Value

A well known speaker started off his seminar by holding up a $20 bill. In the room of 200, he asked, "Who would like this $20 bill?"
Hands started going up.
He said, "I am going to give this $20 to one of you but first, let me do this." He proceeded to crumple the dollar bill up.
He then asked, "Who still wants it?"
Still the hands were up in the air.
"Well," he replied, "What if I do this?" And he dropped it on the ground and started to grind it into the floor with his shoe.
He picked it up, now all crumpled and dirty. "Now who still wants it?" Still the hands went into the air.
"My friends, you have all learned a very valuable lesson. No matter what I did to the money, you still wanted it because it did not decrease in value. It was still worth $20.

Many times in our lives, we are dropped, crumpled, and ground into the dirt by the decisions we make and the circumstances that come our way.  We feel as though we are worthless. But no matter what, was always have value to others and to our Heavenly Father.  We are never totally lost, or totally wasted.  It is up to us to figure out what we need to do in order to get to where we need to be.  
I was looking at a project that I am trying to do for my grandkids this morning, and I thought about how nobody really cares about a project that is not completed.  Halfway done, is still not done. 
I think life just might be a lot like that.  We judge ourselves as if this moment is all we are ever going to be.  It doesn't matter how much good we have done, how many projects we have completed, it only matters for this one thing I haven't gotten to yet, this one flaw. 
We see this mistake if you will, as the one thing that will keep us totally out of our Father's presence.  We see ourselves as if we can never change. 
Isn't it a wonderful thing that Heavenly Father looks at the entire story of our lives, and not just the parts that are in shadow?  Isn't it wonderful that He sees the entire project and not just our own judgements of it? 
Maybe today, the person that you should be a little kinder to is yourself.  You might be crumpled, stepped on, dropped on the ground and injured or sick, but you are still a child or God.  You are of infinite worth.  You are needed.  You are wanted.  You are loved.