Sunday: Christmas!!!!! Soooo good. This was also the first Christmas for a long time that our relatives were able to spend with us. I got a Macbook!!! Well, actually I split the cost with my parents. It still was a very generous Christmas present. Then we left for Disneyland!!! .....that's it. :)
Monday - Friday: DISNEYLAND DISNEYLAND DISNEYLAND!!!!!!!!!!! This was the first time I'd been back since I was 15! Needless to say, I was very excited. :D :D :D We spent all week going on rides, seeing Fantastmic and World of Color (twice each), and lots and lots of Indiana Jones. That's my favorite ride, just so you know.
Saturday: Saw our cousins who live in Corona, California. Played volleyball, then went to their house and pigged out on Little Caesar's and peanut butter m&m's. Then we played Just Dance 3....not the best idea after pigging out on junk food. Just FYI.
Sunday (January 1): We drove home. .....Yup.
Monday through Saturday (2-7): On Monday, I got ready for school and spent the day with my cousins and family. Same thing for Tuesday. Wednesday through Friday I went to school! For the first time this year...haha. I really like all my classes this semester, but...they're also all really hard. So I have a lot of homework. I guess that's life, right? You learn to do hard things. This, however, meant that I spent most of my waking hours on Saturday doing homework. AAAAHHHHH!!!
That brings us to today. I went to church, learned about the life of President George Albert Smith, and reflected on the experiences I've had in the past two weeks. I realized that I have been kind of letting myself slip away. Not that I'm loosening my morals or anything, but I'm getting more lazy in my personal life. Besides working out (which I do all of the time now, thanks to my cousin J), I almost never push myself. I never pretend that I'm perfect, but I'd become complacent in considering my accomplishments "good enough". There is a fine difference in feeling "good enough" as in feeling worthwhile, and feeling "good enough" as in "I'm already a good person, and I just need to keep being myself." While that is true, we should always be striving to be better. We are always changing - either for good, or for ill. My goal is to always be changing for the better - for the rest of my life, hopefully. So that helped me to write down changes that I wanted to make, and make plans to carry out those changes.
I would also like to mention a lesson that I learned over the past few weeks. Throughout our lives, we will experience hard things. The word "hard" can range from "man, I had an extra-long homework assignment!" to "my father just passed away....he was shot". Yet in all things that we go through, it is important to keep proper perspective. I just finished reading a book series called "Pendragon", the chronicles of a boy named Bobby Pendragon who flies around the universe saving worlds of people with his abilities. Corny, right? Yet in this book I found an extraordinary principle. In these books, Bobby struggles with saving the universe from an evil demon named Saint Dane, while still fighting "the right way", or "the way it was meant to be". These two sayings permeate the books, and are so important to Bobby that it is better for him to lose the right way than to win the wrong way. Because, in the end, if he loses the right way, then eventually right will triumph and evil will be thwarted. In the same way, we too must concentrate all of our efforts on doing the right thing. Then, regardless of what happens to us, we will eventually prevail. This requires a perspective beyond this life, for there are many things that cannot be made right in mortality - premature death of a parent, physical or sexual/mental abuse of a sister or cousin, murder, etc. Yet if we hold fast to the way of Christ, in the end all these wrong things shall be made right.
"Shadrach...knew that they could trust God—even if things didn’t turn out the way they hoped. They knew that faith is more than mental assent, more than an acknowledgment that God lives. Faith is total trust in Him. Faith is believing that although we do not understand all things, He does. Faith is knowing that although our power is limited, His is not. Faith in Jesus Christ consists of complete reliance on Him." Elder Dennis E. Simmons But If Not...
If you are dealing with struggles from relationships to stressing about future pain from financial struggles or future responsibilities to dealing with the death of a loved one, the only way that is guaranteed to bring us happiness is to follow Christ. Listen for His voice, study His words, and keep His commandments. His Spirit will then be with us, and will guide us to make right decisions. He will give us peace and joy in the meantime, even as we struggle with our difficulties. Then, if we prove faithful to Him through our lives, eventually we will be brought before Him and He will accept us with open arms, whispering tearfully into our ears, "I knew you could make it." If the most powerful Being in existence is on our side, and is our Brother, we can overcome anything. I love Him. He is my Savior, my Master, and my King. I worship Him, and I do all that I can to become like Him - He is my hero. At the end of the day, I know that faith and trust in Him will bring me the peace and comfort I seek.
And so we go.
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