"Find Joy in The Little Things"

    Its dark, about 8:45 at night. It had been a long, hot and somewhat disappointing day.As you are on your way home all you want to do is eat and go to bed. But than you realize that not only do you have to cook dinner still, you have to update paperwork, make adjustments to tomorrows schedule, start soaking the laundry, and write in your journal. You get to your subdivision, and begin to walk towards your house and you start to see little random dots of light! You think to yourself am, I really that tired that I'm starting to see spots or is that actually something. Don't worry, you aren't going crazy! You are than informed that those "little spots" are actually fireflies! 
    Adjusting to missionary life can be exhausting, stressful and the greatest experience, all at the same time and in the same breath. I had the most wonderful trainer, Sister Ultra. Unfortunately for her I was her last companion, that's right, I killed my companion! (That just means she went home and I was her last companion!) No need to call the police! I didn't become a murderer on my mission! Just like all missionaries, she wasn't ready to go home! You learn to love the people so much that you just think you could be a missionary for the rest of your life! So as we embraced the different emotions associated with entering the mission as well as leaving the mission we kind of made it our motto to "Find joy in the little things".
    I remember one day during personal study I read a talk by President Uchtdorf titled "Your Wonderful Journey Home". In this talk he outlines the Plan of Happiness or the Plan of Salvation. Where we came from, Why we are here and Where we are going. Towards the end of his talk he says this...

"You can spend your days feeling sad, alone, misunderstood, or unwanted. But that isn’t the journey you had hoped for, and it’s not the journey Heavenly Father sent you to take. Remember, you are truly a daughter of God!"   

    He was 100% correct. I could go throughout my days feeling bad because I didn't know the language, I very literally felt misunderstood. And as a missionary you face a lot of rejection, so unwanted isn't a feeling to far away. But than I had to remember I was a daughter of God! And that journey of frustration and sadness was NOT the journey I had expected nor was it the journey He has sent me here to take! Whether it be my journey here on the earth, or my journey as a missionary!  

 

   This was the turning point for me. And from than on the little blessings seemed more beautiful, and had greater importance in my life. It no longer was about doing my hair, or having the fancy cell phone, or even having a "real" and by real I mean running shower! It was about being able to tell my niece that every night when I walked home I get to see Tinkerbell (the fireflies), and that she is a Filipina! And it was being able to look up and see the starts and moon and not only feel a deep connection to my Father in Heaven but to also know that even though my friends and family were half way across the world, they were being held in the palm of His hands! And it became more about being able to hear from those same family members and friends and becoming interested in their lives and how I could help them! "Finding joy in the journey" helped my to better recognize the wonderful blessings that were already in my life. And less about the things that I wanted to be in my life. And it taught me just how real and how powerful prayer and the atonement are! I know that God hears all prayers. He doesn't just hear, but he listens intently to our joy, to our dears, and to the desires of our hearts! And because of our faithfulness and the atonement, we are able to be granted those righteous desires!

    

  I admire my trainer for her perseverance and her love. I know it wasn't easy for her, but she was a great example to me! In fact I'm sure my other companions got tired of me saying "Well, Sister Ultra taught me this" or "Sister Ultra that..". I will always hold our friendship close to my heart, as I know that she was a gift from God. Even though we were only together for 3 months I learned things from her are things that I would in no other way be able to learn! So my dear Sister Ultra, thank you for teaching me how to do my laundry, for getting buko pie AND ice cream on those really rough days, and for teaching me how to speak Tagalog (I know that was probably the toughest part!). But most of all thank you for showing me what it really means to come unto Christ and how to truly accept the gospel, along with how to help other fully understand just how much their Father in Heaven loves them! 

   

 In his talk President Uchtdorf continues...

"I invite you to walk confidently and joyfully. Yes, the road has bumps and detours and even some hazards. But don’t focus on them. Look for the happiness your Father in Heaven has prepared for you in every step of your journey. Happiness is the destination, but it’s also the path. “Peace in this world, and eternal life in the world to come” is what He promises.That is why He commands us to “be of good cheer."

    I to want to extend this invitation to everyone who may be reading this. Sometimes life doesn't seem fair! Sometimes we can see a great length of pathway in front of us. But other times all we can see are a few steps. But those few steps, though difficult they may be, are full of wonderful blessings to be realized! Choose NOW to take the journey that you had always imagined and the one He has prepared for you! 

-XOXO-

Welcome to My Journey

    As I sit here staring at the blank computer screen I ask myself, "Where should I start?". So, here goes nothing.
I want to start with 3 scriptures.

1) " But behold, if ye will awake and arouse your faculties, even to an experiment upon my words, and exercise a particle of faith, yea, even if ye can no more than desire to believe, let that desire work in you, even until ye believe in a manner that ye can give place for a portion of my words."
-Alma 32:27 (The Book of Mormon: Another Testement of Jesus Christ)

2)"I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know the the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the things which he commandeth them."
-1 Nephi 3:7 (The Book of Mormon: Another Testement of Jesus Christ)

3)"Have I not commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: fir the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest."
-Joshua 1:9 (Bible, New Testament)

    As we all grow up we are faced with choices to make, things to decide, and we must individually decide what direction we must follow to accomplish our own vision of who we should become. Everyone in the world is faced with hard times, and I have not been exempt. I'm not going to say I have had the worst, because that would be a lie! But if I said I have never had trials I would be lying as well.
    Now, I don't want to bore you all with the mundane stories of my life so for the sake of our attention spans I will focus on 2 decisions that have changed my life! beware, it could still be long, but hopefully it will be worth it.  
    When I was in High School I met a boy, we quickly became friends! Well this friendship grew into a relationship. Time moved on, we graduated from High School and went off to college. To make this story short, lets just say we were inseparable! We had become the best of best friends. We were there for each other through the big milestones of life including deaths in the family, marriages, crumbling relationships, and everything else in between! And than...we crumbled. I know this sounds like predictable teenage drama, but for me it was very real. The night that we broke up I felt as though my entire world was crashing down around me! I didn't know where to turn or who to talk to. Except Him. My Heavenly Father. At the time I didn't understand why all of this was happening, and what I had done to "deserve all this" so to speak. But looking back it all turned out to be revelatory.
That next Sunday my family and I went to church, just as we always do. But it will be a Sunday that I will NEVER forget. My parents needed to have an interview with our Bishop, to get a temple recommend (a sacred piece of paper that shows they are worthy to enter into  the temple). Well, my mom was in her meeting and a very special person, we will call him President N was waiting to interview my mom and he asked me if I needed to speak to him. I answered back no, and that was that. After President N talked with my mom, he came out and asked me again if I needed to talk to him! I again answered no and so he continued to talk to those in the hall when he again turned to me and asked "Jayne are you sure you don't want to talk?". This is where I kind of frustratedly answered "if you want to talk, lets talk, but I really don't think I need to talk to you!". So guess what happened... we talked. and that "talk" was divinely inspired. We talked about why I looked upset and had been crying, what kinds of things I was experiencing and so forth and than he asked if I would like a Priesthood blessing.A priesthood blessing is when a worthy authorized representative of Jesus Christ lays his hands on your head and under the authority of God, and the guidance of the Holy Ghost, the priesthood holder will give you a blessing, and tells you the things that God also called our Heavenly Father would have you hear, personally! We receive guidance for the whole world from Him through a prophet, but as His children, we are entitled to what we call personal revelation, or personal guidance! In this Priesthood blessing I was told that I needed to serve as a full time missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I came out of our discussion more upset than I went in. If I said I was stoked at the first though of a mission I again would be lying! But do you remember the story of Jonah and the whale and when he didn't follow God plan we was eaten by the whale? well, lets just say I didn't want to be eaten by anything! So.. after some thinking I decided if it was what He needed me to do I would do it and somewhere along the way I would find happiness. This is where the 1st scripture comes in. I wanted His will to be my will, but it had to take time! All I had was a desire I didn't quite have the genuine want yet. But I testify that if we only have a desire to believe and we ALLOW it to work in us instead of continually pushing it to the side, and we get up and act on "it" whatever "it" may be, it will grow and you will gain faith and understanding as to why it must be that way!
    So in my efforts to follow what I knew I needed to do I began to prepare my mission papers and about this time last year I received a call from the Prophet of God to serve a mission in the Philippines Quezon City Mission. This is where scripture 2 comes in. Since I was called to a different country, I would be required to speak another language! Tagalog! and I must admit when I first read it I pronounced it tag-a-long. haha silly me! But to be even more honest, I was so scared! It would be a different country,a different language, a completely different culture than I could even imagine! But I knew that I was called to serve in this beautiful country for a reason, and He would prepare a way for me to accomplish whatever it was that I needed to do!
    Even though my journey to the Philippines started out a little scary in my head, I grew to love the land and the people so quickly. I am forever grateful for the time that I had to spend over there! It has forever changed my life. The people are absolutely amazing and some of my closest friends. I was able to be made into an instrument in my Heavenly Fathers hands and having the privilege of witnessing miracles is the most humbling experience! Some of God choicest people are in the Philippines! I believe that with no doubt in my mind. You will not find a more kind people than the Filipinos! But I will spend some time in other posts talking about my experience as a missionary but for now we will leave it at being the best 6 months of my entire life. Hard, and challenging, but absolutely worth every second! And I have missed it every day since I have been home.
    But we must go to the 2nd decision that has changed my life.Coming home. Many of you may be familiar with how a mission works but for those of you who don't, girls are usually called to serve for 18months or a year and a half. And as I mentioned above my mission was the best 6 months of my life...
    Well, I am the youngest of 5 children. I have a sister who is only a few years older than me and she was born with what is called Chronic Kidney Disease, with a neurogenic bladder. Doctors didn't expect her to make it through puberty and she is now happily married and 24 years old. Well growing up she was always told that if she did survive she would eventually need a kidney transplant. Eventually is now. About this time last year my dear sister told the family that they would start testing those who were willing to be a donor, but according to her I was not allowed to consider it, because I was going to be a missionary. We were under the impression that if you lived outside of the country for more than a few months you were no longer eligible to be a donor. We know that Heavenly Father knows the beginning from the end and this would mean he didn't intend for me to be the donor, as I would be out of the country for quite a while. Well one preparation day I was emailing my mother and she was telling me how no one in the family was a match and they were starting to look at other options. So I decided to try and find out what my blood type was. Some have asked me what motivated me to get my blood typed. That I don't know, except for it being the spirit. But I do remember it was just a loud bold thought in my mind that I needed to find out what my blood type was. I also remember saying a prayer and telling Heavenly Father before I was tested that if I wasn't supposed to be a match and further the whole process, to not let me be a blood type match. That was in interesting day, which once again I will talk about that later on. But I was a match and so after having communication with my family, mission president and other church leaders and lots and lots of prayer it was decided that I needed to come home! I love being a missionary and I love my sister, it was a hard decision to come home, I needed to be strong, and I needed to have courage and it has been a decision I will never regret. This very rough journey back into the "real world" has changed my life. I have learned more fully how to rely on the Holy Ghost when I cant see more than a few steps in front of me. Since I have been home on this quest to save my sister life I have had some of the most tender of spiritual experiences and felt the love of my savior more abundantly in my every day life.
    Looking back I see that I needed to let go of the relationship to be in the right place to be called as a missionary, and I needed to be a missionary so that I could learn and grow in ways otherwise impossible, and I needed to come home so that I could learn what real love and charity actually meant. At the time of the trial things don't make sense, but as the saying goes "hind sight is 20-20". I wouldn't be where I am or who I am without these specific experiences and the people who are in my life. Each and every person including past relationships have lead me to where I am today.
    Now, one may be wondering why I have shared these things as an introduction to a blog, but what better way is there to introduce you to my life than the moments that have defined me the most! Some say that happiness is a destination. Times are hard but when we follow Him happiness becomes the journey. Welcome to my journey! :)

-XOXO-

P.s Jenny has now been approved for transplant and my last appointment is next week! And if all goes well, transplant will be 2-4 weeks after that!! Thank you SO much for all of your prayers in our behalf. There is power in prayer and we couldnt do this with out your faith, love and support! Thank you so so much!