Here's to a killer good week (Week 15 from Ostrava)

Hey Everybody

So, last week, the catchphrase was "Here's to a killer good week." Turns out that we actually shot straight zeroes on all our statistics, excepting member lessons (2, which went really really really well) and Speaking Czech (which came into 58 hours, above standards and really great considering we had a zone conference on Wednesday in English). We had other lessons, appointments, member lessons, and spent many many many hours finding last week, but we ended up with absolutely nothing that happened. People wouldn't show up and wouldn't answer their phone for appointments. Investigators went on vacation. The rest cancelled. Kind of disappointing, in a way. Then again, I can think back to times in my life when my best "just wasn't good enough." Or was it?

This week, I'd like to talk about all the good things that happened, as well as why it was a success. I would say that success is a composite of several factors. External successes like winning a trophy, baptizing a new convert, or teaching 30 lessons (which, by the way, is happening in companionships in the zone, 29 of which were with members :D) are really easy to see, measure, and feel good about. Everybody sees what you did and you can feel proud of what you've accomplished. There are internal successes. These happen everyday when we choose to do good things instead of bad, and better things instead of just good things. Maybe it's when somebody chooses to not start smoking, or when we keep ourselves focused and committed when the going gets tough. It happens every day when someone chooses to be an optimist instead of looking on the downside. And, of course, there's always the combination of the two when we do success, we become internally successful, and we achieve successful results. Unfortunately, sometimes things don't add up like we want. I think all of us are OCD to a certain extent, if I can use that term, in the sense that we all like things to add up evenly and be squared away. You put in x hours of work, you get x dollars and cents. You spend 10 hours talking to people, and you should find maybe 5 people as new investigators. Wouldn't that be neat? Sometimes, however, 2+2 doesn't equal 4 in the way we expect. It could be that part of the answer is external, like a lesson taught. Another part is internal, and we feel it but don't see it, but it's still part of the solution. Even then, you might not feel like the difference is made up. That's where faith comes in. A great example of faith is going to school. We put ourselves out, have faith our teachers are right and know what's best to learn, and then do the homework. We might skin our intellectual knees with B's or C's or even F's. But when we're committed, when that internal success adds up, we can then say to ourselves that we fought our way to the top. Pretty soon, we start seeing how what we're learning actually does exist. A calculus student can't help but see the order in the universe. A musician or artists begins to see how beautiful and organized and creative our world is, and begins to draw inspiration. A computer programmer or scientist starts seeing neat ways to make the world a better place.

It's in these small, saved up moments that we start to prepare for the future. Instead of spending all our figurative money right now and going into debt later, we prepare for rainy days without realizing. Even though we don't get what we want now, we know that someday it'll be made up, and we can look forward faithfully in hope. Mmm, hope - what a great word.

Ultimately, I want you all to know that when I write these letters, it's coming from the heart. I do it right after sending a report to my Mission President accounting for every minute of every day of the week, including everything that's happened. I really really am as happy as I say I am. Sure, it's hard - but that's what we signed up for when we said "yes, I'd absolutely love to come to the earth and be apart of all this." We knew it would be hard, but only the good things in life are. Ultimately, I want you all to know that, even when all things go "dead wrong", it just means you're measuring something the wrong way. Like a ruler, if we measure it's width, it's only an inch at most. But, if you turn it on it's side, suddenly it's a foot, maybe a meter, maybe even more in length. When we look at ourselves and can honestly say we're clean before God and man, are trying our best, and are especially relying on our savior to make up the difference that we all inevitably leave, that is enough. No matter what, your best really can be enough.

I hope you all have a fantabulously great week. I need to look for a word in Czech that doesn't exist in English to describe how much I'm looking forward to this week. I'm sending home my SD card soon, so you can look forward to another batch of pictures and crazy-good experiences from the Czech Republic. Elder Smith says hi, everything is going great, and we've got 2 weeks before the end of the transfer.

Good luck everybody!

Love,
Elder Brent

PS - I've gotten some great letters from many of you out there in the "real world" (Thanks Christie, Kayla, Kat, Trevor Johnston, Grandparent's "Grunt" and "Joe", and, of course, my fantastic family). Thanks a ton!