Relief Society

As women, we are strong, and we want to seem that way. We don't want to ask for help because we think that we would look weak, we wouldn't be being strong if we ask for help. This is NOT TRUE!!! Relief Society is a society of sisters who provide relief. How does one provide relief? By seeing that there is a need and doing what they can to help. If we need help, we should ask for it. I mean, isn't that the point of Relief Society? To help and get help? As women, we feel the need to be superwoman and to do everything all by ourselves, but let me tell you a secret...all superheros have aside kick, i.e. Batman and Robin, to help them. We need to learn to be humble as the Lord has commanded and let someone help us. No matter how little or stupid you thing it is, even if you just need a hug, there is a group of women eagerly waiting for you to ask for their help. We don't have to be strong all the time.

Alma 23

I read Alma 23 last night. It talks about the Lamanite king and his entire household becoming converted and then the king made it illegal to mess with Ammon, Aaron, Omner, and Himni (the prophets at the time), who then went tracking. Seven cities of Lamanites ended up converting, repenting, and laying down their weapons of war. It got me thinking...what are weapons of war? I thought about bows and arrows, cimeters...those kinds of things mentioned in the Book of Mormon. But we don't use those anymore. So what ARE weapons of war?

I got to thinking, and the thought came to me that choosing the right is often referred to as a battle against Satan. In a sense, I guess "weapons of war" could be our choices, our actions. While wrong choices might not causes physical bloodshed or harm, they cause harm to our Spirits.

Sister Dibb told a story during the General Young Women Broadcast on Saturday about a man who went to his neighbor's farm to steal some corn one evening. "He took his little boy with him to sit on the fence and keep a look-out, so as to give warning in case anyone should come along. The man jumped over the fence with a large bag on his arm, and before commencing to take the corn, he looked all around. First one way, and then the other. And not seeing any person, he was just about to fill his bag. The boy then called out, 'Father, there is one way you haven't looked yet! You forgot to look up!'"

When we are tempted to do something wrong, we tend to think that it's not going to hurt anyone, what's the big deal? Who's going to find out anyway? But sin ALWAYS hurts the one doing it, and most of the time, it hurts someone else too, whether we realize it or not. We also hurt God; we disappoint Him. Alma 23:7 says about the converted Lamanites, "...they did lay down the weapons of their rebellion, that they did not fight against God any more..." God has commanded us to be humble and repent. We should also lay down our "weapons of war," our rebellion, our sins, everything...I believe that that is the way back to the Celestial Kingdom, where we can live with our Heavenly Father once more.

Taco Bell Adventures

My dad and I were at Taco Bell the other day, and I'm eating my food when my dad seemingly randomly gets up, walks over to this elderly couple, and starts talking to the husband (I later found out his name is Joe). I'm watching them and wondering what my dad's doing, when I see the husband basically go blank and stop responding to anything my dad says. He did it again a couple minutes later, so my dad (a paramedic) called 911. From what he and his wife, this has never happened before. They told my dad that Joe takes medication for high blood pressure, but the medication doesn't cause this type of reaction in someone.

My dad knew the life squad crew (part time firefighters, part time ambulance) that showed up because they work at the same station. They hooked Joe up to a bunch of stuff to monitor his heart rate and stuff, which was low but not something to be worried about. They were giving my dad problems because, of course, once they got there Joe was fine other than his slightly low vitals. They finally convinced Joe to let them take him to the hospital. They had him walk, like, 2 feet to a chair that was easier for them to get to him and get him onto a gurney (he and his wife were sitting in chairs up against the window with their backs to it, the table in front of them, and two more chairs facing them and the window), and Joe froze up and became unresponsive again. When he did that, the life squad crew looked at my dad and asked, "This what you were talking about?" ...yup! And when he came to, his heart rate and blood pressure was even lower, like, less than 100/40, and his heart rate was, like, 40 bpm. Joe lost all option on if he was or wasn't going to the hospital...he WAS GOING!

I haven't heard any news on how Joe's doing. I hope he's ok and that the doctors figured out what was going on and were able to fix it. My dad told me later that he went over there because he saw Joe with his head down on the table, unresponsive, and his paramedic instincts just kinda kicked in. I really do hope Joe is ok, but I couldn't help but smile as I suppressed a giggle as I thought of the irony when I saw the ambulance pull into the Taco Bell parking lot.

~Sister Jones!~

No lies, I completely love this lady. Sister Jones was called to serve on the General Young Women Board a few years ago, I guess...I'm not completely sure when. It's crazy for me to think that it's been almost a year since I met her. I was attending Snow College at the time; it was my 4th semester there. This one Friday, I was running a tad late for Friday Forum (an hour-long Institute class only on Fridays with a guest speaker), as always. It was the last Friday of March.

I left my house, like, 2 minutes before it was supposed to start, and proceeded to walk the block and a half to the Institute. I had no idea who the speaker was going to be, but I remember that the closer I got to the Institute, the more excited I became to listen to the speaker to the point that I was practically sprinting toward the Institute.

The speaker turned out to be Sister Jones. I don't remember what she talked about; in fact, if you asked me right after she finished speaking, I still wouldn't be able to tell you. But I DO remember how I felt. Ever since I started attending church, I was always told that I'm a beautiful daughter of God. I always knew it in my head, but it never clicked, I never had a testimony of it, until that day. She was the first one to actually make me feel beautiful, the first one who's testimony of it I felt.

The next evening was the General Young Women Broadcast. I don't know that it's possible to feel more beautiful, to feel more loved, than I did those two days. Sister Jones, along with the General Young Women Presidency (Sisters Dalton, Cook, and Dibb), are AMAZING, inspired women of God. If you ever get the chance to listen to them speak, TAKE FULL ADVANTAGE!!!

My New Life

Last week (Tuesday night), I was straightening my hair before I left for Ohio the next morning. I don't like to get up in the morning, so I didn't really want to have to deal with it when I got up. I was listening to a bunch of Mormon Messages on lds.org in hopes to learn something I guess, and one video struck me in particular:

It got me thinking...how sad would it be to not be able to play with your kids in the snow because you were in too much pain? I was on edge. It didn't sit right with me that she was physically struggling so much.

The next morning, I went to work with my mom in Berkeley. I figured out that I could save a little change on BART if I catch it at the North Berkeley station, which is a 5-minute walk from my mom's work, than if I caught it from the Pleasant Hill station, which is up the street from my house. My mom couldn't take off work to drop me off at the San Francisco airport, and BART would dropped me off out front. Before I left for BART and the airport, my mom and I were talking. Stephanie's story still wasn't sitting right with me, but I hadn't told my mom about it. We somehow got to talking about my plan to go into the military and more possible job options for me. My mom was a nurse in the U.S. Army for a while, and she told me that if she could go back and do it again, she'd want to work in a burn unit. I was even more unsettled, and the more I thought about it, the worse the feeling got.

When I got to Ohio, I was talking to my dad, a firefighter/paramedic, about it. He said that he heard about something interesting, and then showed me the following video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXO_ApjKPaI. And then it clicked. I thought that the skin gun was great...for people with fresh burns. But what about people like Stephanie, for whom it's too late to use it for? I got this idea...what if you could somehow remove the scar tissue and THEN use the skin gun? I guess it'd basically be like plastic surgery, but you'd be made out of yourself instead of plastic.

Earlier today, I saw this video of her: http://www.oprah.com/relationships/Blogger-Stephanie-Nielsons-Daily-Struggles-Video. The littlest things are a huge struggle. Having to stretch out her skin every morning can't feel all that good. And I mean, not only do showers hurt, but she can't lift or hold her kids very well? REALLY??? I think about the skin gun and wonder how I can use it to help her and somehow fix her scars and repair her nerves so she doesn't have to be in so much pain. I think that once I figure this out, my world will be a happy place once more. :)

who knooows?

Ya ever get into one of those moments when someone is reading something out loud to someone else, like, on the computer or whatever, and you wanna tell them something? So you wait til they finish a sentence, start to tell them something, and they treat you like you're an idiot, all asking you, "Was I reading?" as if trying to punish you like a little kid for interrupting them, when they in turn interrupted you in the middle of your sentence? Um, yeah...I'm not sure how to react to that. I gave them time to finish and went into my room to change out of my pjs and into what I'm gonna wear today, figuring that since they said they were almost done, it'd be enough time for them to finish reading. I thought that, since they knew I had something to say, they'd let me know when they were done and tell me when it was a better time for me to talk.

Now one of them is gone and the other is watching tv. On a commercial, I asked him about it. I brought up a good point, he told me that I'm splitting hairs, and then he un-muted the tv. I mumbled something about him not caring, and he asked me what I said. My thing is that if it mattered to him what I said, why would he have un-muted the tv, if he really wanted to know? He told me that they can't read my mind, they don't know what I'm thinking, and I don't expect them to. But I still thought it would have been some sort of common courtesy. :P I mean, I can't read their minds either, I don't know when they're done!

Any ideas on how I can see this differently? Any ideas on how I can better understand where they might have been coming from? I know I wrote this kind of sarcastically, but I really do want other perspectives!

Sensei

I just got back from the dojo that my dad goes to, and the sensei said a few things that really struck me. Speaking of martial arts, he said:

• your greatest opponent is not the person you see across from you, but the person you see in the mirror
  
• the more impatient you become with something, the more you push it away
• good enough is the enemy of excellence