Heaven and Hell

Wednesday, October 16, 2013 0 Comments

Man. This has been one of the longest, most difficult weeks of my missionary life! I feel like I've gone to hell and back and hopefully am on the straight and narrow again.

The work is going pretty slowly here recently. We've had to drop more investigators, which is never fun. Every time you have to make the decision to stop meeting with someone for a while, it's hard not to feel like a failure of a missionary.

Updates from this neck of the woods are as follows.

We have a puppy! Well, the family we live with has a new puppy. Her name is Tess and she's a Cane Corso and she is just adorable! She has all of these skin rolls and she trips over her own feet a lot and she's going to have a fierce bark when she gets a little bigger. I don't know if it gets any cuter than baby Tess.


I've been having such a hard time wanting to be a missionary lately. I let myself get distracted by things I would think at home before my mission, and suddenly missionary work becomes second priority. First priority is my frustration in being unable to live two lives at once.

Despite all of my struggles this week, I've come to the conclusion that God knows what He is doing with me. I'm the kind of person that has to touch the hot stove to understand it. I don't know why, but it's true. I learn best from going through preventable, hard things and coming out having learned more about my nature and more about the nature of the Atonement. I guess that, as human beings, we all work that way sometimes.

So, I went from crying a lot and being frustrated this week to going to the San Diego temple just a few hours ago. Temples are like heaven on Earth. There is no better place to get right with God than a quiet spot in the temple. If you can, you should visit often. There are countless blessings to be received every time you go.


 I think I'm starting to reach a point in my mission (four months this week!) where I get why things need to happen. I get why obedience is important. I get why this work is so important. I get what I have been asked to do, to some extent. I just need to figure out ways to keep going and loving it until I'm strong enough to take on new challenges.

Last P-day it got so cold and rainy that I had to wear my coat! I was SO STOKED. I couldn't contain myself. :)

I'm always so touched when I hear others pray for missionaries. I never noticed that before General Conference. I never really thought about how much the members of this Church do to support us missionaries. Thank you, to members all over the world! Thank you for calling down the strength of heaven to help us help others.

Advice from an ordinary sister missionary:
1. Use more exclamation points. It's awesome!
2. Watch Mormon Messages often. Go to http://www.mormonchannel.org/ and indulge. Your spirit will be lifted, I promise.
3. Don't ever let Satan get into your brain and tell you that you are not good enough, not strong enough, or not knowledgeable enough to do hard things. You can! And you don't have to do it alone.
4. To add on to #3: use the Atonement every day. Don't let negativity build up. Talk to God. Use this precious gift of sacrifice that Christ has presented. You will find joy you never knew.
5. Love everyone!

I love you, as always.

Love,
Sister B

God Speaks!

Monday, October 07, 2013 0 Comments

Guys.

General Conference.

Did you watch it? All of it?

YOU HAVE TO!

Seriously, how incredible was this conference? What an amazing time to be a missionary and to be a member of this church. Each of those talks were inspired by God and I felt like at least half of them were written just for me. I can't wait to get this month's Ensign so I can read them all again!

Also, I loved Elder Nielsen's talk about missionary work. You'll notice that the longer you've been a missionary, the more exclamation points you use in emails. Now I know why! Exclamation points are missionary punctuation marks, for sure. :)

This week has been great. Sister Grover is teaching me so much about discipline and finding joy in this great work. I hope that you all don't think I am a perfect missionary... I am most definitely not. I struggle every single day. I get a bad attitude all the time and I get mad at my companion and have a hard time wanting to be obedient. But I am working on positivity, among a million other things, and I really do love this work.

We visit often with a less-active, older woman named Karen. We were helping her put together another garage sale this week, and found a sweet magnifying glass that we, of course, had to take pictures of. I was laughing the entire time.


Then I saw my first suburban tumbleweed! I named him Horace for who knows what reason. Horace the prickly tumbleweed. A testament to my life as a desert dweller.


I've never felt more energetic or alive in my life. Being a missionary is truly something else. I was touched by the prayers in General Conference, all asking the Lord to bless me, a humble little missionary in Southern California, and all of my missionary brothers and sisters. I had almost forgotten how important this work is that I am performing, and how much support I receive every day from every corner of the world. Strangers and family alike are praying for my success as a missionary. I am so blessed!

All the lovely Sisters and Hermanas of the Temecula zone!

I love you all! Exclamation point! (ha ha General Conference joke... If you don't get it, go watch Conference. Okay?)

Seriously. Watch lds.org like a hawk for the conference talks. Watch them. Be inspired. Become better!

Thank you for all of your support! I couldn't do this without you. And remember how blessed we are that God speaks to us through his chosen servants! No other church has that opportunity to be guided directly by God's hand through the words of modern day prophets.

Did I say I love you? Because I do!

Oh, oh. Go and watch this and the other videos in this three part series. They're under 5 minutes each! (http://www.mormonchannel.org/video/mormon-messages?v=1737858982001)

Love,

Sister B

Happenings

Tuesday, October 01, 2013 0 Comments

So, as usual, I don't have a lot of time. I'll try to cover the important stuff.

I got a pedicure for the first time in probably a year on Monday. It was Sister Saxton's last day in French Valley, and a recent convert and his friend, who happens to be one of our investigators, took us and the elders out to lunch, then treated us sisters to pedicures. Yes, they are both boys, and yes, they got pedicures with us. I won't say names to protect their identity, because they'd probably hate me if I broadcasted that to the world. Just know, there are boys in the world that get pedicures.

We visited a lot of members before Sister Saxton left, and had a lot of fun. We went to Victor's house on Sunday night for a family home evening, of sorts, and it was so much fun! We played games and laughed and ate s'mores dip, which was delicious. Our first few days of the week were running around/packing/stressful, and then on Tuesday we went to transfer meeting and I came home with a new companion.

A tender moment, caught on camera.

Sister Grover, my new companion, is awesome! She's from Provo, Utah but she spent the last year living in Sweden as a nanny. Her mom is Italian and so Sis. Grover speaks Italian like a pro. My catch phrase with her is, "so, basically, we are the same person." Because we are. Our personalities are so alike! It's weird and great at the same time. We're going to talk to crazy hookah-smoking teens on the street (yes that happened), sit in random yellow chairs in front yards, and have a dandy time here in French Valley.

Sister Grover and I. We're adorable.

Sometimes Cam comes into our study room and says "take a picture of me, I'm dead."