Look Forward With Hope!

 But Christmas I learned a really valuable lesson hahaha.... So first off it rained the WHOLE day.. so we stayed inside the church and the Branch BBQ ended around 3.... from 3-9.... I kid you not.... I played a little ninja and ping pong for about an hour... so actually 4-9.... I just watched mormon messages..... We had nothing to do so I watched those all day.... And I could care less how unproductive my Christmas was.... but I realized the best gift I had.... (obviously besides all of you, family, friends etc.)... And that was a testimony of this gospel... as I watched each one I felt the spirit confirm to me what I was hearing was true... So It was a pretty sweet Christmas I would say.
Now let me tell you about my New Years Eve..... So I remembered I was thinking... What did I do this time 1 year ago?... And we were in the house in Cashmere playing farkle and I remember mom and dad kissed and Jared was like "gross" Or something mean and I laughed super hard...... And now.... let me tell you about my lovely new years eve for the finishing of 2012 :) .... We had to be back at our flat at 4pm and once we got in... we were told to make the flat "Temple Clean"..... And so me and Elder J live in a 4 man flat.... so me and Elder J had to clean a huge flat with the 2 of us.... we cleaned 5 hours straight until 9.... planned for tomorrow for like 5 minutes and then cleaned til 10:30... we didn't even have dinner..... And then this morning we cleaned another 3 hours!!!!!!!!!!!! So we finished the new year cleaning and started the new year cleaning.... I kid you not... we were in a state of wearyness where you're laughing for no apparent reason and yet you still wanted to just hit someone.... And there were tons of party people (we live by a ton of clubs) and I was so angry hahah.. we were just yelling "REPENT! REPENT!".... oh my goodness.... I was thinking the whole time... "this is so dumb.. I didn't come on a mission to clean... I hate my life".... pretty dramatic right? hahah but if you would've seen how dirty it was, you would've said the same hahah. And so this morning for personal study I came across some revelation that slapped me in the face... First I'll give you some background... My zone leader Elder A... always has the most intense and revelation flowing studies in the world... and he says every morning he prays for it and opens up the scriptures randomly... and comes to his revelation... so this morning I did the same.... I prayed and opened up randomly.... I was in a pretty bad mood due to the most stupid new years eve I've ever had and it just so happened I landed in the bible.... where it speaks of the first and great commandment... Love one another... And I thought... "love one another?... more like hit someone".... And as I read it said a phrase with Jesus speaking "Because I live.. ye shall live also..." And it popped in my mind the talk given in General Conference which was titled that... So I flipped that open... and read.... and there's this little strand of light that comes from my window.... and it landed exactly.... perfectly..... on this sentence in the story.... "look forward with hope, rather than look backward with despair"... And that just dumbfounded me for real.... I was so shocked that I underlined and marked it and even took a picture that you can see..... With such simple words.... brought a great peace to my mind... mostly because I was pretty angry I had cleaned my whole new years eve hahah and started off the new year stupid as well... So I thought to myself.... from now on... I'm not going to dwell on the bad things this past year such as yesterday.... instead I'm going to look forward with hope.... And I think the same can apply with EVERYONE.... often when the new year comes everyone thinks about all the bad things that happened to them and just hope for a better year.... so what better way to live by... than to look forward with hope, rather than looking backward with despair.... (there's my over exaggerated story for you hahaha) So now I've typed too much and I shallst be on my way now... Just remember that and have a happy 2013!