Earthly Education…a large serving of humble pie.

In institute I was reminded how this life it a time to prepare, not only to meet God, but moreover striving to do all we can to become like him. I was brought to a visual picture of the earth being our classroom and, the good Lord, the teacher. We can either excel in this life, doing well with our experiences, or continually having Him say redo across the top of our assignments and then back to the drawing board until we get it right. His grading system is perfectly just and full of mercy, endless amounts of do-overs until we get out of it what we need in order to obtain the qualities of a saved being.

Recently some harsh lessons I’ve been learning are in large part for my own personal humility. I find myself willing to take the hand of others or even allowing them to carry me, both in the mental and physical sense of context. I’ve always been the one caring for all of those around me- my sisters, brother, grandparents, and friends. I’ve always been placed in the situation to be the strong one and not really allowing others to serve me. My roommate is the best example of service I’ve ever known and a few exceptional others placed around me. Her dad is one of the handymen around the house and comes to town and takes us to dinner. Lace reads me better than any female I know, it’s such a blessing to have someone to open up to and trust.

I had a mentor type example placed in my life the beginning of May and he is very abrupt and blunt in our conversations and I love him for his constant care, critical council and adamant advice. He teaches me straight and undiluted, he sees me as his daughter and treats me as such. BpB doesn’t take my crap and makes faces at me in front of his cohorts and colleagues, slightly obscene gestures for a public figure, but that’s alright since everyone watches everyone else anyway. He watches me at activities and then encourages me to keep being an assertive member of my community and lifting the hands that hang down. What a great blessing in my life!

Another is the chance I’ve had to open up my heart! My best guy friend, we’ll call him CC for short, taught me trust like I’ve never known, or at least not in the past 16 years of my life! He was so open and honest with me upon the beginning of our friendship, it’s taught me it literally hurts the heart to be that open, but when all is said and done, there aren’t really any regrets from it! He’s taught me to be absolutely alright with my open dirt surfing hippie self, less judgmental of others and their circumstances and to embrace awkwardness. There is so much good mixed in with the tragedy and innocent suffering of life. He’s helped me have greater compassion and love for my fellowman and in breaking down my walls I’ve found the greatest amount of love in my heart for him. I’ve found I am really good at being rude, mean, and generally unkind when I feel vulnerable and in allowing me the blessing of sincerest love, it leaves me wide open for absolute tragedy and the vastest vulnerability I’ve ever been placed in. Since this recognition has occurred I’ve begun trying to implement more proactivity versus reactivity in my life.

We are here to act and not be acted upon. My goal for the rest of the year is to be Proactive, not reactive: And Sarah suffereth long, and is kind, and envieth not, and is not puffed up, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, and rejoiceth not in iniquity but rejoiceth in the truth, beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. It’s a tall order to fill, but as I pray for it-all things are possible with His help! After the best teachers give you what you need when you really need it.

Duct tape your mouth shut!

Tonight at softball-I was catcher and also played third base, getting at least three outs and stopping two runs. We ended our winning streak and I lost it on the EQP tonight as he was criticizing my batting strategy from behind the fence. Funny thing...he strikes out at least once a game and I've never have as of yet, I've always made the runs, just wait for the right pitch to give me the time to make it to first and maybe round to second. I'm an encouraging and supportive player to all of our teammates and even at times the opposing team members. The last two weeks I've been catcher because I've been running in the morning and my shoes are to small giving me more blisters with every passing day (today I did 5.4 miles in flip flops and still got a blister!) After I took a base for my waiting on the pitchers 3 balls, I went back and threw the bat at the fence towards the EQP (I had a runner, who can't bat and were the perfect pair cause running on dirt in flops isn't my fave). He was grinning at me and I let him have it more than I've let anyone have it in years. I told him, "He better shut his mouth, cause next week I'd be bringing duct tape and I'd be using it if I heard anything critical out of his face!" Bp was standing right next to him and nothing was said, just glances of seriousness exchanged.

I don't get why people here associate callings with capability or capacity. In church on Sunday, the spirit testified to me the reason I needed to be called as Relief Society President is because God places us in callings to teach us skills and attributes we may not gain any other way. Not that we are amazing or spectacular saints being called to positions of grandeur or aspiration, He calls us in our weakness and qualifies us for the work. If we all acted out of our own free will and accord to the best of our ability there would be no formal need for callings in the church. We are all just the little guys, no calling in the church is better than another. It's some whacked Utah status quo to have this or that calling...wild!

Regardless of who said the comments for there were others sassing players, and here I am sassing Andrew, maybe he had a hard day at work and I should have responded to him with empathy and love? I know I should have... however it brought me to a further reflection of what's been on my mind most of the day-a need to be proactive and not reactive to life's happenstances. Covey covers this in his literature and I know it to be true. Positivity, encouragement, and charity are the way to others feeling God's love through us. We need to always strive to lift where we stand and be builders of the kingdom. Not build up personal walls to keep us safe, but if we have a focal point on building others up, in turn the Lord elevates us to a higher plane than we can yet comprehend. This is where the principle of forgetting yourself and going to work comes into play...I will bring duct take next week, but I will most likely use it, asking Andrew to tape my mouth that I remain positive and proactive and for anyone else in need. Better yet maybe to tape my flops to my feet so I can run the bases in them!

Validation and Bouncing on the Bed

Tonight at dinner we discussed a short movie called Validation. It's incredible to recognize how influential the validation of others can be. Interesting enough, we have those in our lives who increase our self-worth by their kind words, recognition, and love. We can either chose to be those people of incredible impact or not. The choice is ours for the taking! Sometimes we do all we can to uplift and edify another person directly, yet try as we may, we lose the light at the end of the tunnel and ultimately lose hope. No matter what, no kind deed, word, or thought is ever wasted as Charity never faileth!

TJ Thymes is amazing in this short film with his heart-felt message of love, smile, and hope. I love his soothingly satisfying sounding voice, fantastically fun fusion of hair, breathtakingly bright blue eyes, and the enduring endearment of his character.

This is a must see:

Validation

This being said I must admit the highlight of the evening was bouncing on Mike's amazingly soft bed. Although I think everyone was in shock at my follow-through. When I said I wanted to bounce on the bed I meant it! Previous to my jumping we piled 5 chics on his Tempur-Pedic queen mattress and pillow-top. Then I politely asked them to leave so that I could jump in the bed in my dress. Thanks guys for allowing me my childish requests of innocent fun! Will you please post pictures so I can add them to this blog. :o)

Nothing to Fear Except Fear Itself

Yesterday a bunch of us went to Lagoon, another estro fest, and had a great time! One of the objectives of my day was to assist my friend in overcoming her fears. She's one of the "best sports" I know-always up for anything and wanting to try new and exciting things. One of my true adventure buddies, a majority of the time she possesses the world's best attitude! Our lovely Lace is horrified of heights and in passing weeks, I've remembered my own initial fear of climbing and activities of greater altitude-how I initially embraced my fear and now it is something I dabble in the excitement thereof. In my youth, I overcame it by riding the chair lifts, high school cliff jumping off the 30 and 90 footers at Cave Point into Lake Michigan, in college it's been snowboarding, bungie jumping, and parasailing. Regardless your more intense fears can be holding one back from their grandest adventures or happinesses.

In Lace's case, you resolve the concern or issue previous tho throwing her into the lions den. Her faith must be increased to the point there is no room for doubt. Or to teacher her it is her own conscious decision to entertain her fears in heights. It's not rations, it's not beneficial to her longevity and joy (well maybe in the survival of the fittest, but besides the humanistic approach)-I won't be able to take her climbing or boarding this year if she can't face her fear of heights. We worked towards this outcome yesterday and I feel as though we made some very good headway. She made a statement yesterday and I woke up this morning with gratitude and more of a recognizable reliance on some of the gifts I've been given. She said in moments right after the embrace of her fears, "You know it's the Spirit that makes you so good at helping others face their fears and getting over them!"

I concede and would want it no other way. When the Spirit is the teacher, lessons are learned and an indelible impression is made on the mind of the learner to change needed behavior or mind set on a more permanent basis. I find her statement to be of the most absolute worth-my ability and willingness to teach through the Spirit is key in this life. My love, passion, and willingness to do my best to stay worthy of His companionship set me up to use this talent in a much needed capacity. As Elder Uchtdorf pointed out in last conference, "We live well below our means." Many of us have made covenants in this life to dine at the shmorgas board of absolute delicacy and what do we do as individuals with these blessings? Indeed, we need to "get off the sidelines and practice what we preach (or know/believe)."

So the story goes...our dear Lace our first ride of the day was Blast-off and then throughout the afternoon we took the Gondola a few rides where we practiced giving in the control and safety mechanisms we mentally exert to keep us from our fears. Then the very end rides of the day were Re-entry and Blast-off! We practiced and focused on vicarious living-observing others let go of their fears, their underlying reason for doing so, and what joy can come from this journey of embracement. True doctrine was taught as we were able to talk about how much fear and joy oppose each other! Where doubt and fear are...faith and joy cannot be! They are the counterparts of each other and if we are to experience the Heaven's good for us we need to be willing to expel doubt and fear that we may obtain her costliest blessing! Fantastic job Lacey in being faithful and believing and helping me remember the dependance on the Lord for some of His blessings to me!

This also made me think of another experience when one of my best friends went up to Bear Lake for the weekend, to camp out, recreate in nature, and go boating. The only hold up is he was afraid of water...I can't remember how much time he spent in the water that weekend, but I recall a group of our friend took out Trace's boat and eventually he took up the courage to get in the water. He didn't get his feet wet, but fully immersed himself in his fears, embraced them, and was filled with joy! I can only now, in retrospect see how that day has impacted his life for good as he too has made covenants and been filled with a capacity to help others do the same! I'm so honored to have spent so many years with you and look forward to our lasting friendship-based on truth and honesty.

Virtual Reality

As an instructional designed for the Corporation of the President one of our goals was to make training for the people around the world as interactive as possible. The more hands-on a training is the better and more cognitive the experience for the learner. This is one of the highest goals for the training user experience. During my three years of working here I was able to attend a lecture series given by some of the top instructional designers in the nation. One of them used the computer program, Virtual Life in their presentation. It was what we thought was on the extreme side of the conference as he showed how we could have our meetings, trainings, and team building experiences as a virtual experience.

This being noted, I felt quite validated in cutting myself off from pretty much all video games after attending a fireside given by Elder Bednar in May of 2009:

http://lds.org/liahona/2010/06/things-as-they-really-are? lang=eng&query=bednar+virtual+reality

One of my favorite parts of his teachings was reference to those of Joseph Smith, “We came to this earth that we might have a body and present it pure before God in the celestial kingdom. The great principle of happiness consists in having a body. The devil has no body, and herein is his punishment. He is pleased when he can obtain the tabernacle of man, and when cast out by the Savior he asked to go into the herd of swine, showing that he would prefer a swine’s body to having none. All beings who have bodies have power over those who have not."

This talk made an influence on me that I am still grateful for to this day. I do my best to be doing something productive with my time and about the only time I will make the exception for video games is for positive interaction, time on-line to further relationships with friends and family, or teaching and recording purposes, such as this blog.

Last night I had an awesome experience with playing on the XBox with friends! I occasionally enjoy Rock Band and Guitar Hero, I love singing, and rocking out on the guitar, the bass, and playing the drums very much. Dance Dance Revolution and Just Dance are other games I enjoy, but last night I played two games that take the cake...literally I could play them with friends frequently and not feel bad about it. Maybe because they're sports and some of the guys were actually sweating by the end of their turns! Awesome-XBox Kinect Dance and Kinect Sports. Boxing, sprinting, javelin, ping-pong, hurdles, bowling, beach volleyball, discus, etc, and then dancing was more fun to watch others and cheer them in getting their grooves on!! Such a great time and refreshing change of mind-all thanks to our gracious hostesses-Natalie and Ariel!!! Love you both!

Walking ☛ Running ☛ Crawling

I don't know even where to begin. About a month ago I was walking through life-truly enjoying the casual stroll of it all. A new house, a new job, a new ward, said goodbye to friends from the past 3 years and was ready to move forward with whatever the good Lord had in store. I know life to be 90% attitude and what you make of it and the other 10% of what just comes your way. I was completely content, happy, loved being outdoors by myself, in fact doing most thing by myself, with the exceptions of climbing, teaching, and chilling with my roommates. I was completely satisfied and had come to a strong resolution I wouldn't even think about men and just play the summer away and get back the life I once had two summers ago! I had been previously consumed by school, work and a calling.

Then in the middle of me about to go on a climbing date-which is my passion, climbing not dating, comes this kid out of now where!!! It was kind of like I lost my head and couldn't have cared less about the climb or the other guy any more. It may have been the goodness in his eyes or the intrigue of his smile. To this day I'm still unsure, maybe it was some combo action. Either way something weird happened to me, I dropped my guard, and or the first time since I was fourteen really let someone in! It was the most empowering and bittersweet feelings I've ever had.

I've had people try and explain these occurrences to me, but I honestly haven't felt anything like it. In part I'm sure because I hold back and make a complete disconnect between my heart and head. I can love with my head really easy-it's actually 2nd nature to me. At an early age, I was taught to love by my father, know the doctrine associated, understand the principles and actions behind what love is and most of this can actually be done without the heart, but I must warn you when you finally let your heart get involved it's like a race. One I've seen others run, one I thought was great for them if they wanted to lose their heads and look foolish in front of everyone. It wasn't ever going to be me...or so I thought until now.

I'm in this race, with my hands tied behind my back, unable to use them to propel myself forward. The water stations are only dangerously every 5 miles apart instead of every two and for the first month of the race, water stations were every 1/2 mile! Making the race easy and I felt full and hydrated, giving me much confidence and next to no worries about my twittered behavior. Then my running partner started getting cold feet and talking to runners who haven't trained, either in the best schools or even at all! Runners who don't run or give up because they stub their toes. He loves them so he listens to them, but they don't know me or even the whole situation. I openly admit I don't have a clue about their whole situation either, other than there is some impenetrable bond that won't ever be broken. I actually respect that a lot, just not the judgements and harsh reality this group of friends-is like a VIP club and every other runner wanting in, even the very best must endure the harshest hazing process.

If that wasn't enough, this other old-time runner comes from out of town, doesn't know me from Eve, makes a few harsh judgement calls, and I'm out of even being on the steps of the VIP club, but to the back of the line four blocks down the street! I just got messed...I don't even want the club, just a member, the best member, to come back out and run with me. What does he do? Takes an axe and hacks me at my ankles. Now here I am ready to run and no means even whereby to do so! In the back of my mind I recognize, he has these amazing plans cause I know he saw the trail and was ready to run it too-at the same time I did. It like being in a 5.8 on the richter scale and denying it ever happened.

Indeed I am grateful to have had the experiences I have had. Seeing a family that isn't perfect, but lovely and what I picture as mostly ideal. Allowing myself to open up and it's done wonders for me in some aspects. I'm just seemingly sassy to everyone. I forgot how very much I love being crazy-like hanging out truck doors, late night 711 runs, spending virtually every free moment in the mountains (that was why I came to Utah anyway) But now that I feel free with who and how do I run? Do I wait until he decided to give me my feet back while soaking my ankles in ice? Do I force him to give me my feet and my heart back too? I believe force is unjustified in most if not all cases, or do I follow the heart that I have left, freely give him what he has already, and go shopping for prosthetics? They are doing amazing things with them these days. When running with others I get board and if I don't run then I tuck my head nicely within my shell and wait out the hazard. All of the options make my heart, feet, and head hurt.

Early on in the week I had a training session with the head coach. He told me to crawl along with my feet iced, work on the other things I have been given to occupy my time, love the runner with all his friends and it would all work out as I'd been previously instructed by the coach. The only problem is...I'm not a big fan of placing things on ice. Ice melts, it makes a mess, the flesh runs chill, and there's always a chance of constant ice burn.

Afterwards, I ran into a dear friend who was once an honorary VIP in the club, she gave me some good advice. She tells things like she sees them. Moreover, maybe she calls them similarly to how I see them. She used the example of a dog, which I relate well with, since I've taken much time to love and understand how mans best friend works. If a loyal dog wonders from home and someday will, the confident and educated owner trusts the dog knows where his home is, how much love it felt in her care, and god willing no harm comes to the animal, and they make it to their destination. If it's back home then it's exactly that-home. If not, then it just wasn't meant to be.

Faith is when you believe in someone enough to let them go that they can be who they are supposed to be!

Lots of Laughter and Love...when you lose yourself...

Sometimes I get to serious about life...there are items of my own genuine concern I feel necessitate such seriousness at times. However, when I set first things first; like I did today by spending hours in the scriptures I felt like I was able to unwind and let loose this evening! I gave plasma this morning and genuinely thought about the recipients and what their needs may be. I got to get outside of myself as a friend of mine is having medical problems and I was able to serve her. Two out of the few things I brought her she couldn't use, but alas I did my best!

Studying in the Old Testament is teaching me so very much! I don't know why we don't love them as much as all the others books of scriptures. I think they are harder to read because we as a scripture reading people have some phobia of long books. What about all the classic literature-they too are over a thousand pages. I was doing fine until I realized everything was going fuzzy and I was about to pass out from lack of food and water. Funny though...today I was reading in my personal study of how we need not take thought for what we need or want, if we build His kingdom Christ will care for us in 3 Nephi 18 (sometimes in giving adequate resources, material items, amazing abilities and talents to employ ourselves through). He cares for us. My roomates father bought us dinner, he fixed my refrigerator, and my Batty came and picked me up and drove me home to our abode.

After the food kicked in I did swell, had an invite to play some outdoor soccer, but declined so I could experience the best home teaching by Kev, ever! Than these lovely new found athletic chicas took us out in this beast of a truck-let me hang out (I still had my seat belt on) the window as we drove, singing at the top of our voices, screaming/cat calling to pedestrians, and we even got in a wrestle with a semi in one 711 parking lot before moving on to another 711. These lovely friend purchased a round of Slurpees and our night was well underway! We planned out more fun nights or dancing, concerts, and sports and now have more sistas of funness in the group!

Then I think the absolute highlight of the evening...A replay of the movie RM, except technically tomorrow, well today, is the last day of the month-anyway he leaves a reception to go and complete his home teaching. The best scene ever is when Kirby is tossing cookies at his teachee through the mail slot in her door and proceeds to tell "Sister Jane Doe" he can see her arm. You know he is bizarrely late and I think one family drags their kids out of bed to see him. Funny to have it a bit backwards. One sister we saw tonight didn't get home from Grantsville until 11:30 p.m. and the other didn't leave work in Bountiful until 11 p.m. Latest visiting teaching of my life and I loved every moment of it! It is such a wonderful blessing to feel how much God loves each and every soul as an individual, their there own little worlds they function within.

This life is to be enjoyed not just endured (G.B. Hinckley) and how can we more appropriately express our Joy than through love and laughter. Until recent weeks I'd forgotten how much I truly love laughing! Even more I love hearing others laugh, most everyones laughter is some sort of expression of love! Before I went to bed this evening I tickled my roommate as she wiggled around on the floor like a worm on a hook. I think she's the most ticklish person I know. You don't even touch her and she's squirming. What if our main goal in life was to help others to laugh, like life more, and love...Can you imagine how wonderful life would really be? I'd wager it's actually called Heaven on Earth. Why don't we focus more on building it today...right now!

My Bishop told me I looked devious tonight! If he only knew I was merely full of joy and excitement and a renewed love for life!