Blessed

Today I’ve been thinking a lot.  Surprised?  Well, don’t be.  I happen to think about a lot of things.  It’s Sunday and time to reflect on a lot of things and today I’ve been reflecting on how blessed I am.  I think about this quite a bit and I surprise myself by thinking something new every time.  

As we were walking to church yesterday morning (it’s about a 30 minute walk) I was looking at the scenery around me.  It’s nothing like anywhere I’ve ever seen in America.  I can’t take my eyes off the sidewalk as I walk because I’m afraid I’ll step in some sort of Animal poop.  I suddenly because so grateful for how clean my country is.  I’ve always taken that for granted.  I’ve never thought about it before but I will think of it from now on.

(In no particular order)

I’m blessed to attend a university.  Just to attend any sort of university is a blessing but I’m double-y blessed because I attend BYU-Idaho.  I get to go to school and receive a temporal education that gives me so much knowledge about the world around me PLUS helps me grow spiritually.  I have friends there that share my values and beliefs and I am blessed to know they care about me and love me, no matter what.

I’m blessed to have a sound mind.  I learn things quickly and I can understand them.  Everything I learn in school is preparing me to make a difference in the world.  Whether I get a full-time job in my field right after graduation or not, I’ll have that knowledge forever.  I can influence those around me.  I am blessed to live in a place where I can express my opinion if I want and where I can teach others the things I have learned.

I’m blessed to have learned how to read and write.  I can’t even imagine what the world would look like if you couldn’t read or write.  Actually, I assume it would be much like going to a foreign country!  Except you’d be there all the time and always have to rely on others to get by and help you out.  I love books and I love reading.  I’m blessed to have a plethora of books at home to choose from, as well as a library close by to satisfy whatever learning cravings I have.

I’m blessed to live on the same continent and in the same country as so much church history.  I’m a three hour drive from Kirtland, nine from Palmyra and the Sacred Grove, 12 (?) from Nauvoo and Carthage and a mere 30 hours to Salt Lake City.  I’ve visited all of these places and benefited from the things they’ve taught me.  Most of the people here will never get to experience even one of those sites and I’ve been to them all.

I’m blessed to have a home and family.  I have a dad who’s always had a solid job and has been able to provide for us.  We’ve always had the temporal necessities and we’ve been able to have fun as well.  I’ve never had to worry where my next meal will come from, I’ve never had to eat the same thing every single day, I’ve never had to rely on only the food I could grow in my backyard and I’ve never gone a day without food if I was hungry.  I’ve never been without hot water, soap, a toothbrush or toothpaste, clean socks, shoes that fit me or anything like that.  I’ve always had chocolate in the cupboard and ice cream in the freezer if I was craving something sweet and delicious.  I have a mom who’s been able to stay at home and take care of me when I was sick.  I’ve had medicine stocked in the cupboard for any type of illness that arose, and if we didn’t have it I’ve always had a doctor close by who I could visit.

I’m blessed to have a house that is more than big enough to fit my family.  I’m blessed that it has hot, running water and that it smells good.  I’m blessed to have tile floors and carpets that clean easily.  I’m blessed to own cleaning products so that when I’m not feeling lazy I can clean the house (or apartment, or wherever I’m living).

I’m blessed to have my own bed.  I have blankets to keep me warm and a pillow to rest my head. 

I’m blessed to have parents that are married and who have stayed married.  I’m blessed they have continually worked on their marriage and persevered through any rough patches.  I’m blessed they both have parents that are married and who set good examples for good relationships.  I’m blessed to have both sets of grandparents still alive, working, and laughing.  They are all wonderful and have so much to share with me.  I know I don’t take full advantage of them and their knowledge.

I’m blessed to know how to operate a computer…and then to own my own computer.  You can learn so much about the world just by logging onto the internet!  Most of the kids I work with can’t operate a computer.  It’s almost incomprehensible that a child doesn’t know how to type or look up a useless, funny YouTube video.  

  

I’m blessed to have good health.  Besides the occasional cold and runny nose, there hasn’t been much wrong with me.  I have to go to the chiropractor sometimes but that’s almost a blessing since it feels so ridiculously amazing.  As mentioned earlier, whenever I do feel bad, I can go to a doctor.  A specialist if I have to.  And then I can get whatever medicine they prescribe.

I’m blessed with shoes that fit me.  I’m blessed with more than one pair of shoes.  I have my old tennis shoes for dirty work, my new tennis shoes (which aren’t looking too hot since they came to Peru with me), more than enough heels and flats, some sturdy winter boots for the cold months and even a nice cute pair.  I’m blessed that my tennis shoes have shoelaces and my shoes with straps and buckles have those in working condition.

I’m blessed to have grown up in an area with clean drinking water.  I don’t have to purchase or boil all water I ingest.  Even if I don’t like the taste of it, I can turn on a faucet and drink to my heart’s desire.

I’m blessed to have grown up in a country with peanut butter.  Seriously, how does anyone live without that stuff??  And nutella.  I’ve just discovered that in college and don’t know how I thought my life was complete before it.

Oh there is so much more I could write about but I’ll stop there.  These are just a few of the things I was thinking about.  Now, don't think I've never realized these before and I'm having some huge epiphany because I'm in Peru.  I've known my entire live how blessed I've been and I try not to take it for granted.  BUT some things I now have a new appreciation for and feel even MORE blessed.  I don’t know how I got so lucky, but it’s the cards I’ve been dealt and I am so grateful!!

Time is Ticking

Have you ever thought of how time came to be?  Time in the sense of seconds, minutes, hours and days is really quite a miracle when you think about it!  Even just a few hundred years ago there was time in the Native American Americas and then separate time in Europe and another time in Africa and another time in Australia.  Heck, it was different time from Spain to Portugal or any neighboring country.  Every culture had their own way of measuring or keeping track of time.

When did the world click?  What was the point at which I, in Idaho, looked at my watch that says 5:00pm and someone in Utah looked at their watch and it said 5:00pm?  Then halfway across the world someone looked at their watch and said it's 5:00am...but on the next day?

How do millions and millions of watches everywhere tick around a little circle EXACTLY at the same time?!  How did we go from sundials to tell us what time of day it is to something that wraps around our wrist?  THIS IS DRIVING ME CRAZY!!!  Now that's you're thinking about it, isn't it AMAZING?!?!

I've just been marveling recently about how awesome man is.  How creative he is.  How inspired he must be.  There's no way man could think of all these things on his own.  He just isn't that smart.  As smart as man is, I just don't think a man alone could coordinate all those watches!

A Day of Thanks

(In no particular order...)

1.  Cars, planes and means of traveling long distances in short amounts of time
2. Telephones (and the people who built all those telephone lines in the middle of nowhere)
3. The temple and what it represents
4. Whitney, Alexis, Lauren, Brittany, Hillary, Bailee, Jamie, Audra, Kadi and all other previous roommates
5. BYU-Idaho
6. The admissions office (first, for letting me come to BYUI and, more recently, for my job and the great people that work there.)
7. My family and their support in whatever I decide to do
8. Green Bay.  The people there.  Cheese.  Cheeseheads.  Seroogy's chocolate.
9. Fireplaces and fake fireplaces
10. Laptops, email, facebook, blogs and other ways to quickly communicate with people all over the world.
11. My professors
12. Food...mostly delicious food
13. PERU!  New experiences.
14. Warm socks, sweatpants and sweatshirts
15. My ancestors
16. Late night movies.  Movies to procrastinate homework.  Musicals.  Classics.  Classic musicals.
17. The Classy Clarke men.  You know who you are.
18. Classy parties
19. Beginners Rec. Volleyball.  3-0!
20. Spatulas
21. Crafts
22. Books that warm my heart
23. My faith
24. Modern-day prophets and apostles.  Modern-day revelation.
25. Shawnee High School
26. Board games...Rummikub, Cribbage, Quelf, Catch Phrase, Mastermind
27. Cameras, pictures, scrapbooks
28. Missionaries- Elder Chris Tucker, Sister Kimberly Tucker, Sister Kadi Baggett, Elder Nate Smith, Elder Taylor Haycock, Elder Myles Johnson, Elder Aaron Curth, Sister Lexi Bramwell and more
29.  Stoplights
30. Vision and hearing
31. Cinnamon and the smell of cinnamon
32. Fingernail clippers
33. Conditioner
34. Days off of school
35. Good health and a sound mind
36. Birthdays and the chance to grow older and wiser
37. Movies in heaven (hopefully these are actually real)
38. Laughing.  Laughing at nothing.  Laughing babies.  
39. Bridges
40. Umbrellas.  Singing in the rain.
41. Clouds
42. A day to think about things I'm thankful for

Tuesday Devotional

One of the awesome opportunities available at BYU-Idaho is the chance to go to a devotional every Tuesday.  At these devotionals we get spiritual instruction from leaders of our church and faculty members at the university as well as BYU in Provo.  Today we heard from Sister Elaine Dalton, the Young Women General President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  She was amazing!!!  I may have even snapped a picture of her.  You never would have guessed she'd be the one to peel a potato at the pulpit and not look crazy doing it....

She talked about dreaming big and stepping out of your comfort zone.  Both of which could be very important for me in the near future...blog post coming about that soon.

Potential

Isn't it interesting when you can see potential in people when to the world they don't have much potential?  I gave a tour today to 10 boys from the JCC (Juvenile Correction Center) in Rexburg.  I don't know their stories or backgrounds.  I have no idea what they did to be sentenced to time there, away from their homes (all over Idaho).  I don't know how long they've been there or how long they have to stay.  All I know, is that it was one of the best tours I've taken this semester.  Those boys were well behaved.  They asked great questions.  They hung onto every word I said.  They even laughed at my jokes!  I could hear some of them talking about how they wanted to come here someday and I hope with all my heart that they will be able to!  And if they can't come to BYUI I hope they have the chance to go on to college and change the world for the better.  They are so young and I hope the counselors and teachers at the JCC are encouraging them to become bigger and better men who respect the world they live in and the people around them.

Do I live up to my full potential?  Probably most definitely not.  And that's on my good days!  I would venture to say that most people, if not all, don't live up to their FULL potential.  I believe that we just limit ourselves and what we think we can accomplish to what's comfortable and easy for us.  It's kind of sad if you really think about all that we're capable of doing and yet throw away because of peer pressure, fear, societal limits or a multitude of other things.  Maybe we should all try a little harder to be a little better.  HERE is a link to an address entitled "Your Divine Heritage" by Robert C. Oaks.  It's pretty awesome.  Check it out.   

If you tilt your head 35 degrees to the right, this picture will scream POTENTIAL to you.

Liftoff

Ah I have so much to blog about.  I think I'll split up my thoughts over a few days though. 

First, I need to talk about my trip back to Idaho.  I had such an AMAZING experience.  I sat down next to a young looking couple on my flight from Dayton to Denver.  We exchanged the usual flight pleasantries and during that time I found out that they had just been attending a Bible research conference and they learned that I attended a private religious university in Idaho.  Really long story short, we ended up talking for the entire two hour flight.  We talked about being saved by grace verses works, the fall of Adam, missionary work, Joseph Smith's vision, the Book of Mormon, modern prophets and revelation, and so many other things!  I felt a little intimidated because they knew the Bible very well and were able to look up all sorts of scriptures to explain what their beliefs were.  I didn't have my copy of the Bible with me which was really frustrating because I know where certain passages are in my copy because they are marked, but don't know the exact references and couldn't find them quickly in theirs.  Sometimes if I just described a scripture to them they knew where to find it! 

The whole experience made me really realize how I do KNOW what I believe to be true.  They were extremely nice people and never in the entire conversation did they make me feel uncomfortable or make me question my own beliefs.  They were genuinely interested in what I believed.  And although there were many points that we differed on, the one thing we had in common is that we believe that Christ came to this earth to atone for our sins and that the only way we can be saved is though that great sacrifice.  I wish I could write about everything we talked about but that's unrealistic.  For now, the important thing is that I stood up for what I believed in for two hours.  I held a conversation about pretty heavy religious topics with people who were also firm in their faith.  I wish I was better at expressing what I believed on some subjects because I know I didn't do them justice but I have no regrets about the entire conversation.

BYU-Idaho is a great place and I love being surrounded by people who share my beliefs but sometimes I really miss living back east where I can have these types of conversations with people on a regular basis.      

President to President

On Saturday I had the opportunity to listen to and be trained by Sister Julie B. Beck, Relief Society General President for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for four hours.  The first meeting was from 10:00 to 12:00 and was open to women from 45 stakes around the area (Let's pause for a second and think about this.  45 stakes were invited.  The farthest anyone had to travel was 90 minutes.  We're definitely not in the midwest anymore....).

The meeting was conducted as a question and answer session so it was interesting to hear her responses to questions she had no time to prepare for.  I don't think I learned any new, huge, spiritual thing, but I did come away knowing I need to work on being patient with people.  She handled some of the questions so gracefully when they weren't exactly the types of questions she probably wanted to be answering.  And if a person asked a question that was fairly personal, she was able to reword it so that she could answer for an entire group of people.

The second meeting was a much smaller group (still a few hundred).  Those invited were limited to ward and stake RS presidencies, bishops, and stake presidents.  It too was question and answer.  She talked mostly about the new handbook and questions we had regarding it.  It was really open for discussion and I even made a comment!  I mean, how many times are you in a Q and A with a member of the general board and have the opportunity to answer a question!?  At the risk of sounding completely crazy, I went for it.

It's a strange feeling to realize how much of an influence this woman has on the entire world.  Here at BYUI, I am the Relief Society President for about 40 girls ages 18-25ish.  Sister Beck is the president for MILLIONS of women from numerous cultures, lifestyles, and age brackets.  It would be a responsibility far greater than I can imagine.  And yet, she can take the time to visit the women of southeast Idaho and stand for hours to teach, and then another 30 minutes afterward meeting and hugging young presidents like myself.  

Alexis's mom was actually in charge of the whole event so after the second meeting we got to meet Sister Beck and get a hug and a picture!  I just pretended like I was part of the Peterson family for a few hours.  No big deal.

The Peterson girls plus one...and proof that cardigans look good no matter your age!

How an unhappy post became happy

It's definitely good to "sleep on it" after having a rough day.  For some reason, things are so much more positive in the morning, or even a few hours after whatever disaster just happened.  This happened yesterday.  I had so many things that I wanted to rant about and vent but decided I was not in the right state of mind for blogging and might regret something that I said.  I had already said too much out loud that was probably not the smartest or nicest things.

I've never really had the impression to read from the scriptures before.  Now that sounds weird, I know.  I can't exactly put to words what I mean by that.  But I was in kind of a rotten mood and I had the impression that I should just go read my scriptures...so I did.  I started by reading in Hosea because that's part of my assigned reading for my Old Testament class but after reading a chapter I felt like it was doing me very little good and that I needed to go elsewhere.  Off I went!  I flipped in the Book of Mormon to 3 Nephi 11-12 (For any who are unaware, the Book of Mormon is Another Testament of Jesus Christ and it is a record of the people in the Americas and takes place about the same time as the Bible.  We do not believe that it replaces the Bible in any sense, but only adds to our understanding of it.  3 Nephi chapters 11-26 are the record of when Christ visited the American continent after his resurrection and contain many things that he taught the people.  Most of the doctrines and principles are the same as those he taught to his apostles in the Old World.).  Ever since being in the Hill Cumorah Pageant, these chapters have become some of my favorites and I understand them more and more.  Boy were they the perfect verses for me to read.  Since this is a happy post, unlike what was going to be posted last night, I don't feel the need to write about what exactly touched me in those words due to the situation I was in BUT it did provide me with new insights and new attitudes that I need to apply in my life.

I am so thankful that I live in a time where I can pick up the scriptures whenever I want and I can read and understand them for myself.  I don't have to rely on a priest, bishop, or televangelist to tell me what Christ taught his people or how I should be living my life.  I readily admit that I don't know a majority of the facts and history and stories of the Bible, but I know that the words and doctrines it teaches are true.  Christ did live.  He is God's son and works in harmony with him, although they are two separate and distinct beings.  Christ died for the sins and sorrows of the world, which includes all of my sins and sorrows.  He would have done it even if I was the only one on the earth because he knows me personally and loves me.

I know that the Book of Mormon truly is Another Testament of Jesus Christ.  The people and events in that book are real and true.  Joseph Smith was a prophet of God and he translated the Book of Mormon for our understanding and restored the gospel of Jesus Christ in it's fullness today.  Thousands of years ago, God loved the people so much that he sent them prophets to teach them and call them to repentance.  I know that God loves us just as much today!  And we have a living prophet on the earth today that will teach us those things we need to know to return to live with our Heavenly Father again for eternity.  This is the last dispensation and the fullness of times and the Lord will not allow for the fullness of the gospel to leave the earth again.  We are waging a war this very moment against all the powers of Satan and his minions and we will come off the victor.

As Christ appeared in the Old World AND in the New World, he will appear again.  I hope that at that day I am ready to greet him with open arms.  I will not be one to shrink in the corner, wastefully wishing I had done more.  I want to run to the open arms of the man that atoned for my sins.  I will call him my brother because I know him and he will call me by name because he knows me.  What a happy day it will be!