Talents

Today has been such a sweet Sabbath, and has given me the opportunity to reflect upon certain things that have filled me with only the greatest amounts of gratitude. I am so thankful that I have a loving Heavenly Father who gives me challenges in order to prepare me to help others, and that He is constantly placing increadible people in my life who, whether they know it or not, have been prepared to help me. I need to pray more and ask for opportunities to be an instrument in the Lord's hand, and to heed promptings the FIRST time I get them... sometimes I tend to try and test the Spirit by ignoring promptings at first and seeing if He'll promt me a second or third time.

Anywho, today I was able to go to yet another one of my friends' mission farewells and it's really starting to freak me out big time! I remember looking at the missionaries and thinking they looked so old, who said I was allowed to grow up so fast? Anyway, Jeffrey, Collin, Mason, Chris, and now Kyle, I am SO PROUD of you guys! Whether you're the ones serving in the tropics of South America, or right up in Provo, the Lord is beaming from ear to ear at your willingness to put aside your fears and your lives to serve Him and the children of His that are just waiting to hear your message!

So today after church I watched this movie that I had recorded after this past General Conference but never watched before called The Letter Writer... dudes. Was it cheesey? Yes. Were there times when I was slightly confused and wondered what about this movie made it a "church" movie? Yes. Did I cry like a baby and immediatley fall in love with the stupid movie when the old guy died? Oops! Spoiler alert two seconds too late! And yes, very yes. It's a little bit lame, yes, but in the end it realy touched me and made me do a little bit of soul searching as to what my talents are and if I'm using them for good or not (and not using them at all is just as bad as using them to hurt others).

This made me think of one talent in particular that I have been blessed with, and that is music. Particularly the piano. When I was young I took piano lessons... which only lasted about four weeks before my mom let me quit. I was always so mad at myself for giving up, but not necessarily for the right reasons. You see, my sister and I could get somewhat competetive in certain aspects, and she played piano like a stinkin' beast! While I? Well... I played clarinet... and I was only in elementary school so my talents were really only at a Squidward Tenticles level on a spectrum of awesomeness. So finally in seventh grade I was fed up! It was Christmas break, I had two week, and I was determined to learn the freaking piano! I had my mom show me middle C in the treble clef, and low D in the bass clef, I printed out a beginers level copy of Breath of Heaven (I know, I know) and got to counting those leger lines! That was the start to a very beautiful love between my piano and I. It was grueling, I'm not going to lie. Teaching myself how to play the piano took patience, perserverence, and buckets of blood, sweat, and tears! I literally lived at my piano for that entire Christmas break, I mastered Breath of Heaven, and once I got brave enough I tackled Nearer My God to Thee. I played, and I played, and I played until sometimes I felt like my fingers would bleed and that my piano keys would look like this!

I played when I was sad, happy, I played to express myself, and I played to bear my tesimony. I learned to express myself through my music rather than focusing solely on the techincal aspects. I started getting braver and decided that I was going to try playing "Love One Another" for the opening hmn in Young Womens. I was a little Beehive, I had never accompanied before, and I said a sweet silent prayer before I played that all of my hard work and practice would pay off. Heavenly Father had other plans however. :) He needed me to crash and burn. And oh... I did. :) I was humiliated, but rather than giving up it pushed me to try harder, and since then I have ben able to put my talents to countless uses in which I count as service! I can't tell you how many last minute musical numbers I have been called upon to accompany, or how many times I've been in a Seminary class where either nobody played the piano or was willing to play the piano. And today I was called in last minute to fill in for the first block of Sunday school as the Primary pianist. So many things went wrong where I was called upon to sight read last minute Primary songs and this time Heavenly Father didn't let me crash and burn, he guided my fingers, boosted my confidence, and told me, "See? This is why I have given you this talent. To help others, and to bring the Spirit."
I am so grateful for the talents that Heavenly Father has given me to make music, to be a friend, to write, and I hope that He will continue to allo me to "crash and burn" when crashing and burning is due.
Ha ha ha, Happy Sabbath lovelies! And go watch The Letter Writer!