April 6, 2009

Hello,

Last Tuesday I finally received all of my MTC mail–lol. I guess things people had sent arrived there the day or so after I had left, but they routed it back to me here. Give my thanks to Sister Peterson, Sister Lee, Ruthie, Mom and Margie for their letters!

Thursday I had my first zone conference meeting! The newbies and the missionaries who are leaving after this change all shared testimonies. I had to go first! But it went well; I left everyone puzzled by my accent, some of the Latinos asked me later if I was from Spain, then some other from Russia. So anyway don’t know what to think about that.

The weather is changing...slowly....it is still hot, but in the evening you can get away with wearing a light sweater. I’m excited for it to get cold just so I can wear my wool socks that I have. I like socks.

I encourage you all to seek after good things in this life, as roughly quoted from the 13th Article of Faith: if there is anything virtuous, beautiful, of good reputation, or worthy of praise seek after those things.

In conference this weekend, someone, I’m not sure who, talked about all of the wonderful good people in the world, whether they be of faith or not, that live good charitable lives and how we as members can learn from them. For me, many joys of living and meeting people from all walks of life is getting to see and know the goodness that they have and applying that to my own life. There is much to learn by example.
If someone can match this description to the speaker and talk, let me know and I'll link it.

I like to think that there is godness, I mean goodness, scattered everywhere and one can be like a berry picker—going through and picking out those best berries in whatever berry patch he may be. (Please see Jacob 5)

Also on a thank you note:
Thank you to my parents for teaching me many good values during my childhood. I remember when I was younger we had the rule during the summer that we could not go out with friends until we had worked at least 30 minutes in the yard. If we slept in late or didn’t get started in the morning, the afternoon would quickly come around when my friends asked me to come out and play. And of course, I hated having to lose a half hour of play time by pulling weeds. I hated it at the time and didn’t understand why it was so important if we had weeds or not in the basketball court. But now that I am older, I recognize that it was from those times that I learned to organize my time between work and play and to work hard in the beginning of the day to enjoy the rest of the day chore free with time to pass with my friends. That’s just a dumb example, but one I think demonstrates important principles. Also thank you for the liberty and responsibilities that I enjoyed in my older teenage years. Learning only comes through having options and exercising agency in making personal decisions.

As we are taught in 2 Nephi, choice is the power given to every man. Think about the choices you make; your decisions make who you are. Also see 2 Nephi 2:27

As far as choosing to apply principles of the gospel in your life, ask yourself (by exercising this principle how will it change who I am) “how do I treat the people around me, my perspective on life and the lives of other?” Is this principle aimed to improve my satisfaction with my life? develop my goals? develop my personal character? Maybe you have already discovered what things or type of behavior make you happy in your life—as for me, I am currently learning the truth behind the scripture Mark 8:35, or in short, the joy that comes from serving others. (Please see conference talk by Elder Dallin H. Oaks, Sunday afternoon session). This also leads me believe that there are different levels of happiness. Of course I feel happy when I’m not serving people or when I am doing solely ‘selfish’ things, but its another type of happiness, joy maybe, that comes from not thinking about me for a moment and instead being pressed in the cause of helping another, whether they be a stranger, brother, or friend.

What level of happiness do you enjoy on a day to day basis?

With love to all,
SSS