Monday, September 9, 2013

Hello!!! 
First of all, I just sent Brittany an e-mail with my personal opinion of what what might be a good idea to do with her time, so she can get that in her e-mail address. Also, it was funny hearing your side of the story for how we got the shirts etc. They were in the mailbox when we checked on Saturday evening, so everything worked out okay in the end. Thank you so much for them! You are so thoughtful and we love wearing them!! Thanks also for the Hot Tamales we got those in the mail on Thursday or Friday and it made us laugh because of course you can send boxes in the mail, but I wouldn't really think to send a box of candy like that haha! It is kind of like on my birthday when I opened the mailbox and there was a piece of "cake" sitting there haha!!! You're so great! 
Anyway, this week has been a little crazy with trying to do everything necessary. Including transfer meeting tomorrow, we will have driven up to Santa Clarita five times this week. We had mission leadership counsel on Wednesday and it was super good!! A lot of the focus of it was on the Book of Mormon. Like if you just do the math. If every companionship were focused on trying to give away 100 copies of the Book of Mormon every month, everyone in the valley could have one in a matter of not too many years. Too often we try to answer people's questions on our own rather than turning to the Book of Mormon and letting the prophets answer for us. I will need to discuss it with my new companion to make sure we're unified in it, but I want to give away 100 copies of the Book of Mormon this transfer. And I feel like it is totally possible. I mean when we go on exchanges it would count for both of us how many we give away in both areas haha! I made a little color in chart to color how many we've given away and so we can see how we're doing. Another goal I want to make is finding 25 new investigators this transfer. President Hall said that if you do the statistics, for every 25 new investigators, 1 person on average is baptized. So I want to do it. And that will be a great goal to have too because our area is going to be split this transfer and we will be gaining at least 10 member families (we only had like 3 before) but we will be starting off with a blank slate basically because all of our investigators and baptismal dates and everything will be going to the new areas. So we'll get the chance to find a lot! woohoo!! I am super excited to have those goals because I think that will help us focus all the time to be even more diligent so that we can squeeze every minute we can out of working in our area and finding, giving the Book of Mormon away, et cetera. I hope my new companion will support me in those goals. 
I really have been gaining a testimony lately of goals. I remember a few months ago I was so inspired with the idea that "someday in the future when I'm home" I'm going to make a scrapbook out of achieved goals. But I was always thinking about it in a way of after my mission. But it hit me a few weeks ago-- why am I thinking like that?! I could apply the same principles now and get so much more done out of my mission. SO I started using post-it notes on the wall and I have been making tons of goals. I've been setting daily goals, weekly goals, monthly and transfer goals, mission goals, et cetera. They are things that range from proselyting (like use the Book of Mormon to answer someone's question rather than answer on my own) to exercise goals and study goals etc. And one of the goals I have is to review my goals each night so I can remember them and keep on working toward achieving them whether in my studies or throughout the day or doing something consistently. I love it! All the time when I'm in meetings I will write down things I love that I want to make a goal about. I am super inspired about it and I really feel like it is helping me use my time more effectively because any spare moment I'm thinking of what else I can do. 
I love it and I just want to keep it up because I want to finish my mission so strong until the last day. I don't want to give myself time to remorse these last few months because I want to live and serve with everything I have so I can know that I really did everything I can do. 
Love you so much! We're going to be taking the new missinaries out knocking in about an hour or so. Then we'll finish preparation day and everything we need to do to help Hermana Vila get prepared for tomorrow. Thanks for all your love to her too! I've let her know that since she's my sister now, you all are officially her family and I think she's going to be getting into contact with you. 
Have a fantastic week and tenga el espiritu consigo para siempre!! 
Hermana Whetten