Sunday Thoughts

Went to the Men's Volleyball game on Saturday night. How's this for bad luck? The men were on an 11 match win streak. They had only lost 2 other home games this entire season. They had swept the match the night before. And with all of that, somehow Amy and I managed to go to the only three matches that they had lost at home all season. In fact, the last time they had lost was when we had gone to see them play when they lost to Pepperdine. It was the same pattern every time too: hosting a pair of weekend matches against highly ranked opponents, win on Friday, lose on Saturday night when Chris and Amy can make it out to see them. They lost in the fifth set Saturday night. Lame.

So it started with the loss Saturday night. I just started to become really irritable. I couldn't put my finger on it. For those of you who have heard my stories the last couple weeks, then you know that one of the things that had been really bothering me is something that happened with my roommate almost two weeks ago. I thought maybe it was that. Then I thought maybe it was something else having to do with the same person, but that wasn't the case either. I was just in a sour mood and I couldn't put my finger on the reason as to why.

Then I couldn't really sleep at all Saturday night. I had a hard time falling asleep that evening, and then had really disturbing dreams the whole night, and then I woke up to texts from the bishop asking about sacrament and if it had been taken care of and blah blah blah. That's when I realized that I had been so agitated because of the anticipation of this new calling.

I really didn't think that I was anxious about it, but Sunday marked the day when I would be officially responsible for a bunch of new stuff, and I was feeling nervous about it.

But then I got set apart. I got my councilors, and they're really great, really stand-up guys. And then we had ward council. And then we had our first EQ presidency meeting together. And all of a sudden all the stress I had been feeling started to dissipate.

It's such an amazing thing to feel the ways in which Heavenly Father buoys us. Even with just the few steps that I had taken yesterday, with the blessing in the setting apart, with having various meetings, and thinking about and praying about different things yesterday, it was incredible to me how different I was feeling from one evening to the next. I almost can't believe the ways I've been able to see even just partial fulfillment of blessings from yesterday and in my patriarchal blessing, but I'm left with no other option than having to admit that His presence and His loving guidance is real. It seems like I'm always needing so much coddling throughout my life, and it always comes when I need it the most.

I'm excited for this new opportunity. It really is so fun to form new relationships and to be available to people. I'm so lucky to be in a great ward, to have such great leaders, and to have so much loving support from the people that are around me. I have the sweetest people in my life. It's such a tremendous blessing to have my eyes opened to all of that.