Week 20
Hooly Cow! So much has happened in this week i don't even know where to start! haha
First of all, we had Sister Allen from Kraków come and do exchanges with us for a couple of days! Having her here was such a blessing. It was so fun and I was happier than I have been this entire transfer! It made me realize that I really needed to change something so I could be that happy all the time and not just when Sister Allen was here with us. I have been learning to more easily forgive and forget and to love bez względu (without regard) to whether I feel like it or not. That's not what true love really is anyways. It's loving all! Just like Christ did, and showing them you love them! Praying for them...out loud so they know you recognize their trials and their efforts. Serving them despite whether they serve you back or not, etc. etc.
The principle I learned this week is sincerity. This week I had a couple moments of feeling absolutely inadequate because I realized that I was not the missionary that I want to be. I found that I was teaching lessons (especially the first lesson) in rote presentation...pretending that I was applying it to their needs. But in reality, I was not applying it to their life at all! I was not asking enough questions, I was not applying enough scriptures, I wasn't being truly sincere. I had a little break down in personal study when one of the personal studies in PMG asked "how could you apply a principle to a woman you passed by sitting on a park bench who is crying". I realized that I had no idea! Definitely not a moment to say: "Hi! We're missionaries and we know that God reached out in love to the world and restored His church through a living prophet!"...she's probably start crying harder and shoo us away! As the week progressed, I tried to have a genuine conversation with everyone I met, both investigators and strangers on the street. Talking about their life and then explaining why we're here in Poland, or why I'm learning this crazy language. Talking to them as real people and not "contacts" has really helped me gain a greater perspective and feel greater joy that I really am helping REAL people! Real children of God! Asking lots of questions (which are actually harder to come up with than I originally thought!) that help them go into their own mind and really think about why they believe in a certain way. I'm still working on it, but I'm excited to turn the way I teach upside down and start focusing on the PERSON I'm teaching and not WHAT I'm teaching.
An amazing experience this week was the fact that Sister Ellis and I reached the standard! We worked our TAILS off to achieve the goal!!! Every person we talked to, we asked for a referal. I knew and had faith that if I asked every single person we talked to that day for a referal, that the Lord would eventually bless us with referrals because we were showing real intent! It was just so amazing to see how obvious the Lord's hand was in our day yesterday!! And when I say working our tails off I mean it!!! We talked to people for 4 hours straight on the street in the blistering hot sun (37 degrees Celcius) and were sweating like crazy and ended up accidentally skipping dinner (sorry sis bez) because we refused to go home until we reached the standard! But the Lord blessed our hard work! I also learned to not procrastinate trying to reach your goals until the last minute! haha
Also, I picked a hangnail last week and it got infected, so i had to go to the doctor's...who didn't speak English! haha it was interesting, but i just got some topical antibiotic stuff and the swelling has gone down a lot...i'll attach a really gross picture of my self surgery so Sambo and Huddy can laugh and see how gross it is.
Also, last week we went to the zoo and I was staring at the seal swimming in the nice cool water for about 10 minutes in a trance.. haha Oh it looked so nice as I was standing there dripping sweat!! ah.....summer time. oh well...in a month from now next year, i'll be swimming so for now i just need to not think about how lovely the disease infested seal pool looks and keep working hard! haha
I also have quite a nice tan line from my shoes!
Why am I here in Poland? (summarized in simple Polish): Jestem tu, w Polce bo chciałabym dzielić się czemuś, które daje mi szczęście i spokoj co dziennie. To podstawa na Jezusie Chystusie. Dzięki temu, mam związek z Bogiem i wiem, że On kocha mnie.
I love you all!
Funny moment was that i saw a naked lady this week... oh what the heat does to our little human brains.
LOVE,
Sister Blake
Hooly Cow! So much has happened in this week i don't even know where to start! haha
First of all, we had Sister Allen from Kraków come and do exchanges with us for a couple of days! Having her here was such a blessing. It was so fun and I was happier than I have been this entire transfer! It made me realize that I really needed to change something so I could be that happy all the time and not just when Sister Allen was here with us. I have been learning to more easily forgive and forget and to love bez względu (without regard) to whether I feel like it or not. That's not what true love really is anyways. It's loving all! Just like Christ did, and showing them you love them! Praying for them...out loud so they know you recognize their trials and their efforts. Serving them despite whether they serve you back or not, etc. etc.
The principle I learned this week is sincerity. This week I had a couple moments of feeling absolutely inadequate because I realized that I was not the missionary that I want to be. I found that I was teaching lessons (especially the first lesson) in rote presentation...pretending that I was applying it to their needs. But in reality, I was not applying it to their life at all! I was not asking enough questions, I was not applying enough scriptures, I wasn't being truly sincere. I had a little break down in personal study when one of the personal studies in PMG asked "how could you apply a principle to a woman you passed by sitting on a park bench who is crying". I realized that I had no idea! Definitely not a moment to say: "Hi! We're missionaries and we know that God reached out in love to the world and restored His church through a living prophet!"...she's probably start crying harder and shoo us away! As the week progressed, I tried to have a genuine conversation with everyone I met, both investigators and strangers on the street. Talking about their life and then explaining why we're here in Poland, or why I'm learning this crazy language. Talking to them as real people and not "contacts" has really helped me gain a greater perspective and feel greater joy that I really am helping REAL people! Real children of God! Asking lots of questions (which are actually harder to come up with than I originally thought!) that help them go into their own mind and really think about why they believe in a certain way. I'm still working on it, but I'm excited to turn the way I teach upside down and start focusing on the PERSON I'm teaching and not WHAT I'm teaching.
An amazing experience this week was the fact that Sister Ellis and I reached the standard! We worked our TAILS off to achieve the goal!!! Every person we talked to, we asked for a referal. I knew and had faith that if I asked every single person we talked to that day for a referal, that the Lord would eventually bless us with referrals because we were showing real intent! It was just so amazing to see how obvious the Lord's hand was in our day yesterday!! And when I say working our tails off I mean it!!! We talked to people for 4 hours straight on the street in the blistering hot sun (37 degrees Celcius) and were sweating like crazy and ended up accidentally skipping dinner (sorry sis bez) because we refused to go home until we reached the standard! But the Lord blessed our hard work! I also learned to not procrastinate trying to reach your goals until the last minute! haha
Also, I picked a hangnail last week and it got infected, so i had to go to the doctor's...who didn't speak English! haha it was interesting, but i just got some topical antibiotic stuff and the swelling has gone down a lot...i'll attach a really gross picture of my self surgery so Sambo and Huddy can laugh and see how gross it is.
Also, last week we went to the zoo and I was staring at the seal swimming in the nice cool water for about 10 minutes in a trance.. haha Oh it looked so nice as I was standing there dripping sweat!! ah.....summer time. oh well...in a month from now next year, i'll be swimming so for now i just need to not think about how lovely the disease infested seal pool looks and keep working hard! haha
I also have quite a nice tan line from my shoes!
Why am I here in Poland? (summarized in simple Polish): Jestem tu, w Polce bo chciałabym dzielić się czemuś, które daje mi szczęście i spokoj co dziennie. To podstawa na Jezusie Chystusie. Dzięki temu, mam związek z Bogiem i wiem, że On kocha mnie.
I love you all!
Funny moment was that i saw a naked lady this week... oh what the heat does to our little human brains.
LOVE,
Sister Blake
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