August 20, 2012

hey mom!

i`m glad to hear you guys got out again! you sure have gone out a lot though, pretty sure we did nothing right  before my mission...haha but oh well, at least someone gets a vacation. it`ll be fun to go to yellowstone now and just chill, since here i don`t really ever get time to just chill haha. and i`m sure the showers you have are better than the one i have. it`s pretty pitiful, and there`s no temperature guage thing. it`s weird cause the water is really cold, especially in the morning, so it`s cold while i`m in the shower, but 2 minutes after i`m hot again and i have to keep the fan on me haha. i think i`m a little more used to the heat now. i still sweat a lot, but i`m pretty sure it`s gotten a little better after 7 months. i didn`t even realize that i hit 9 months the other day. time sure is going by faster than i thought! as far as the curfew goes, i always had a curfew, and for a long time you and dad would come search for me if i was late. i think maybe after my senior year it went to midnight, and on the weekends of my senior year, but always during the week and stuff i had a curfew. and you always told me to be home earlier on saturday night, even though i may have been late one or two times...:) i think after awhile you kinda just let me do whatever, but part of it was probably cause i worked until 10 30 at night, and i was going on a mission and stuff, so i don`t know, that`s tough. that`s one thing i`m not looking forward to as a parent haha. there comes a point where they need to just make decisions, and they`ll see the consequences. something i learned on the mission is that you`ll never learn to love the rules until you actually obey them and see the blessings you receive from following them. now the mission rules are a little different than a curfew, but i think the principle still applies. yeah it kind of sucks to have to come home a little earlier than your friends, but it only sucks in the moment. now i look back and i don`t even care. i`m sure i didn`t miss anything, and if i was out later we usually just did stupid things or nothing. i think the rules kept me safe, and maybe something would have happened if i never chose to obey them. not to say i`m perfect, but the rules aren`t there so that we can`t have fun, but because someone with more experience understands and wants to keep us safe. that probably doesn`t answer your question or help at all, but there`s my 2 bits.

so yeah changes are this week, and as i said i already know i`m going. as to where i don`t know, and i won`t know til wednesday, but i`m both excited and sad to leave. it was a hard sunday yesterday. we have these little "missionary minutes" during sacrament meeting, and it was my turn to talk. so i just told them that if someone didn`t know that me and my comp were leaving and 2 new sisters are coming, so if you see them in the street or something if you could say hi just so they know who the members are and can learn the area a little bit, but it was hard. i told them thanks for helping me and having me here, and for all they`ve done. it`s actually a lot harder to leave than i thought, especially with recent converts. we`ve kind of spent the week just saying goodbye`s and stuff, and it`s hard. i`ve met a lot of people here that i`m gonna miss. we went to see one of the recent converts and she almost cried, and it was tough to say bye. who knows if i`ll ever get to come back out here and see these people again. i really hope i can come back before i end my mission, cause i`ve made some really good friends here. we`re also leaving behind some really cool investigators and that`s hard too. the only thing i can think of is that we found these people so late because the hermanas coming have something for them that me and my comp don`t have. i already miss them and i`m not even gone yet. my first area was a lot easier just cause i never really talked to anyone and i didn`t see any baptisms or anything, but i was here for 4 months and learned how to speak and listen and made a lot of friends. we`ll probably go see one or two people tonight and tomorrow, and that`s it, we`ll leave tomorrow night at like midnight to get to Panamà on time. it`s tough to leave, but that`s how the mission goes i guess.

really that`s all that`s happened this week though. just trying to get a few things ready for the hermanas and saying bye and doing all that good stuff. we were blessed with having a baptism on saturday and that was super cool. i think i told you about him a little, that his sister invited us over to teach her family and he was reading the BOM and had a really good experience with prayer and just wanted to get baptized. he  had to do some talking with the mom, and she said yes on the conditions that he goes to school, to church and all the church activities too. he agreed and so she said it`s ok. so we taught a few more things, watched this movie on the prophet one night, on the Lord`s errand i think? and it was really good. it was a super good baptism, his cousin came and something just hit him i guess cause he just started crying after the baptism and he felt something. he lives in another area, but it was still cool to see. so that was a good little farewell present, but me and him became good friends so it`s hard to leave him too.

this week was really just a sad week haha. we also met this other lady and she was sad. we just contacted her, and we were just casually talking for a bit, and i don`t remember how it got to this point, but we started talking about family and stuff and she shared how her nephew had just died a month ago, but he was like a son to her. she said he had a really good relationship with her 5 year old daughter, and when she found out he died she just changed. she doesn`t want to do homework anymore or even eat, and is just super sad. the lady was just crying the whole time and even i almost did (which is big since you know i never cry :) but it was sad. i wanted to help her, and i know what we have can, but it was still hard. i can`t bring back her nephew or make her daughter eat, but i want to help somehow. so it`s hard having to leave people like her behind, but i`m hoping the hermanas can help. i really am leaving a lot of trust in the hermanas that are coming, just with my investigators and converts and stuff, but that just made me realize that i also need to be good and take care of the converts in the area that i`m going to. i want people to be like "oh good elder paskett is coming, he`ll take care of my converts" so i need to make sure i`m doing what i can to make that happen.

that about wraps it up though. it was a fairly quiet week, mostly just of goodbyes and stuff. i`m excited for a change and i hope it`s good, but i`m really gonna miss this area. i hope everyone does well. and i hope you have an awesome week too. good luck with school,  i`m sure it`ll all work out well. thanks for everything, talk to you next week!

much love,

elder paskett

August 13, 2012

hey mom! 

well, here`s the thing with the covers. next monday will be my last day here, and so that will be the last time i see anyone in the branch here. i guess what will have to happen is if you can send some to me, and i can just give them to the office to send to the missionaries here to give to the members that wanted them. but yeah just let me know what you find, thanks!  and yeah usain bolt may be cocky, but he is the fastest man in the world haha. i heard about the men`s 400, and that the usa was actually winning? but usain came back and won it, so he is just insanely fast. i`m glad the basketball turned out well too. i`m bummed i never got to see a game, even if they just killed everyone. the nba will be starting somewhat soon too, so i`m gonna be missing a lot of basketball haha, but oh well, it`s all good.

but this week ended up being a little interesting. well so the zone`s been having a few problems between all the missionaries, just between them fighting and having emergency changes and all this stuff. it finally got really bad when the zl caught 4 other elders out at midnight planning on going to the sister`s house to have a sleepover thing. yeah things aren`t very good here haha. i always thought before the mission that missionaries were perfect and never did anything bad, but boy was i wrong. so last monday we just went to the church to play basketball and whatnot, but no one showed up. there were like 6 of us, so we just basically played cards all day. it was really boring, just a waste of a pday. but that night something really cool happened...

so we got home and did planning and got ready for bed and stuff, and someone called like a little before 10. it was a member, and only her and her sister are members, i don`t know if i mentioned them, but she invited us to go teach her family. so we had taught them like 2 times before, but she called us monday night and told us a really cool story. so her little brother, who is 12, was reading this picture book version of the BOM, and just had this really strong desire to pray (coincidentally enough he was reading the story of Enos) and so he got down and prayed about everything that we`ve taught and asked all the questions, and she said he just started to cry and cry. so he ended his prayer and got up, but just couldn`t stop crying. so he got down again and prayed and thanked Heavenly Father for giving him his answer. and so that experience was the saturday before the other sunday, like the 4th? and he said he just knew he had to go to church, so he got up all by himself to go to church the next day, and had a really good time and just knew it was all true. so she called us the day after, so last monday, and told us that and asked if we could come by the next day. of course we said yes, so we went by, and talked to him and stuff, and he told us the experience he had and how good he felt and how he really wanted to go to church and everything. midway through the lesson the sister was like "so my brother has some news to share," and he just said "i want to get baptized." it was way cool! so we set the fecha and everything, taught him some more that week, and he came to church yesterday and liked it again. but the sister told us that the mom doesn`t really want him to get baptized just cause he`s so young and doesn`t know everything, so that`s kind of a problem. we`re going by tonight to see if we can`t talk with her, so i`m hoping that it all goes well!

another cool thing happened yesterday too. i think i told you about the lady that we had the lesson with about the plan of salvation and how she really liked it. so we passed by this last friday to talk with her some more but she said she was really busy and couldn`t talk with us. so i was kinda bummed but we just invited her to church and said it would be awesome if she could go. she said she`d do everything possible to go, and we left. so now it`s sunday, and i like to just hang out by the doors until the first hymn, just to see if there are any late stragglers. and yesterday that turned out to be the right thing. she showed up about 5 minutes late, and i was way excited. so we said hi, and then went and sat down. the meeting turned out really well. they talked a little bit about the temple, having hope in the world even through hard times, it was just a good meeting. so afterward i was just chatting with her, and she said she really liked the meeting cause she felt she could relate to a lot of things and she really enjoyed it. and then she just started crying. i know she really felt the Spirit there. so we asked if she`d like to come to the next class, and she said of course. so we went, and we have a class for the investigators, and today it was on the temple and family history. it was perfect! we read some cool scriptures and talked a little bit, and it was just good. we could tell that she really loves her family and that they mean a lot to her, and then she shared after that her husband had died awhile back, and had had a dream about him and he was all dressed in white. she started crying again, and she gave a really good prayer to end, thanking Heavenly Father for this feeling that she has that she`s never felt before, and for all the things she`s learned and everything, it was just awesome! plus she met a ton of old friends that she hadn`t seen for a long time in the ward so that was cool too. we`re going by this week and so hopefully we can bring the same spirit then too!

we also learned an interesting thing this week. so saturday we went to paint this building, but before the zl asked me and my comp if we wanted to know if we had changes or not. i was worried cause i thought that meant we were staying, but surprise! we`re actually both going! and they`re gonna put 2 new sisters here instead! that really was such a surprise! i had no idea why. i was talking to the zl after and he said president said it`s just cause he doesn`t want to leave my comp here...but it`s kinda sad. the area is a little cold, but we do have a couple of cool people now and i have a ton of friends here. it`ll definitely be hard to leave. but oh well, i`m excited to get to know some other places. we still don`t know where we`re going, and we won`t know til next wednesday, but he said we need to clean the house and leave good notes and stuff so the sisters have a smooth transition.

that about wraps it up though. it was a pretty good week. me and my comp still aren`t doing great, mostly just with the language and stuff, but i`m ready to get a new comp. anyway i`m glad everything is going well, i`m always happy to hear it :) i hope this week is awesome as well, and we`ll talk next week!

much love,

elder paskett

August 6, 2012

hey mom!

well i`m always glad to hear the good stuff. it`s nice to have a little pick-me-up and see that everyone is doing well. that is really interesting with the jazz, it sounds like it`s gonna be a completely different team when i get back. oh well, i still have high hopes that they`ll be good. i wonder what happened with cj, he was never great but i liked him. they`ll just have to work for a few years and we`ll see where they end up. that`s an awesome story with the car though! it`s too bad karissa never got to really drive it, she`ll never quite understand having such a crappy car haha, but it was time for it to go. it was a good car and served its purpose, but it had to go sometime :) and i guess i can understand where karissa is coming from. i do sometimes look back and think how much more fun i could have had my senior year, but at the same time i realized that high school was kinda dumb and i could have taken a lot more opportunities to study harder and stuff, so it`s a tough situation. it makes sense, but i think there could probably be regrets either way. maybe it`s just a pick your poison thing, although both are good too haha, i don`t know. i guess as long as she`s happy that`s all you can do right? that`s really intersting with chic-fil-a too. that`s good for the owner though. down here we always have a problem with churches haha. like one church, out of the millions, always pushes and says that church doesn`t matter and the church is really just yourself, they say "la iglesia eres tu," and everyone agrees, so it`s really hard to get people to see the importance of the church. but oh well, ¿así es la misiòn no? :)

well this week was ok i guess. not really anything too interesting happened. so there`s this one girl in the ward, and her and her sister are the only members in their family, so she invited us over the other day to have a little lesson with them. we`ve taught them twice now, and the first lesson was just awesome. we talked about prophets and the importance of them, and when we got to joseph smith the Spirit just came big time. usually saying the first vision always brings the Spirit, and that time was no different. i really hoped the mom and son felt it, but after the lesson we were talking to one of the sisters and she said we did a really good job. so we passed by last saturday just to invite them to church and see how they were doing, and the son had been reading the BOM and liked it, the mom still hadn`t but she`s still cool. so yesterday the brother came to church and seemed to like it. so i want to have like a get together thing where all the youth meet together and we go leave with them and see a less active or another youth that didn`t come, and then go play soccer or something after, just cause i want him to feel like he has friends. the sister told us that he likes the church and wants to get baptized, he just doesn`t feel like going to church some days, so i think having some friends would help with that.

on monday we were just contacting and walking around at like 8 30 at night, when this drunk dude tried to stop us in the street. i don`t really like talking to drunk guys, cause just five minutes later they`re gonna forget they even talked to us and nothing will ever happen. but this guy was really determined. he stopped us, gave us the same routine, he really needs help and wants us to do something, so i was like alright we`ll just come by your house later cause we can`t talk when you`re drunk. so he was like ok come to my house, and we walked with him to his house, and he just seemed really happy we came with him. so we left him a pamphlet, set up another visit and said we`d come back. so we went back, and we ended up having a super good lesson with him. he really seemed genuine and wanted to change, so we left him some homework to read and whatnot and said we`d come back again. i feel bad though, cause someone called us to visit someone, and we said that`s fine but we`ll have to leave soon cause we had a visit with that guy. so we went, had a lesson, but after the lady gave us food. we couldn`t really tell her no, so we just had to eat it. so we ended up missing that visit with him cause we were so late. so i felt really bad, and we want by the next day and he seemed really concerned as to why we didn`t pass by the night before. we tried to explain but he still looked disappointed. i asked for his number, and he said he`d call us if we could come by the next day, saturday, and talk some more. he didn`t call, so i tried calling saturday night to invite him to church but he didn`t answer. so he didn`t come to church yesterday, and i feel bad. i hope we didn`t lose him.

we met another cool lady too. we were just contacting, and we stopped at this one house and this lady came out. she was nice enough, and so we chatted for a bit, but her whole demeanor changed when we started talking about families and the plan of salvation. she ended up telling us afterward that usually when missionaries come by she just says that she`s busy and just come by another day, but when she saw us something just told her to let us in and talk. we talked about the plan, and she just seemed super interested and just loved it. ya know it took me leaving my family for me to realize how much i love them and how grateful i am for the plan of salvation. i guess just sharing the plan all the time has made me appreciate it more, and so i want everyone else to have the same thing. there`s the one saying among missionaries, that "missionaries leave their families for 2 years, so others can be together forever," and i really like that :)

yesterday a couple was talking to me and asked if i could have you guys send me some temple recommend covers. they wanted the ones that like flip out and have pictures on front of like the temples or joseph smith or something, if you know what i mean, and they wanted like a lot. i said i think they were like 2 bucks, and so he said he wanted like 20 if they were that cheap. i don`t know why, but he wanted them. so i don`t know if you could investigate that a little and see how much they are. if it`s too much of a hassle, then don`t worry, but yeah that would be great :)

i should tell you really quick about my chat with my comp. so fridays are our planning days where we sit down and talk about everyone we have and what we need to do to help them and whatnot, and they`re usually pretty productive. it`s also a good chance to talk with your comp about whatever is happening in the companionship too. so i finally just talked to him. i asked him what he thinks we need to do better, how i can help him with spanish, what i can do better, just everything so that we can see some success this change. the thing is is his answers were just very vague and general. he just said like nothing or i need to study or you`re doing good, but wouldn`t really help me out. it`s hard cause he just has no desire to work or sacrifice or anything, and he`s content with just the very bare minimums. i told him i would just follow him one day, contacting and teaching and everything, and he just told me if i follow him we`d just walk around one day, and we really did for awhile. i don`t know how to instill a desire in him. it`s really hard.

but that`s about it. it was a fairly intersting week. we`ve met a few cool people so i`ve got some high hopes for this week, and so we`ll see how it goes. i`m glad everything is going well at home, as always, it makes me happy. i hope everyone has a great week, and i`ll talk to you later!

much love,

elder paskett