wouldn't have the truth and light that we do. The LDS Church is a prime example of an organization that has used advertising to bless the lives of others. Advertising isn't unethical; it's a form of communication. It has helped to bring the gospel to many converts' lives and continues to affect the Church positively.

There are things that can be improved on in the advertising world, but overall, the industry is improving as a whole. The principle of advertising is ethical, although some of it's representatives are not. We see examples all over the world of good advertisements that redeem the industry. Examples like Dove's Evolution and the Latter-Day Saint's Mormon Messages are becoming more predominant as time goes on, and hope is coming back to the American public. The demise of the society has not completely consumed our American living yet and with the addition of strapping young lads like myself, the advertising realm will continue to brighten. Advertising is meant to inform, giving us knowledge and a greater understanding. Usually, the products that advertise well are the ones that perform well, so we have little need to fear being coerced into buying something that wouldn't help us. The product will sell itself. Advertising just helps to make it known. With the 3000 advertisements we see each day, we are merely picking up 3000 more bits of information.

Works Cited Page

Advertising: It's Everywhere. November 14, 2010. http://www.media-awareness.ca/english/parents/marketing/advertising_everywhere.cfm

Dove Evolution, November 16, 2010, www.dove.com

Ethical Advertising at a Glance, American Chronicle, November 15, 2010, http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/10795

Mormon Messages on Youtube Reaching Millions, November 16, 2010, http://beta-newsroom.lds.org/article/mormon-messages-on-youtube-reaching-millions

O'Barr, William. A Brief History of Advertising in America. November 15, 2010. http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/asr/v006/6.3unit02.html

Mac Attack!

Is this a common sight for many of you? Have you been around the BYU campus and seen the influence Apple has established on campus? Here, in the library, I took a picture of a regular day. Out of the 12 computers I can see in this picture, 8 of them are Macs! 67%!

I have always loved the uprising of Apple. It has always intrigued me after watching a movie called Silicon Valley in high school. After watching the movie, which depicted the former partnership of Steve Jobs and Bill Gates, I felt a loyalty to Apple that I never had before.

Apple continues to produce moving advertisements, like this campaign:

Apple is continuing to gain market share. I am excited for the day when they will surpass Windows in sales. In 2006, Apple owned about 4.6 % of the market share for laptops overall. Not very impressive, but it has been steadily growing. In 2007, it grew to 5% and in 2008, it kept growing to 5.6%, and Apple continues to grow!

Go Apple!!!

Climbing a Rock?

     Why do people feel the urge to climb things?
Especially in the case of climbing rocks and mountains, why do people do it?

I've decided to use this as a research project for my writing class this semester.

To give you my opinion, here are some pictures I took yesterday from a 600 foot climb my buddy and I did.

Simply beautiful.

You look cool.

And you're safe... for the most part. ;)

Those are a few of my reasons for climbing, but I'm interested to see what others' reasons for it are.

"The Devil Can't Make You Do It" by President Boyd K. Packer

"The Devil Can't Make You Do It"

President Packer

General Conference October 2010

    Bold as he was in the October General Conference, Boyd K. Packer made some enemies. In the morning session of General Conference on October 3, 2010, President Boyd K. Packer talked about the sanctity of the family and bravely presented his feelings on the Family Proclamation and the sins of homosexuality and pornography. He answered my questions and although no new doctrine was presented, his message brought about a protest on Tuesday because of how straight forward and logical he was, not beating around the bush.

    The night before, I found myself asking my date why she thought we, as a church, were so against the gays having an opportunity to get married. It was a question that had bothered me, because I felt it went against the LDS philosophy of agency. Luckily, the Lord knew that this concern would be on my mind and had President Packer give a talk on it the next day (I love how that works). President Packer gave me the answer I had known all along, but never connected. From the Family Proclamation, he quoted “marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of His children.” Wow, it's so simple. Marriage is something that only applies to a man and a woman, not a man and a man or a woman and a woman. Your agency allows you to be gay together, but don't call it marriage. It's not marriage. Marriage is ordained of God and perpetuates life and the family.

    Apparently, the gay community along with a few disgruntled members of the Church weren't spiritually ready to hear this message. On Tuesday, a group protested against President Packer's conference address. It's funny, President Packer addressed people like this in his talk. He implied that you wouldn't vote on absolute truths, asking “what would a vote against gravity do?” His clever remarks helped me to realize that God's truth can't be altered or voted on.

    President Packer couldn't have been more bold in his remarks. He used a great sense of logos to present his message in a way that answered my questions, and I'm sure others' as well. His speech couldn't be taken any other way than the way he intended it to be. Great talk, President Packer.

Puffery

    Puffery is a technique commonly used in the advertising world. It refers to an over-exaggeration of a product or service. Examples of this would include saying such phrases as "the best", "the most satisfying", or "the greatest". These phrases don't even necessarily need to be true. They could have the worst, least satisfying product out there. The way that advertisers can get away with phrases like this has to do with proof. There is no calculation that can tell me if your product is "the best." Although the company can't prove that it's the best, you can't prove it's not. Best in what? Even though quantitative claims can be proven wrong, qualitative ones can't. Puffery is present in many companies.

This probably isn't the greatest value in the world, but you can't prove its not.


Even modern advertisements that you'd never guess, use puffery. Take, for example, Kellogg's Frosted Flakes. They're what?? They're gr-r-reat!! Really?

Look at the ads you see today and notice how many of them use puffery.

My Bold Move

  I've been on a few dates since being home, but none were initiated quite like this one.

  Friday rolled around and I found myself sitting on a bench outside the Wilkinson Center. A girl came and sat down on the bench next to mine and I heard my thoughts say, "wow, she's really cute." I couldn't keep from looking at her and I knew it was a problem, so I decided I was going to do something about it. You only live a mortal life once, right? So about half an hour went by and I didn't act. I kept waiting for her to approach me (like that ever happens) and nothing came of it. Finally, as class was about to start, I decided it was now or never. Music influences our irrational decisions and I think I was listening to Muse, so I was pumped.

   I went up and introduced myself, nervous at the thought of what was to follow. She told me her name was Laura and I said something to the effect of "Well, I think you're really cute and I was wondering if you wanted to go on a date with me some time." Warning signs started shooting off in my brain as she paused, smiling. I had to blurt out "I would never do this, but something told me to." She accepted and gave me her number, telling me she normally wouldn't say yes, which made me feel a little better and boosted my confidence back up a little bit.

  We went on a date Saturday night, which was a lot of fun. She came to my apartment to pick me up (lame, I know) and when I opened the door, I was surprised by how beautiful she was [with these situations, you never know if you're just feeling that way in the moment]. We went to the malt shop and then to Comedy Sportz (which was pretty hilarious). She seems really nice and interesting. From California, and has two older sisters. Parents are converts, which is really cool. Overall, it was a great date. There will be a second.

Cadbury?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wy52yueBX_s

I am going to attempt to critique the advertisement "Gorilla Drummer", by Cadbury.

The video starts off with a Phil Collins song, beginning with no drum beat, just synthesizers and lyrics. The audio starts off slow, but gradually builds. The video that accompanies it is composed of close up shots of a gorilla on a drum set. You can tell that the gorilla is emotionally attached to what he is about to do. The tension builds as these shots continue. I think this would have been a perfect time for the editor to slow down the video and make some slow motion shots. I think moving panoramic camera shots would have made this beginning sequence more emotional.

The camera shot then is zoomed out as the monkey bangs on the drums and the beat comes into the song. I almost feel like it took too long to get to this climax. It takes one whole minute to get to that point and I feel like some people would have lost their interest in it by then. You usually only have about 10 or 20 seconds to make a lasting impression. I do love when the drums come in though. There's a sense of "coolness" that hits you.

Lastly, I've been trying to figure out what this ad has to do with Cadbury Dairy Products. They flash their name at the end, but it's easy to forget because the ad does not utilize the product or company at all. Ads like this bother me. Yes, they are fun to watch, but you're not going to remember Cadbury here. You're going to remember a gorilla on a drum set. Over all effective ad? Probably not. It doesn't draw me to Cadbury eggs.

College Success

There has been a new craze on YouTube over the past few months started by a man named Julian Smith.





   He has created funny videos that appeal to the college-aged crowd. Interestingly enough, the videos make little to no sense, and yet he has about 35 million views.
   The slogan that Julian has made for himself is "I made this for you!" Thus, he makes the viewer feel important and improves his brand. With such an influence as he has, he should be getting into the corporate world and using his fame to spread some product or service. I'm sure he has had many offers at this point, and shouldn't feel like a "sell out" for making money from his talent.
  His videos remind me of a small production that bloomed years ago, David Lehre productions. He was a young college student that produced similar shorts and had spots with Nesquik, Nokia, CareerBuilder.com, and various rappers. I'll include one of his videos as well.





   Hilarious shorts like these give college students hope at a bright future without the time restraints that graduation makes. Many of us have been inspired by the creative genius that has come from both David Lehre and Julian Smith.

Pepsi Commercial

   I found this ad while searching the YouTube database. It caught my eye as an advertisement with impact. The scene of the little girl ordering a Pepsi contains a lot of humor, yet gets the advertiser's message across. The spot struck me because I had always thought as the bartender had, that Pepsi and Coke tasted too similar to have their own identity. The commercial, though, makes you feel as though thinking something like that would be preposterous.
   The advertising agency caught hold of a phenomenon that was sweeping the nation in 1997, that of the Italian mafia. The Godfather was a big craze at the time, so Pepsi swooped in and used the setting. Great use of entertainment and product placement. This commercial brought Pepsi a lot of business.




Taken from www.Youtube.com

"A Child of God" by Henry B. Eyring

Today, I have annotated a talk by Henry B. Eyring. This is one of the more impactive speeches I have read. It may be one of the greatest talks given in this generation. I would encourage you to read and apply its precepts.

"...it begins with seeking frequent correction directly from our Heavenly Father."

A Child of God

HENRY B. EYRING2 Brigham Young University 1997––98 Speeches 

One of the reasons I love to come to this campus is to see you, the young people of the Church. Invariably it seems to me that you look even better than you did the last time I was with you. Because I came today expecting that experience, I was reminded of an account written a number of years ago by General James Gavin. He was a young general in the American army during World War II. He com- manded the 82nd Airborne Division. He led them in the invasion of Sicily. There were casu- alties there. He parachuted with them behind enemy lines during the invasions in France. They lost more men there. Then he led them in the bloody battles in Belgium when the Germans counterattacked, taking a terrible toll among his troops.

General Gavin’’s soldiers were given some well-earned leave. Some of them went to Paris. A general from another Allied army saw them there. Later, when he met General Gavin, he said that he had never seen better looking soldiers. General Gavin’’s laconic reply was that they ought to look good: they were the survivors.

You look good. You ought to look good, because you are the survivors. By making the right choices plus the help of uncounted ser- vants of God, you have made it through a hail

of spiritual bullets. There have been tens of thousands of casualties. You know some of them because they are your friends, your spirit brothers and your sisters. You are more than simply the survivors of that spiritual war. You are the future of the Church. God knows that. And so he now asks more of you than he has asked of those who were here before you, because the kingdom will need more. And Satan knows that you are the future of the Church, which gives me a solemn obligation to warn you of the hazards ahead and to describe how to survive them as you rise to the privi- leges God will give you.

I will speak today of one of the great things God asks of you and how you will deal with the spiritual hazard that always comes with it.

You are under mandate to pursue——not just while you are here, but throughout your lives——educational excellence. That is true for you as individual members of the Church and for this university as a community. And yet the Lord gives the warning of danger as he gives

the charge. You remember the words from the

Book of Mormon:

O that cunning plan of the evil one! O the vain- ness, and the frailties, and the foolishness of men! When they are learned they think they are wise, and they hearken not unto the counsel of God, for they set it aside, supposing they know of themselves, wherefore, their wisdom is foolishness and it proteth them not. And they shall perish. [2 Nephi 9:28]

You are to pursue educational excellence while avoiding pride, the great spiritual destroyer. Most people would question whether it is possible to pursue excellence in anything without feeling some measure of pride.

A professional basketball player in the National Basketball Association sat next to me on a plane just after President Benson gave a talk warning about pride. In general confer- ence President Benson had said that there was no such thing as righteous pride. My seatmate hadn’’t heard the talk, so I told him about it and asked whether he could excel in the NBA down under the basket if he were stripped of all pride. His quiet answer was that he doubted that he could survive at all, let alone excel.

A Broadway star had a colorful way of expressing his opinion about the place of pride in his work. He had been hired to be the lead in a production of Fiddler on the Roof with a cast of college students. I was asked to give a prayer with the cast on opening night. The Broadway veteran, who had played the part hundreds of times, stood at the back of a ring of students gathered around me just before the curtain was to go up. He looked puzzled.

As I recall now, I prayed about the way you might have done. I pleaded with God that the members of the cast would be lifted above their natural abilities, that the stage equipment would function well, that the hearts of the audience would be softened, and that they would be touched. I can’’t remember much else

of the prayer, but I can remember what hap- pened just after I said ““Amen.””

The Broadway star jumped into the air, landed on the stage with the sound of an explosion coming from his heavy boots, slapped his hands to his sides, and then thrust them into the air and shouted, ““Okay, now let’’s go for it!”” If the audience heard his bellow, and I can’’t imagine that they didn’’t, they must have expected the cast to come charging through the curtain out into the audience bent on some kind of mayhem.

I can only assume that he was determined to counteract the terrible mistake he had just witnessed. The last thing on earth he wanted was to go on a stage with a bunch of amateur actors who had been infected with humility.

I will not tell you today how to pursue excellence and humility simultaneously in the NBA or on Broadway. In those settings, if you get there, you will have to nd your own way.

But I will tell you that not only can you pur- sue educational excellence and humility at the same time to avoid spiritual danger but that the way to humility is also the doorway to edu- cational excellence. The best antidote I know for pride also can produce in us the characteris- tics that lead to excellence in learning.

Let’’s start with the problem of pride. There is more than one antidote for it. Some of them don’’t take any action on our part. Life delivers them. Failure, illness, disaster, and losses of all kinds have a way of chipping away at pride. But they come in uneven doses. Too much can come at one time and crush us with discour- agement or embitter us. Or the antidote can come too late, after pride has made us vulnera- ble to temptation.

There is a better way. There is something we can choose to do in our daily life that will provide a constant protection against pride. It is simply to remember who God is and what it means to be his child. That is what we cov- enant to do each time we take the sacrament, promising always to remember the Savior.

Because of what has been revealed to us about the plan of salvation, remembering him can produce the humility that will be our protection. And then, as we will see later, that same choice to remember him will in time produce in us greater power to learn both what we need to know for living in this world and in the life to come.

Remembering the Savior produces humility this way: Because we are blessed by revelation from prophets in this dispensation, we see his part in the plan of salvation, and from that we come to know both our loving Heavenly Father and what it means to be his spirit child.

When we remember the Savior we see him as the creator of all things, about which the wis- est of us knows so little. We remember our dependence on his sacrice when we think of the fall of man and of our own sins. We remem- ber his unfailing love for us and his arms extended in invitation to us when we think of the little we understand of what he did to atone for our sins. We remember that we will only come again to our Heavenly Father to live for- ever in families by obeying his commandments and having the Holy Ghost to guide us. And we remember his example of complete submission to the will of his Father and our Father.

Those memories, if we choose to invite them, can produce a powerful blend of courage and meekness. No problem is too hard for us with his help. No price is too great to pay for what he offers us. And still in our greatest suc- cesses we feel as little children. And in our greatest sacrices we still feel in his debt, want- ing to give more. That is a humility which is energizing, not enervating. We can choose that shield as a protection against pride. And when we make that choice, to remember him, we are at the same time choosing to do what can lead us to acquire the characteristics of great learners.

That view of what it means to be a child of God, if we choose to act on it as reality, will lead us to do what great learners do. Those habits are not unique to those who understand

and have faith in the revelations of God. The principles of learning work the same for all people, whether or not they know and believe in the plan of salvation. But we have an advan- tage. We can remember the Savior, think again of what the revelations tell us about who we are, and then we can choose to act on that real- ity. That will make us better learners. And by making those choices together, we can forge a learning community.

I’’ll talk about just a few of those habits of great learners. In each instance you will recog- nize them. You have known great scholars and observed them carefully. There are some com- mon patterns in what they do. And each of those habits will be strengthened by acting in our daily life on our faith that the plan of salva- tion is a description of reality.

The rst characteristic behavior is to wel- come correction. You’’ve noticed that in the people around you who seem to be learning most. You see that in your fellow students, for instance, who value wise editing of their writ- ing. If they seek that correction, study it when they get it, and then revise what they have written, they become better writers. In the same way the scientists who submit their work to be reviewed by those who understand their methods and their research ndings make the most rapid progress.

I have to insert something here. There must be one mathematics major sitting here who knows history and who may say, ““But, Brother Eyring, there was a famous mathematician, and after his death it was found that he had never shared some of his best work with anyone.””

My response is that there would have been more if he had shared it. The desire to receive wise correction is a hallmark of a learner and of a community of learners. That is why you can appreciate getting back one of your papers when it is covered with jottings in red ink. The wise learner cares more for the jottings than for the grade at the top of the page. In the same way the wise student of a new language seeks not the tutor who praises whatever they say but one who won’’t let a mispronounced word or an error in conjugating a verb pass uncorrected.

That desire for correction, a mark of great learners, comes naturally to a Latter-day Saint who knows and values what it means to be a child of God. For him or her it begins with seeking frequent correction directly from our Heavenly Father. One of the most valuable forms of personal revelation can come before private prayer. It can come in the quiet contem- plation of how we might have offended, disap- pointed, or displeased our Heavenly Father. The Spirit of Christ and the Holy Ghost will help us feel rebuke and at the same time the encouragement to repent. Then prayers asking for forgiveness become less general and the chance to have the Atonement work in our life becomes greater.

We have another advantage as Latter-day Saints. We know that a loving Father has allowed us to live in a time when Jesus Christ has called prophets and others to serve as judges in Israel. Because of that we listen to a prophet’’s voice or sit in counsel with a bishop with the hope that we will hear correction.

That is true because we know something of the nature of God and our own condition. There was a fall. There was a veil placed over our memories. We walk by faith. Because of our mortality, we all sin. We cannot return to our Father unless we repent and, by keeping covenants, are washed clean through the sacri- ce of his Son. We know he has placed servants to offer us both his covenants and his correc- tion. We see the giving and the taking of cor- rection as priceless and sacred. That is at least one of the reasons why the Lord warned us to seek as our teachers only men and women who are inspired of him. And that is one of the rea- sons why this learning community welcomes prophets to lead it.

A second characteristic of great learners is that they keep commitments. Any community

functions better when people in it keep their promises to live up to its accepted standards. But for a learner and for a community of learn- ers, that keeping of commitments has special signicance.

That is why we sometimes describe our elds of study as ““disciplines.”” You’’ve noticed as you studied in different elds that they have different rules. In physics there are some rules about how to decide to believe something is true. That is sometimes called the ““scientic method.”” But when you move over into your course in engineering or in geology, you nd yourself learning some slightly different rules. When you arrive in your history or your French literature class, you nd yet another set of rules. And your accounting professor seems to be living in a very different world of many rules. You will someday, if you haven’’t yet, experience the turmoil of trying to learn in a discipline that is trying to agree on new rules but failing.

What all disciplines have in common is a search for rules and a commitment to them. And what all great learners have is a deep appreciation for nding better rules and a com- mitment to keeping them. That is why great learners are careful about what commitments they make and then keeping them.

The Latter-day Saints who see themselves in all they do as children of God take naturally to making and keeping commitments. The plan of salvation is marked by covenants. We promise to obey commandments. In return, God promises blessings in this life and for eter- nity. He is exact in what he requires, and he is perfect in keeping his word. Because he loves us and because the purpose of the plan is to become like him, he requires exactness of us. And the promises he makes to us always include the power to grow in our capacity to keep covenants. He makes it possible for us to know his rules. When we try with all our hearts to meet his standards, he gives us the companionship of the Holy Ghost. That in turn

both increases our power to keep commitments and to discern what is good and true. And that is the power to learn, both in our temporal studies and in the learning we need for eternity.

There is a third characteristic you have seen in great learners. They work hard. Oh, think of President Hinckley! I’’ve traveled with him, and I know something of this great learner and how hard he works. When people quit work- ing they quit learning, which is one of the haz- ards of getting too much recognition early in a career and taking it too seriously.

You will notice that the learners who can sustain that power to work hard over a lifetime generally don’’t do it for grades or to make tenure in a university or for prizes in the world. Something else drives them. For some it may be an innate curiosity to see how things work.

For the child of God who has enough faith in the plan of salvation to treat it as reality, hard work is the only reasonable option. Life at its longest is short. What we do here deter- mines the rest of our condition for eternity. God our Father has offered us everything he has and asks only that we give him all we have to give. That is an exchange so imbalanced in our favor that no effort would be too much and no hours too long in service to him, to the Savior, and to our Father’’s children. Hard work is the natural result of simply knowing and believing what it means to be a child of God.

That leads to the description of another characteristic of a great learner: great learners help other people. Every great learner I have ever met has helped me, or tried to help me, or clearly wished to help me. That could seem to you a paradox, since people trying hard to learn might justiably be absorbed only in themselves and what they are trying to learn. Now I know the rebuke you might give me. I’’ll anticipate your correction. You would say, ““Is that true of all great learners?””

I answer, ““Of course not.”” There are renowned scholars who are selsh and even unkind to those they consider less gifted. You

will meet them if you haven’’t yet. But those who learn most over long lives seem to have a generous view of others, both in what they can learn from other people and the capacity others have to learn. Those who can’’t suffer fools gladly become more foolish themselves. They have shut themselves off from what they can learn from others.

Those who learn best seem to see that everyone they meet knows something they don’’t and may have a capacity they don’’t have. Because of that you will nd that the best learners make the best company.

That kindly and optimistic view of others comes naturally to the believing Latter-day Saint. Every person they will ever meet is a child of God——their brother or their sister in fact, not as a pleasant metaphor. Every person they meet, whatever their condition in this life, has been redeemed by the loving sacrice of the Savior of the world. Every person who is accountable can exercise faith in Jesus Christ unto repentance, make and keep covenants, and qualify for eternal life, the life that God lives. Even those who are not accountable here will someday have that same potential.

With this as our reality, it is not hard to feel that the needs of those around us are as impor- tant as our own or that the most humble per- son has divine potential. Such thinking will lead not only to kindness and to generous appraisal of potential but to high expectations for each other. Sometimes the greatest kindness we could receive would be to have someone expect more from us than we do, because they see more clearly our divine heritage.

Here is one more characteristic: the great learner expects resistance and overcomes it. You remember from your early school days reading about the number of materials Thomas Edison tried in his search for a lament for an electric light bulb. The persistence he needed to work through failure after failure was an application of the rule of learning, not an exception to it.

That has been your experience as well. Some learning has been easy for you. But more often your enemy has been discouragement. You may try to avoid that by choosing to learn only what is easy for you, looking for the path of least resistance. But the great learner expects difculty as part of learning and is determined to work through it.

That is a view common to believing Latter- day Saints. You may have been blessed by a mother as I was for whom the plan of salvation was reality. More than once I complained about some difculty in my school days. Her answer, given in a matter-of-fact tone, was, ““Hal, what else did you expect? Life is a test.”” Then she’’d go off to something else and leave me to ponder. She knew that, because I understood the plan, her statement of the obvious would give me hope, not discouragement.

I knew and she knew that to have the bless- ings of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob we need to face and pass comparable tests. She knew and I knew that the greater the test, the greater the compliment from a loving Heavenly Father.

She died after a decade of suffering with cancer. At her funeral President Kimball said something like this: ““Some of you may wonder what great sins Mildred committed to explain her having to endure such suffering. It had nothing to do with sin. It was that her Heavenly Father wanted to polish her a little more.””

I remember as I sat there at the time won- dering what trials might lay ahead for me if a woman that good could be blessed by that much hard polishing.

You and I will face difculty in our studies and in our lives, and we expect it because of what we know about who God is and that we are his children, what his hopes are for us, and how much he loves us. He will give us no test without preparing the way for us to pass it. Because of what we know about adversity in learning, in this community of Saints we pay special honor to determined learners because

we know the price that they gladly pay. And we know from whence their power to persist through difculty comes.

In this community we know that we are the brothers and sisters of Job, of Joseph in Egypt, of Joseph in Carthage Jail, and of Jesus in Gethsemane and on Golgotha’’s hill. So we are not surprised when sorrows come. We respect their place and know their potential.

You might well wonder what I would hope will come from this brief review of the power of our faith in the plan of salvation to produce humility and the power to learn. It is not that we will now go out to seek some grand experi- ence to transform our lives and our learning.

The way to grow in the faith that we are the children of our Heavenly Father is to act like it. The time to start is now. You’’ve received some prompting in your heart while you have lis- tened to my suggestion about what God would have you do, or do differently. Do what you have been prompted to do. Do it now. After you obey you will receive more impressions from God about what he requires of you. Keeping commandments increases the power to keep other commandments.

Today you could seek correction. You could keep a commitment. You could work hard. You could help someone else. You could plow through adversity. And as we do those things day after day, by and by we will nd that we have learned whatever God would teach us for this life and for the next, with him.

You are a child of God. Our Heavenly Father lives. Jesus is the Christ, our Savior. Through Joseph Smith the knowledge of the plan of sal- vation was restored. If we act upon that plan as we should, it will allow us to claim eternal life, which is our inheritance. And if we act upon it, we will be blessed with a humility that gives us the power to learn and the power to serve and the power to rise up to the privileges that God wants to grant us. Of that I testify in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Talk taken from www.lds.org and annotated by Thomas Busath.

My First Blog

   As a college student, you often find yourself doing things you wouldn't normally do. Some young students find their lives change as they pick up habits. Some succumb to the temptations of drinking, while others get into drugs and promiscuity. I, on the other hand, now find myself starting a blog. I don't know what direction it will take, but as an Advertising major at Brigham Young University, I'm sure it will come in handy. Not to mention, it's a requirement for one of my classes... ;P