Becoming Unshakable - Moral Agency Part Three - Building a Foundation on Rock Not Sand

Part three of our Moral Agency discussion. 

Chaos doesn’t break most people all at once. Drift does. One skipped prayer turns into a week, one “I’ll handle it” turns into relying on willpower, and suddenly the old patterns are back. We apply a framework to spiritual growth and moral agency, aiming for the kind of discipleship Helaman describes as “firm, steadfast, immovable.”

We dig into why real progress can still collapse: winning battles without building support systems. From there we walk through three foundations for an unshakable life: identity (who we truly believe we are), decisions we make once instead of endlessly renegotiating, and the environment that either reinforces righteousness or quietly fights it. We get practical about removing triggers, setting boundaries, and designing the life we actually want to live, not just the life we hope we’ll choose when temptation shows up.

To make it actionable, we share a clear daily checklist (morning prayer anchor, scripture immersion, physical discipline, service, midday reset, evening debrief, nightly surrender) and a weekly system (sacramental reset, deep study, environmental audit, goal realignment). We also talk about why none of this works in isolation, and why the guiding influence of the Holy Ghost is essential for spiritual survival and steady faith in Jesus Christ when the storms still come.

If you want stronger spiritual discipline, better habits, and a more resilient moral agency, listen now, then subscribe, share with a friend, and leave a review so more people can build on rock.

Transcript

Opening And The Flying Analogy

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There are three levels to flying. A beginner, where you don't know anything. You are nervous about the controls, you have no skills, and are just absorbing the knowledge, and everything you do in the cockpit needs to be shown to you before you do it. After a while, you become proficient. You've got your license, you understand the airplane, and rather than just reacting to situations, your situational awareness has grown and you've begun to anticipate and mitigate problems before they happen. The third level is where you become a master of your craft. This doesn't mean that you won't still make mistakes. You're human, but you are far ahead of the airplane. Emergency situations come and you stay calm. You've been there, done that a thousand times, and so little things like turbulence, storms, high gusting crosswinds don't make you stress. They make you relax and smile because you enjoy the challenges. The biggest difference is experience, confidence in yourself and your equipment, and the science of laws, science or laws of nature that you play with. You don't take risks, you accept challenges, but understand the difficulties before beginning. This ethos is embodied by professional aviators, test pilots, military pilots, etc. We recognize the levels. The most dangerous are the ones that think they are in a skill level that they are not. They think they're better than they are. The same goes for any profession. Know your level of skill and work towards improving it, but don't pretend to be more skillful than you are. Your actions and discussions showcase where you are on the timeline of growth in your skill set. When you reach the level of master of your craft, it is often accompanied by a humility because you know how much you still do not know. In this regard, you become unshakable. Why? Because you are a true master. Welcome to Todd Talks, Spirit by Design, where I help you develop the master into the master of spirituality necessary to be unshakable during the chaos that will reign in the world prior to the second coming of our Lord Jesus, Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Helaman in the Book of Mormon describes a people who reached this level of being unshakable in their testimony of the Lord. He states, they were firm and steadfast and immovable, willing with all diligence to keep the commandments of the Lord. Helaman 15 8. This description is the one that I think we all wish would be spoken about us. Look at how they were described. Firm, steadfast, immovable. Those are powerful words. That is not occasional righteousness, that is a group that is built on a solid foundation. That is structural strength. For example, the Bible story Christ told about the man who built his house upon the sand, and the rains came and the floods came, and the wind and the house washed away. While another man built his house upon a rock, and the rain, winds, and floods came, and the house on the rock stood still. Build your house on a rock. Elder David A. Bednar taught consistency in small things leads to great things. That's how unshakable houses are built by consistency in small things. Today we're going to go through some ideas around agency. The last two episodes have been about different aspects of your moral agency. Today we're going to bring it home. Let's ask and answer a few questions, show some examples of how we're what we're discussing works, and then as always, give a checklist you can follow to help you build consistency in the small things. First, why do people collapse even after progress? Why do they regress? Let's be honest, Depeche Mode had a song that emphasized one portion of this in their title. The song continues, People are people. So why should it be that you and I should get along so awfully? There you go, there's my singing. This shows one aspect in human relations. But let's look at the title. What does this mean? That means in this regard? It means that some people, many or most, regain control of their agency and lives, break addiction or sin, and then fall again. They regress. Why? Because they won the battles but never built the system of support around them and systems of habit to structure their lives. Victory without structure is only temporary. I'm sure you've experienced something like this. You've overcome a bad habit. For months you're strong, you're doing all the right things at exactly the right time. And then the human part of you takes over and you become comfortable. You slowly stop daily prayer, you slowly stop structured efforts, going to meetings, checking in, whatever that structure was. And you rely on willpower alone. Any alcoholic will tell you that the fastest way back to drinking is to rely on willpower alone. Because after loosening your support systems and spiritual spiritual backstops, one stressful week can bring your inner demons roaring back to life, and you get collapse, regression, failure. Not because you were weak, but because your systems of spir system of support had weakened. Man, I can't talk today. It is what it is. It's like one o'clock in the morning when I'm recording this. But let's talk about the foundations of an unshakable life. First, identity. Who do you really believe you are? This is the deepest level and often the most overlooked. Who do you really believe you are? Your inner dialogue often is different than your outer dialogue. Why? Because as humans we are our own worst critics and we treat ourselves horribly. You would never say to your friends or to others the things you say to yourself. DNC 1810 tells us, remember the worth of souls is great. If your inner dialogue is always saying you're something towards a future version of self, of yourself, you are on unstable ground. For example, if your identity is I'm trying to be better, that's an unstable identity because it's focused on the future. The future you. Stank to high heaven. I stink to high heaven. Our word of wisdom tells us to not drink alcohol as a commandment. I made the decision then that I didn't want to put any of that nastiness into my system because I reeked at the end of each shift. After that decision, it became easy to abide by the word of wisdom. I didn't even have to think about it because I didn't have to struggle to say no every time something was offered. Because I only had to make the decision once, rather than trying to rethink it the thousands of times I've been offered it since. That could cause decision fatigue. Foundation three is the environment that surrounds you. Your environment either chooses to reinforce your righteous decisions and righteousness or it fights it. When we're told to be in the world, but not of the world, Jesus didn't mean go to immerse yourself in the darkest parts of the world and stay there. You would succumb. You will succumb if you do that. No, he said to be in the world, participate in the world, set an example to those around you. You don't have to go to the strip club to set an example for your work buddies. That would set the wrong example. You can set the example at work and refrain from the other. What to do about your environment? Remove triggers, distractions, easy access to temptation. You don't just fight sin, you design your environment as a barrier against it. If you're an alcoholic, don't go to bars or have bottles of alcohol in your house. If you don't want your kids being exposed to pornography, don't give them smartphones and send them on their way. Have rules. In fact, don't give them smartphones, period. There's a reason kids are now exposed to pornography at younger and younger ages. In my youth, it was around 12 to 14 years old was the average. Today between seven and nine years old. If you don't want to be tempted into worldly things, be careful what shows and what music you let into your home. Design the environment you want. That seems to be a theme, isn't it? Design your spiritual life. Design the environment you want. Design the life that you desire. Those three foundations will help you design the spiritual life you're desiring and help your moral agency to grow because all these decisions are part of that moral agency. You're choosing what you bring into your life and how to participate in the world. To help, let's get into a daily system you can use as well as a weekly one. Things that can help you stay on the path you desire. Daily systems are your non-negotiables, those things that you do every day. First, your morning anchor before anything else. Pray. Kneel, pray, align yourself with the Lord before you do anything else. Doctrine Covenants 636 states, look unto me in every thought. Second, scripture immersion, not just casual reading, but focused engagement. Doesn't have to be long, but it needs to be daily. Set the example for your spouse, your kids, etc., that you turn to the scriptures for answers. Third, physical discipline. Move your body. Exercise. I know it may sound funny talking about something as simple as exercise when you're talking about your spiritual life, but the truth is that your body is the temple housing your spirit. How are you going to treat it? If you treat it slovenly, lazily, or let it go, your discipline in spiritual areas will suffer as well. Science supports this because exercising daily increases the flow of oxygen and essential hormones that only come from exercise throughout your body, and exercise is also a great developer of discipline. I just finished burning a thousand calories on the treadmill earlier today, and I can attest it takes discipline to not quit. Discipline in one area strengthens all areas. Fourth, intentional service. Even if it's small, do something for someone else daily. For men, open doors for women, be a gentleman. Doing something daily gets you out of the meism and gets you thinking about others. We live in a selfish world. Fifth, midday rest. Pause, realign, refocus. Ancient cultures and in some countries it still continues, like in true Latin Spanish cultures. Some cultures had the idea of a siesta to rest and reset for the rest of the day. We don't do that so well in America, but if you take a few minutes each day to rest and reset, you'll find it improves your mind, your body, your spirit. Sixth, evening debrief. This can be an internal dialogue, an opportunity to journal however you want to do it, but ask yourself, did I act or react today? Where did I drift? etc. Seventh, nightly surrender. Give the day to God. Pray, recount your day to Him before you go to sleep, and then let it go. That's the daily checklist. If you follow these things daily, you will strengthen the foundations, and your choices will be built on a rock instead of on sand. Weekly, there's a system that you should follow as well. First, sacramental reset. We attend church meetings specifically to take part in the sacramental covenant. Take the bread and water and renew our covenants that we made at baptism. Second, deep study session, at least once a week. You should have a long study session. Why? Because if you're not constantly trying to learn, especially the gospel, how can you progress? Third, do an iron environmental audit. This is a great time to sit down by yourself or with your spouse and discuss these things. What is pulling you down? What needs to be removed from your life or your environment? Fourth, goal realignment. Reset your heading. Also, this is a good time as a spousal unit to reset your family goals and the path that you want for the upcoming week. That's it for the weekly. It's pretty simple. This isn't meant to be hard. These are small, consistent things that we can do to improve our spiritual life and our moral agency. When you're constantly doing a reset on your priorities and bringing them back in line, you catch the drift before it gets you off course. That is how you become a master of your moral agency. Now, one thing I haven't mentioned yet is the role of the Holy Ghost in all of this. The truth of the matter is that you cannot become unshakable alone. As I keep reiterating, President Russell M. Nelson said, in coming days it will not be possible to survive spiritually without the guiding influence of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost provides warnings, clarity, strength, peace, personal revelation, all necessary to strengthen your moral agency in a declining world. He stabilizes your fight system and your flight system. Even with all these systems in place, the storm will still come. Sorry to break it to you, but it will come. The world is becoming a darker place, and we live in the world. However, with these systems in place, the small consistent daily habits that you exercise, when the storms come, you won't collapse and fail. Helaman stated in Helaman 5.12, when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, it shall have no power over you. Why? Because you'll be built on Christ. The ultimate goal is not just surviving life, but becoming someone that God can rely on. That's my goal. And I hope it's yours too. This is someone who acts under pressure and remains faithful, holds the line even when ridiculed, to even as bad as facing death. Doesn't drift because it is caught before it goes anywhere by these simple habits. Doesn't fold. There will be times when the world pushes you to fold. When you are built on Christ, you won't. This makes you into someone who is unshakable. And how does this affect your moral agency? All these checklists and habits are first chosen by you. Second, once chosen, you put them on autopilot so you don't have to decide again and again and again and again and again and again and again to do the right thing. You're already doing it. Part one on our discussion of agency taught you to regain control. Part two taught you to counterattack. And today I teach you how to build something that lasts. Because the goal is not just to win today's battle, it's to become the kind of person that wins for a lifetime and is a disciple of Christ that becomes your identity. Firm, steadfast, immovable. For that moment when the storms come, and they will come, you won't even think about quitting. This has been Todd Talks, Spirit by Design. I hope you like these three lessons on agency. Put the checklists into practice and become a better version of yourself. In my next episode, I'm doing an interview with a couple of Irish friends of mine who have a program for finding out what your soul's purpose is, and we meditate and talk for a good 45 minutes because before you came to this earth, you knew your soul's purpose. But we forget it when the veil is placed over us. It's a very good and interesting episode. I hope you come check it out in the next episode. Subscribe, and I hope to see you next time. Have a blessed day.