chuanjiao baogao!‏

Dajia hao,

I feel like writing, "What a great week!' because I am in a good mood right now. And in retrospect, this week really was awesome. But it also was super freaking hard sometimes. I had a lot of dark moments this week when I was frustrated with myself, my situation, and felt more distant from God than I should be. 

I am learning that happiness really is 100% about our attitude, our way of being towards the people and experiences in our lives. Our area has been so busy, lately. This week, I had moments where I thought it was too busy. There were so many people we were supposed to be meeting with, calling, following up with, etc. that I started getting so stressed. During lessons I started thinking more about the clock and what was happening next and if people would show up on time and what would happen if they didn't and what I had to do when I got home that night and all these other detail things that I stopped thinking as much about God and our investigators we were meeting with at the time. That is a really bad thing to do! It made me feel like a number-focused missionary, which made me repulsed with myself. And my prayers started being more selfish and complaining about why I was given so many expectations, so much pressure from the missionary organization/myself to be perfect that I didn't get to be the chill, loving, spirit-filled missionary I wanted to be. (As if it really was all these things really forced me to be uptight, leaving me no choice in the matter.)

Then part way through the week, I had an epiphany that helped. In our apartment, we have a whiteboard where we list all the people we are currently meeting with/working with. Our board has many names on it now, and isn't even updated all the way. It's hard to keep up with all the people we meet. Some have potential and sincere interest, while others maybe don't as much, but there are nevertheless a lot of names. And I remembered the first week I came to YongHe, when Sister Duggar and I had only about five names on the board. I remembered our long days of contacting time, and the rain and the perpetually-present clouds. I remembered my prayers at the time to just have real, sincere investigators, to be able to really share my testimony of God with people. 

He has totally answered that prayer. And how have I responded? By complaining that I am too busy. So yeah, I am trying to have a much more thankful attitude this week. 

Sister Sun, my companion, and I have so much fun together. It is so interesting how completely different our backgrounds are. She grew up on a farm on the Southern tip of Taiwan, reading the Koran, studying science, teaching her Indonesian mother Chinese. I... totally didn't. But there is so, so much overlap in our understanding of life and ability to work together. We also--somehow--just have a really similar sense of humor. I think I have laughed more with her than with any other companion. It is so fun. One of the things we like to do together is be frugal with whatever food we have in the fridge--which means eating things together that don't normally go together. Last week we ate peanut butter and banana sandwiches with cheese melted on top. Kind of weird, but it is food! We talk 98% of the time in Chinese, which may be part of the reason we laugh a lot, because I definitely say a lot of silly things that don't make grammatical sense every day. But she says my Chinese has already improved a lot in just the week we have been together! That makes me really happy. 

I am feeling a lot less anxious about training now than I did a week ago. When I found out I was going to be training, I gave myself such high expectations about how I was supposed to act, in order to teach her "how to be a missionary". I pictured this person who followed rules to a T and never had moments when their faith falls short, etc.  And then when we actually started working together, it occurred to me how silly and inhuman that was. I realized that that person wasn't ME, at all. When I started seeing her experience her first really long, tiring days, her first experiences with investigators' complicated questions, her first experiences with rejection by people we meet on the street, I realized I wanted to teach her the REAL wisdom I have developed from missionary work. Which is basically this: that even though life as a missionary is often joyful and really good, that you do have moments when you don't feel like going out. That's okay. You say a prayer and go out anyway. That you do have moments when there is so much to do that you can't get to bed on time. And sometimes that thing you want to do isn't even related to missionary work--you just want to write in your journal. That's okay. That sometimes you forget to call that person or you respond badly to a person's question. That's okay, you just say a prayer and try to do better next time. That sometimes you feel like everyone else just "gets it" and you must be missing something, which is why good things happen to them and things come harder for you. It's okay to feel that way. You just say a prayer, try to see what Heavenly Father thinks of you, and try to just focus on that. She doesn't have to be perfect; she won't be. I won't be. 

I really love God, and believe in him. This week I have had a lot of emotional struggles trying to figure out if all the pressure I give myself is really from him, or from me, or from missionary expectations/rules. I have wavered back and forth between resentment of the ideals/rules the mission sets for us and commitment to them. One morning, as I was writing in my study journal, I decided that the rules/expectations were too high and crushing, that the mission's use of key indicators/numbers in order to measure our progress was basically the root of all evil, and that from then on I was going to be a rebel and not care about any of that and just do the best to follow the spirit. I sort of envisioned myself nobly reporting to my district leader at the end of the week that even though we had "0" new investigators, that we had done a lot of good. And then I actually listened to the spirit. And I felt God telling me, "There are so many more important things for you to do than to fight against this." I fear I can't explain what I want to very clearly, but it just became so clear to my soul in that moment that 1) the numbers/expectations set by our mission are tools, 2) that they are not really what God cares about, and 3) that nevertheless, they are very useful, and as far as they are the best system we have now to progress in the work, are even necessary, because this work really is hugely important. I saw how the number system was neither inherently good or evil, it was a tool that could be used both ways, and that God didn't want me to waste time pretending it was inherently evil when I could be using it, more properly, as a tool for good the way it was intended. I felt the spirit tell me, "Live in such a way that you are always close to me, and everything else will work out for your own and for other's good." 

I really know that God loves me. I feel that whenever I have the guts and humility to ask, and I know he looks at the quality of the things I do rather than the quantity. I really see how it's me and other imperfect people who try to think he cares about the external indicators of work rather than the internal ones. The details of life matter so much less than our way of being, our relation with him. I wish I could express just how good and full of love I really feel and believe him to be. Yesterday in relief society the lesson was on teaching your kids the gospel, and the little Taiwanese ladies, many of whom are not married or don't have children, most of whom are in part member families, and all of whom are imperfect and feel inadequate like we all do, started talking about how they needed to improve and try harder and blah blah blah. All of which is so true. The first truth of life is that there is endless room for improvement with all of us. But the lesson was wrapping up, and I realized they had forgotten to talk about the second truth. So I raised my hand and even though my Chinese is terrible and awkward, I tried to express the second truth: that Heavenly Father loves, accepts, and believes in every one of us completely, in every moment. No matter what we have done. No matter how much we did NOT teach our kids the gospel or find new investigators that week. He sent his son to atone for us so that none of us need to be in eternal despair because of our inadequacies. His expectations are to teach us and help us to be open to a better, happier, fuller way of living, but he knows we will fall short. His arms are stretched out still toward us to help us wherever we are along that path to move towards a higher, happier way of being. I wish I could express how much love and faith I have in these two inseparable truths. 

God is real. He loves you! Take care!

Sister Brown