Pigment to Our Thoughts – Sunday, April 16, 1944
Perhaps most of us have had the experience of looking down from great heights, or of peering into deep chasms, to find that we seem somehow to be drawn toward the abyss—in our thoughts and feelings, if not in an actual physical sense. Gazing into an abyss may have its attractions, but it is an exceedingly hazardous pastime. Gazing needlessly into voids of other kinds also has its hazards. It has long been recognized that people tend to take on the characteristics of the thoughts they entertain, and of the atmosphere they frequent.
For example, it may be noted that many who deal with elements of crime and sordidness, even with the most unquestionable good intentions, find their thinking modified accordingly. Those who contemplate too earnestly the negative and undesirable phases of living, are in constant danger of becoming negative in their lives. Impressionable youngsters who are forever seeing and reading and listening to the wrong kind of stories are apt to find their processes of thought following channels that are not wholesome and that may have a blighting effect upon their outlook. Sometimes boys in crowds, in the spirit of foolish bravado, step into the wrong part of town, or into the wrong places, just to see what goes on. Often they find out, and by so doing, fix images in their minds, which they are likely to dwell upon too frequently and to recall too vividly.
Young people away from home sightseeing in sordid places may acquire some colorful tales to recount, but they don’t come out untouched, because every impression that crosses our lives is there indelibly to be recalled, the undesirable as well as the desirable—and there is every reason why we should not go out of our way to mar the pattern of our thoughts—unless by so doing we can accomplish good, or unless calls of duty require an acquaintance with such things. There is an old saying that you can’t afford to step over into the devil’s territory. Stay in your own province, with your own safeguards. Stay away from evil ground if you don’t want some of it to cling to you.
Even if it doesn’t touch you physically, it may mentally and spiritually. Gazing at sordid or sullied things, if it does nothing worse will certainly add its pigment to our thoughts. Unless there is a constructive purpose and an honest reason for doing so, don’t look for things that it would be unwise to find.
By Richard L. Evans, spoken from the Tabernacle, Temple Square, Salt Lake City, Sunday, April 16, 1944, over Radio Station KSL and the nationwide Columbia Broadcasting System. Copyright – 1944.
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April 16, 1944
Broadcast Number 0,765