Parent-teacher conferences at my children’s school were this past week. Parent-teacher conferences are always bittersweet. You learn some things that make you proud, and you learn some things that you wish could be better. You learn about some things that seem to come easily for your kid, and some things that don’t seem to come as easily and require more work.

Of course, it would be nice if everything just came easily, but that’s just not the way it goes. Thankfully, I was given advice on how to help in these areas that need work, and I felt assured that if that advice was followed, areas of weakness could become areas of strength.

As I reflected on this, I realized that this is simply the way life is. Some things come easily, while others don’t.

What is to be done about those things that don’t come easily for some? The key is what I learned from my parent-teacher conference experience — working at it.

A great example of this comes from the Book of Mormon with Nephi, Laman and Lemuel. I don’t know that faith came easy for Nephi. It certainly didn’t come easy for his brothers Laman and Lemuel. But what prevented Laman and Lemuel from increasing their faith? According to the record:

“And it came to pass that after I had received strength I spake unto my brethren, desiring to know of them the cause of their disputations.

“And they said: Behold, we cannot understand the words which our father hath spoken concerning the natural branches of the olive tree, and also concerning the Gentiles.

“And I said unto them: Have ye inquired of the Lord?

“And they said unto me: We have not; for the Lord maketh no such thing known unto us.

“Behold, I said unto them: How is it that ye do not keep the commandments of the Lord? How is it that ye will perish, because of the hardness of your hearts?

“Do ye not remember the things which the Lord hath said?–If ye will not harden your hearts, and ask me in faith, believing that ye shall receive, with diligence in keeping my commandments, surely these things shall be made known unto you.” (1 Nephi 15:6-11)

Nephi knew what it took to understand the words of their father, Lehi. It took work. It took asking. Laman and Lemuel simply assumed they couldn’t figure it out, but they lacked faith to even put in the necessary work.

Laman and Lemuel are often shown as the perfect examples of how not to behave, but I wonder how many of us in our own way act the same.

“I’m not having any meaningful personal revelation,” we say as we give half-hearted effort to going to church, reading the scriptures and praying, if we’re even doing those things at all.

I’m hardly someone to brag. I’m as guilty of being lackadaisical as the next person.

In a BYU devotional on Tuesday, Elder David A. Bednar, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, discussed the word “work” and said:

“Understanding that faith in the savior is a principle of action and of power suggests an ongoing pattern of spiritual work that is a fundamental expression of reliance upon and trust in him, and a source of learning and growth. For these reasons, work is essential for our spiritual progression.”

There are no perfect students in life. We all have strengths as well as areas that need work. It’s up to us to decide if we want to put in that work. If we do, we have the promise that we will learn and grow. We will progress spiritually toward the ultimate goal — made possible by the Atonement of Jesus Christ — of eternal life, “the greatest of all the gifts of God.” (D&C 14:7)

Contact Ryan Comer at rcomer@standard.net. Follow him on Twitter at @rbcomer8388 and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/rbcomer8388.

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