AN 8 COW WIFE

I have rewritten this post so many times. It was not making me happy at all. Needless to say, it probably won't be the last one either I will write and rewrite 1000 times. I think I have this need for, at least, making these posts I write - "perfect!"
Why? - Is a question to which an answer might be given in some random post in a very distant future. 

"Mahana you ugly" is quite possibly the best line in a movie of this sort I've ever heard.  So simple and yet it explains the point of the movie so well.

For all of you non LDS people out there reading my blog; the movie "Johnny Lingo" is one of my favourite LDS movies of all time. It talks about a man who understands how a woman needs/wants to be treated. How she needs to feel, so she can love herself and feel good about herself. It portrays everything spiritual a great man, a husband needs to aspire to - what I'd like for my husband to essentially be like!

Johnny Lingo understood the principle (what this post is supposed to be all about), more than anyone on the Island, male or female; because he said this:  "many things can make a woman beautiful, but what matters the most is what she thinks of herself!"  Amen Johnny Lingo, Amen I say! 

Well, the tradition of the Island was for a potential husband to come before the brides father and bargain with him for his daughters hand in marriage. The matter of payment would be cows who are very valued on the Island for their milk, meat and skin. They would make one very rich if the bargain went well.
Even in today's world, "modern world," a healthy cow that gives a lot of milk and has been fed well to have quality meat, can achieve a price as big as the cost of a small car or a motorbike. So an 8 cow wife then is worth a lot!

But it wasn't about the cows; it never is. It was about how to treat people around you and especially those you love. It was about Mahana's confidence. People around her made fun of her. Even her own father did so. The very person that was supposed to give her unconditional love and protection from all the scoff. Weather it was because he was unhappy about his life or he just really was a mean person it matters not; her confidence was gone and he was partially to blame. 
The ONLY thing she needed was for someone to believe in her. Someone she can lean on, who will be by her side at all times and see the inner her. Someone who will love her forever! [Way to go Johnny Lingo for mastering what the Gospel is all about!]

He understood that anyone can believe in themselves and feel special and confident if they see themselves as an 8 cow wife! And the truth is, he is right. All of us (male and female) are 8 cow [people]. The potential is within us - we just need to find the people that make us feel special or be the people that will help others achieve the 8 cow potential.

That's why, these are some of the characteristic I'd like to see in my future husband (a girl can dream, right?): 

• humble
• sees the best in me (and others)
• doesn't care what others think, because he knows what he wants, who he is and what he believes in
• is a worthy priesthood holder!
• treats me like he would other guys to threat his daughter, his princess
• would go through hell and back for me
• is not rude or disrespectful 
• the Temple is his Castle
• PUTS GOD FIRST IN ALL OF HIS DOINGS! 

And if he will be like that (bullet points) He will get this:

And to sum it all up, here's a quote from the very end of the movie that says all of these things I have written in a much nicer and better way:

JOHNNY LINGO: Think what it must mean to a woman, her future husband meeting with her father to discuss the lowest price for which she can be bought. And later, when the women of the village gather, they boast of what their husbands paid for them - three cows, or five. How does she feel, the woman who was sold for one, or two? This could not happen to my Mahana.

TRADER HARRIS: Johnny, I've misjudged you. I thought you were thinking only of how important you would look to your friends, paying 8 cows for a wife. I didn't know you wanted to make Mahana happy.

JOHNNY LINGO: More than happy, Mr. Harris. I wanted her to be an eight-cow woman.