Arizona is pretty much
amazing! I'm having a great time here! I got here on Wednesday, but my first
morning to study was Thursday, so starting Thursday morning I've made it all
the way from 1 Nephi, all the way to Alma 45! So that's pretty awesome! I'm just
trying to make it all the way through one last time before I really start to
dig into it! I'm loving it here! It's
kind of frustrating at times though, but no one ever said it wouldn't be right?
So I'm just pushing along taking things one step at a time!
You said you wanted to know what a normal day for me looks like, right dad? Well, first off let me tell me about the situation. I am white washing my area. That means my companion and I don't know a thing about the area because we're brand new to it. Our area was just split, so the area book, which tells us about all the work that's already been done and still needs to be done, is completely blank. And! our phone is completely blank. We are completely blind and don't know what's going on! That's pretty frustrating sometimes. Oh, and it was whitewashed the transfer before, so it makes it even harder.
So on a normal day we wake up at 5:45 and jog down to the stake center and play some sort of sport until 7. Then we go back home and shower/eat breakfast. Then we study from 8 - 11... After studies we usually walk down to Taco bell or McDonald's or some authentic Mexican place and have lunch. After that we go back home, get our bikes, and bike to our church building where we park our bikes. By then it's about 1. So at 1:00 we start going to inactives and members houses just try getting in doors to get to know people and share a message with them. We've been having fairly good success with that. We actually started out with 2 investigators so we go see them every once in a while. We have a family from the Congo and the kids are the only ones really interested, but their parents won't let them get baptized. Their names are Aline (16), Francine(11), Cedric (7), and Jonathon (5). They are all super awesome and they're hilarious too! Cedric actually lied about his age so that he could be baptized. He was saying that he was 18! Haha, that kid’s a stud! Our other investigator is a lady named Glenda! She's fairly old, maybe 70, but she believes everything about our church. She's read the Book of Mormon several times, and she's been to church several times. The only problem she has is that she prefers to listen to a preacher give a sermon rather than our sacrament meeting. She understands the purpose of sacrament meeting, she just likes a sermon better. She loves the 2nd and 3rd hour meetings though because it's more of a class and she can input and ask questions and all that, but ya... that's Glenda for ya!
You said you wanted to know what a normal day for me looks like, right dad? Well, first off let me tell me about the situation. I am white washing my area. That means my companion and I don't know a thing about the area because we're brand new to it. Our area was just split, so the area book, which tells us about all the work that's already been done and still needs to be done, is completely blank. And! our phone is completely blank. We are completely blind and don't know what's going on! That's pretty frustrating sometimes. Oh, and it was whitewashed the transfer before, so it makes it even harder.
So on a normal day we wake up at 5:45 and jog down to the stake center and play some sort of sport until 7. Then we go back home and shower/eat breakfast. Then we study from 8 - 11... After studies we usually walk down to Taco bell or McDonald's or some authentic Mexican place and have lunch. After that we go back home, get our bikes, and bike to our church building where we park our bikes. By then it's about 1. So at 1:00 we start going to inactives and members houses just try getting in doors to get to know people and share a message with them. We've been having fairly good success with that. We actually started out with 2 investigators so we go see them every once in a while. We have a family from the Congo and the kids are the only ones really interested, but their parents won't let them get baptized. Their names are Aline (16), Francine(11), Cedric (7), and Jonathon (5). They are all super awesome and they're hilarious too! Cedric actually lied about his age so that he could be baptized. He was saying that he was 18! Haha, that kid’s a stud! Our other investigator is a lady named Glenda! She's fairly old, maybe 70, but she believes everything about our church. She's read the Book of Mormon several times, and she's been to church several times. The only problem she has is that she prefers to listen to a preacher give a sermon rather than our sacrament meeting. She understands the purpose of sacrament meeting, she just likes a sermon better. She loves the 2nd and 3rd hour meetings though because it's more of a class and she can input and ask questions and all that, but ya... that's Glenda for ya!
After we spend all afternoon trying to get into a door, a
member feeds us every night, so that's really nice! After dinner we usually go
talk to inactives since people are more likely to be home in the evenings. It’s pretty fun to see which ones will let us
in and which ones want nothing to do with the church. That's pretty much a normal day for us! Oh,
and at the beginning of the day, right after breakfast, we go across the street
to a place that sells water, and missionaries get free water there! So we go fill our gallon jugs and try to
drink a gallon a day! We do this so hopefully
we don't have any kidney problems because of dehydration. We're drinking tons of water!
Oh! I forgot to mention, my
companion’s name is Elder Parker! He's awesome! At first I wasn't quite sure
about him, but the past couple of days have been a blast and absolutely
hilarious! I love that guy to death! I can't even describe his humor, it's just
toe different. Haha!
I love all the people I've been
meeting down here! They're all super cool! Today on our way to the stake center
we rode our bikes along-side a guy riding his bike who only had one arm, and
the better arm was cut off at the wrist.
That was pretty sweet to see! He just had a backward pedal brake!
Elder Anderson who was in my
MTC district actually lives in the same apartment as me right now! So that's
pretty fun! I've seen pretty much everyone from my MTC district except Elders
Rowley and Karlinsey, but they're clear out like an hour and a half away in the
far east part of Apache Junction and on one of the Indian reservations, so I
guess I'll excuse them for that one. Sister Harris and I had a party playing
basketball with a few of the other Elders. She kills me every time though,
because she used to play for BYU.. She's pretty boss at b-ball.
My companion, Elder Parker, is
huge into basketball. He's got the shoes,
and the jerseys, and the socks, everything…except his game... haha! No, he's really good at basketball, but
Sister Harris beats him almost every time, so I guess since a girl can beat him
so much he isn't that good. Haha!
He actually has a little
brother, 7 little sisters and 3 older brothers, so that's pretty crazy!!! I
guess I just have a thing for getting companions with tons of siblings, because
Elder Rowley had I think 9 or 10, I'll have to check my journal for that. I can't really remember.
I'm having a really good time
in Arizona right now, but I miss home sometimes, usually at night when I'm
trying to fall asleep. I'm not really stressing out, because working at McDonald's was about 10x
more stressful than a mission. I would much rather be doing this if it was 100%
based on stress levels. Basically if stress were from 1-10, 10 being the most
stress, McDonald's would be about a 9, mission would be about 7, and being involved
with music and meeting deadlines and getting to rehearsals and performances and
preparing for auditions and being in 4 ensembles and all of that trying to
juggle it all, I would put as about a 5.535934789762. All of them are a ton of
fun, but sometimes it just gets too stressful.
The higher the stress, the more frequently it gets overwhelming. It's
not too bad out here! You’ve just got to
learn how to handle your stress and just take things one thing at a time. Don't
take everything you have for the next 2 weeks and think about all that stuff
you have to do. Just write it all down
on a calendar or whatever so you don't forget it, but do things one thing at a
time. So instead of saying I have this project, and this homework, and this
test, and I have this class that I need to catch up in, and this is coming up,
and it's all happening so soon, just say, “I have this homework, I’ve just got
to work on it.” Then when that's out of the way, move to the next thing. I'm
pretty much rambling at this point. Just
don't freak out over things that don't need to be freaked out over.
I love you all. You should all send me tons of letters so I
can make Elder Foulger totes jelly when I have more mail than him (He's the
only one whose gotten any mail this week) I'll send my mom my address when I
get it, I don't know it right now, but I'll send it in a letter today or tomorrow.
Love,
Elder Mullins!
No comments:
Post a Comment