Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Some thoughts...

So the last few weeks have been eventful. Things seem to be going by quickly and its hard to savor the moments. At the end of 2010, for New Year's Eve and day, we went to Disneyland with my side of the family. It was great. We had a great 2 bedroom villa that had a kitchen, laundry room, and so much else. Disneyland is one hoppin' place on New Year's. We had all decided to go to the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. In the alleyway just before you get there, they had it all decorated like you were in the Tron:Legacy movie. It was a hopping place! My wife and I both said if we didn't have kids and were freshly married, heck even if we weren't church goers, we would have been partying and drinking up a storm with all of the techno music. It was truly a fun place. My daughter and I, while everyone went on Soarin' over California, went back over there and danced around. She was so fun to watch. She is just like her daddy, which I have to watch out for, haha. She is an amazing little girl. This was one of my best trips i've been on. My wife and I want to do a cruise on the Disney Cruise-line next New Year's. Let's see what pans out.

I started up on clinicals again and man, it is a blast. I am excited to be able to do more of it when I am the one in charge and able to do what I need to. I've done quite a bit at this facility. I have been going to Jordan Valley Medical Center. The therapists are great to work with and the facility has a little bit of everything to do. I have one more visit to the hospital on clinicals, and then one more round of classes (1 month) and then I take the board exams. After that I continue with my bachelor degree, which is all online.

My wife is due very soon. She is about 6 weeks out from her due date. I assume she'll come early. She doesn't think she will, but I do. Obviously the longer she can keep him in there, the healthier he'll be. I am excited, but also scared at the same time. My daughter is totally stoked for her little brother to be here. I am very happy for that. I am excited because it's a new experience and I love change. I am scared because it is a big responsibility. I would love to have more time to spend both kids and my wife, but I feel I may be busy for a few years until I can do that. I have some ideas for the future as to where I want to go with my career and it may take away from their time. If I could stay home everyday and spend time with them, I would totally do it. Unfortunately we wouldn't survive if we did that.

Religion... I see a need for it, in some cases, but in others I don't. I am a strong believer in that religion is not to be number one in life, but family should be. Anyone who opposes my view there doesn't understand what joy is. Joy is not going to a meeting to discuss the welfare of others, when comparing it to time spent with your children and/or wife doing something together. There is more joy that can be felt in the walls of your home with family, than any church could offer. I have looked at several articles over the last few weeks about the church, other churches, and atheism. While all are very fascinating in their own respects, I am interested in the church (LDS) and atheism. In a lot of aspects they are similar in my own opinion. The reason why I say this is because they both reject the common Christian theme of normal worship. They both are trying to make the world around them better and are trying to do it their own way. Where atheism actually has an edge over the church is in hypocrisy. The church (in Utah) is very hypocritical. The saying goes, "The church is not as true in Utah" and this couldn't be more correct. The church outside of Utah is just another church, rather than the whole system of how things work. The church outside of Utah has to rely on everyone in the community for many things to work. They judge, yes, but not to the extent of the Utah members. If you disagree with me, then you have never seen another shade of white. What I mean by that is the people who don't see anything wrong with creme white have never seem true white or even white diamond. I assume this is the same way baptists in Houston feel when visiting other baptist churches up north. It is the name of the game and how things work. I am a believer in being different than the majority. If I live like a member outside of Utah in Utah, then I judge less, serve more, feel guilty less, and just plain don't care what others say about me. If I were outside of Utah, living in a community where I was a minority, I would try to attract the majority. This is missionary work at its finest. I am positive that when you can stand higher than the others, people take notice and success comes. Now I am not one that does it because it is expected for me to do it, I do it because I want to do it. I am not one that will do my home teaching for the number. I will do it if I have the desire to help the family. I am not going to lie, I haven't done my home teaching for the entire time I have been in this ward (1 year). I have been set up to teach someone I have no idea who they are. I hear some great things about them, but I don't have a desire to do it. In my last ward, I did have the desire to do it. I felt the need for some help in their lives. I did it every month. I still have contact with some of those people. One is a good friend of mine. I am probably missing out on the opportunities to get to know the individuals I have been assigned to, but I haven't felt a need to do it.

The "anti-Mormon" stuff that is out there, to me really isn't anti, but is there to really help you develop a testimony for yourself rather than what you've grown up to know. I am not a member that could get up and say that I know this church is true, because to me I am lying to what I've come to know. As I have said before, there are many roads that lead to Rome, some are more rugged than others, some may be longer than others, but they all lead to the same destination. I believe it is the same thing with the afterlife. We are all on our own path, trying to get to the same place. I have found some websites that share information (from church members like me) that show us where the "anti" stuff may be a little off, but they do not ever come out and say it never happened, it never was, and that it's wrong. They actually acknowledge what happened as truth, but where the tangent is. So you end up not judging the church as much as you would if you had read only what is being said. I don't think the people that write it are really out to hurt the church in that way, they are expressing their knowledge and hoping that it helps others. Mankind is a strange breed. We are beings that try to help out others, out of our desires for ourselves. Let me explain what I mean with this. If we are studying something and feel it is so right and feels so good, the next thing we would like to do is proclaim it to everyone else! This is because in some cases we would like the recognition of others to believe the same thing. This is how we work and how we are programmed. We feed off of the input of others, whether we like to think we do or not. We are always doing something for someone else for recognition somewhere. Whether it is "God" or the attractive person you've just come to know, the recognition is the same. I find myself doing it all the time. When I am watching a movie with my wife and I laugh at a part, I turn to look at her to see if she was laughing. I am looking for the recognition. Human kind is always looking to better itself, that is why we can build things that no other animal can in this world.

So if you are one that has to devote everything to God, just know that your effort may feel like it is better than the other person who may devote everything to their family, but in reality, it is the same. You may work very hard to "impress" God, but the other guy is working very hard to "impress" his family. I don't know if that makes sense at all. Maybe this will help. When I was growing up, my dad approached me before grade school started and told me that for every "A" I received, he would pay me for it. This was a huge motivator for me to do well, because I could save that money and buy something great. I had straight A's all throughout grade school and junior high. My dad did the same thing with my brother that is just younger than me and to his surprise, it didn't work as well. He did well in school, but not as well as he could have in some cases. My brother didn't feel like money was worth working harder for. I did. With this analogy I think it makes more sense for those out there working harder in their life for either God or their family or any other thing. Now granted, if you put too much into one, you miss out on the rest of what you have neglected. For instance, if all you eat at the restaurant is the rolls they bring out before your meal, you become full and therefore cannot enjoy your meal. If you take small portions and spread it around, not only do you get the rolls and meal, but you also get the dessert. So it is with life. This is what I've come to know over the last several months of thinking. My family is my first effort, but I have to work, go to school, and even worship a little. I will admit, the worship part isn't as high as it used to be. My family is the crown of my achievements.

Hopefully after reading this, it sparks an interest in getting to know what is important to all of us and not judging where we may have gone wrong, because we know that no one is perfect and everyone makes mistakes. It is the learning that comes from making the mistakes, that success feeds off of. When we feel successful at something, we want to feel that again and we will work harder for it. It almost becomes a drug, but in a good way. So let's make the world a better place and try our hardest to put the right things in place in our lives and not worry too much what everyone else is doing. Human kind eventually figures it out.

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