Patience is a virtue

This week, I learned a lot about the elders in my zone. 

I now know what it sounds like when an elder pukes (poor elder Gibson). 

I know that my district leader had a mullet before the mission and plans to go back to it after the mission. I'm trying to persuade him otherwise.

I now know what it looks like when an elder engages in dramatic rebellion. 

I know that they all like to dramatically pretend to be injured when we play sports. (It's actually quite hilarious sometimes.)

And I know that the some of them want to join in on our district calls (our district leader calls us every night to see how our day was and keep us accountable for whatever goals we set that night) because Sister Hatchett and I are sometimes quite funny and the elders don't like to be left out.  

This week, I have found myself severely impatient with people. And from that, I learned a lesson about humility. 

You see, before my mission, I never wanted to punch people. Aside from my siblings, which isn't to say that I don't love them (because I do, very much so) but we all know that living with people brings things up. It just does. Anyways. Not the point. 

I never really felt a strong urge to whack people. And it wasn't because I was a saint. It was because I wouldn't admit to myself that some people just ticked me off. I very much felt I was above such urges and certainly had a holier-than-thou attitude toward those who lost their temper (so sorry). 
So here's what this temper-testing week has taught me. Humility is not a state of being in which we are never bothered by people. Humility is the choice we make when we feel negative emotions and "turn the other cheek" anyways. 

I think humility is acceptance of our fallen, human state coupled with gratitude towards our Savior for His ability to ultimately turn us into someone who handles life with holiness.

This brand of humility is certainly applicable to a variety of situations.  
For example, missionary life. 

Many, many people skip over the hard parts of this experience to dwell on the miracles. If you've got a missionary out, the chances are that they're not telling you how hard this is for them. The problem with this is that I think when we negate the hardships, we diminish our understanding of the immense power that God has. 

If this life isn't that bad, if we don't struggle all that much, then our Savior doesn't need to have all that much divine power to rescue us. 

If the life of a missionary is generally grand, and we're generally good at this, then His work is not all that miraculous. 

And if people don't aggravate us all that frequently, then the choice of charity doesn't mean much. 

As a self-proclaimed perfectionist, I used to beat myself up for every emotion I felt that was not in line with the actions of a disciple of Jesus Christ. Now I realize that Jesus felt all of that too (duh, sometimes I'm slow).  He just chose the better path. Something that I will definitely work on this week. And for the rest of my life, of course. 

Aside from all of that, the only other things that happened were that I went on exchanges, tried on a bonnet, ate sushi for dinner, and drove a car on a half pipe. Pictures and videos to come. 

Love,

Sister Barlow