I shall be candid, as candid as this photo Hermana Beecher took of me taking off a few of my many sweaters last night.
I don't feel like explaining myself today. I didn't exactly want to be 20, but it was inevitable, and I can't find a reason to feel sore about something that was inevitable. Why do people feel so many things toward their birthdays, anyway? Your birthday happens on the same day every year. It's so predictable, you think we would have learned to steel ourselves over by the time we were 5.
If you want to get really weird, think about how missionaries talk about themselves in terms of mission-time. Your "birthplace" is your first area, your cumple-mes is about as eventful as your cumpleaños. One day about a month ago on divisions, Hermana Rodriguez and I were at a member's home washing dishes and a neighbor walked in with a baby on her hip. Hermana Rodriguez asked how old the baby was, and the mother said nine months.
"Hermana Beecher is nine months old too!!!!" I cried, not realizing how it sounded.
This week we found/charla-ed with a lot of people where it was hard to say what they might have wanted to hear in the moment. I found myself instead saying what I would like them to remember I said in the future.
As we teach these people these people I exert myself to teach it in a way that is right. If I feel like I'm talking to please them or win them over, I get a dreadful feeling in the pit of my stomach. If I feel like I'm throwing hard cold doctrine at them just to make sure I'm fulfilling my function as a missionary, I get that same feeling. When Elder Oaks was here, he closed by talking about our missionary calling and said "I bless you to do it effectively and with love."
How can we do it effectively and with love if we're doing it just to do it? Doing something effectively and with love is a huge task, since you have to a.) have studied enough to know what you're talking about, b.) believe in it, and c.) keep your head from flying off your shoulders while you're in the pressure of the moment.
Well, the more you think about the answer the more you realize that it is indeed complicated, and it takes experience. But the more you get experience, then and only then does it become simple.
I have been studying and reciting D&C 50:11-22. I highly recommend it!
Here is a picture of Fabricio, Brian and Mariel. We had a lot of laughing to do with them yesterday evening.
Love, Hair-mana Tolman
If you want to get really weird, think about how missionaries talk about themselves in terms of mission-time. Your "birthplace" is your first area, your cumple-mes is about as eventful as your cumpleaños. One day about a month ago on divisions, Hermana Rodriguez and I were at a member's home washing dishes and a neighbor walked in with a baby on her hip. Hermana Rodriguez asked how old the baby was, and the mother said nine months.
"Hermana Beecher is nine months old too!!!!" I cried, not realizing how it sounded.
This week we found/charla-ed with a lot of people where it was hard to say what they might have wanted to hear in the moment. I found myself instead saying what I would like them to remember I said in the future.
As we teach these people these people I exert myself to teach it in a way that is right. If I feel like I'm talking to please them or win them over, I get a dreadful feeling in the pit of my stomach. If I feel like I'm throwing hard cold doctrine at them just to make sure I'm fulfilling my function as a missionary, I get that same feeling. When Elder Oaks was here, he closed by talking about our missionary calling and said "I bless you to do it effectively and with love."
How can we do it effectively and with love if we're doing it just to do it? Doing something effectively and with love is a huge task, since you have to a.) have studied enough to know what you're talking about, b.) believe in it, and c.) keep your head from flying off your shoulders while you're in the pressure of the moment.
Well, the more you think about the answer the more you realize that it is indeed complicated, and it takes experience. But the more you get experience, then and only then does it become simple.
I have been studying and reciting D&C 50:11-22. I highly recommend it!
Here is a picture of Fabricio, Brian and Mariel. We had a lot of laughing to do with them yesterday evening.
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