Blessings

Today, I am especially grateful for this blessing:

I am also grateful for the blessing of these people:

(just a side note: these are not the sister missionaries I talked to)

In the event you couldn't tell by these two pictures, I went to the temple today. For the first time by myself. It was so nice to be there by myself so I could think about things. And have a conversation with some sister missionaries which made me think some more on something I never actually thought about before. Even though this was my first time going alone, I realized that that's one reason why I love going to the temple- it's easier to think about things there where, although it's in the middle of a city, it's still peaceful inside the fence. I was definitely able to feel and follow the spirit there, and it was truly an amazing feeling. I wish I hadn't waited so long to go, but what held me back from going alone before was the fact that Salt Lake is a city, and I've never really driven in a city before so I was a little apprehensive about it. Today though, I just felt this prompting to go to the temple, and after driving down and spending probably over an hour looking for a place to park (drivers in the city are CRAZY...it was irritating and fun at the same time ha ha), I'm happy I followed that prompting. I can't wait to finally be able to go into the temple :)

Oh yeah...

The point of that last post was to say that being the force behind the Air Force makes me feel pretty proud of my job. Even though it gets boring, and repetitive, and just plain stupid because sometimes loading just gets ridiculous...We should take pride in what we do because it's pretty darn important. Without the flight line, or even better, the Weapons and Ammo career field, there would be no Air Force. Just U.S. Air. I used to think that the little slogans we had in Tech School were just a bunch of little insider jokes, but they really are true. Without us, it really would be just another airline.

Sometimes, I really enjoy my job. And other times I don't.

What's your job?

When I first meet people and I tell them that I'm in the Air Force, the next question they ask is "What do you do?" To which I just say that I'm weapons, where I basically load bombs and missiles onto jets. After doing this job for two years, it kind of gets a little boring and repetitive...But when you really think about it...

It's the United States Air Force. Air Force being the key words. My job is to load the weapons that bring said force to those who bring harm to this country. The jobs on the flight line ARE the force in the United States Air force. Crew Chiefs make sure the jet is good to fly (basically the jet mechanics), E&E takes care of the Engines, Specialists...I'm not sure what they do but I know they put the targeting pods on the jets and they record all the video from the flights I think. And then you have my job. Weapons. It's our job to put warheads on foreheads. Which, in about a week and a half is what we'll be doing. It's kind of a scary thought, loading up a jet with live munitions, and then have them come back empty, because then you know that you did your job correctly. Those warheads got dropped where they needed to be dropped, and most likely killed someone (or animals, so I've heard...), and we're the ones who provided those warheads. I'm not concerned with loading lives because I've done that before, it's the part where the jets leave loaded and come back empty. It's...I don't know. It will be a new experience, but I'm looking forward to it.

Letting Go

I guess it's something that I need to do. Go figure, life decisions come to me when major life events happen. I don't know why that is, but I guess I need major life events to happen to me to be able to put my life into perspective. I also have a math assignment that I need to do, so naturally I blog about something serious ha ha.

So. This particular entry is about letting go. And how I just need to let go of this plan that I have formulated in my head, and let God take control of my life. Now, I'm not entirely sure how to go about this, since I'm not good with not knowing how things go. I like having control of things in my life. That being said, when I have things set out in my head, I like to live according to the plan in my head. However, after a few conversations with a very special best friend of mine, maybe I should think about how much sense the plan in my head makes. Looking back on my past...choices in life and men (mostly men, with the exception of one man), I'm realizing that I've dated/"been with" jerks. And no matter how much effort I put into trying to make them happy and possibly feel the same way about me as I do them, they were still jerks. But, me being the way I was back in high school, I looked past that. Because I wanted people to like me, I was willing to look past how they treated me. Now though, I realize that allowing everyone to walk all over me is not the best way to live my life. I shouldn't be comfortable with living in my own little shell aka my apartment, and instead should be doing things outside of my apartment. Like... shopping, going to the movies, visiting the zoo or the aquarium, or heck, even going into the mountains (especially since I keep talking about how beautiful the mountains are). That is the letting go part. The other part I need to work on is letting God take control of my life.

Now, I'm not entirely sure how to go about this. I'm sure prayer is in there, along with service work and living the commandments and living the Gospel (are both of those the same thing?). Is there a step-by-step process to letting God take control? It probably starts with prayer. That is step one. But what's step two; step three? Maybe the previous paragraph are steps two and three in this plan...I have quite a few "How do I" questions. Like...How do I pray? How do I know when Heavenly Father is speaking to me? How do I recognize the promptings of the Spirit? I'm sure we've all thought that life would be so much easier if we were provided with a map of what we're supposed to do, but then I guess that would defeat the purpose of our being here. So...I guess I pretty much just answered my own question. Huh. Kinda interesting how we can sometimes answer our own questions in things such as blog entries.

*sigh* I suppose I should go work on this math assignment now...

Dear Math

Why must you be so hard to understand sometimes? How is it possible to understand the concept and still pretty much bomb the quiz?? REALLY? What changed between the concept and what's on the quiz? True, I did better than last week (somehow), but that's not good enough. I still have to pass *sigh*. Can you PLEASE just make sense, for me? I would be forever grateful.

Signed,
Someone trying to keep their head above water in this class

Oops...

I forgot one.

14. Get out of my apartment and go on adventures! Even if it's by myself!

Okay I think I'm done :D

One day...

I'm sure it's a phrase we've all said at least once (if not millions of times) a day, usually when we're trying to motivate ourselves to accomplish a goal or be productive. I know that's the case with me. So, I'm dedicating this blog to making a list about things that I will do "One day..."

One day I will...
1. Do my homework when I say I will
2. Finish a book in a month
3. STAY ORGANIZED
4. Get out of my shell and talk to people
5. Make new friends
6. Work out regularly
7. Make a schedule and STICK TO IT
8. Be more diligent in reading my scriptures
9. Figure out how to pray. How do you talk to Heavenly Father like a child does to his father?
10. Do more servicework
11.Get up the courage to talk to a guy
12. Figure out what I want out of life
13. Discover who I really am.

I'll stop at 13, mainly because it's my favorite number. I should probably write these down though, because I know that if I don't, I'll forget ha ha. Maybe on post- it notes...And of course I get this idea right before I deploy...Go figure... *sigh*