No Clickbait

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One of my favorite parts of the week was talking to my good friend Braeden. He's 10 and he told me about how much he wants to be baptized. At that point in the conversation, he was getting to be pretty sleepy, but when I asked his thoughts on baptism, his tiredness was gone; he immediately lit up and told us all about his great desires to be baptized and told us a list of all the blessings he knew he would receive because of it. His mom remarked thereafter that she knew that his father would allow him to be baptized if he would "tell those same things to your dad."

I remember that in the moments leading up to this episode, I kept having impressions to just listen to the kids. We did so, and he touched our hearts.

On Monday when we came to visit an older member we can call Phil, (that's not his name, but Phil is a good name) he told us about how one of his children had gone wayward, and recently had become estranged to him. Phil seemed to be deeply troubled by it, though he tried to not let on much. I shared with him about how my success in Peru was greater than it was here in California, and how that had bothered me off and on for the past couple weeks. I continued on to share that I had recently had an impression while I was thinking over it that in reality, success has nothing to do with what we get other people to do. We are successful when we fill our hearts with love for other people and diligently act on that love. Love prizes agency, and enables and inspires rather than forces. If we do anything without love, regardless of the results, we have broken those first and second great commandments of love. In the words of Jesus 

"For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man (or woman) give in exchange for his soul?"

I was then able to promise Phil that he was a very successful parent because of that great love he has for his children. 

My favorite part of my mission is that it has helped me to not only do good, but be a good person. Love is the key.









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