Women's Conference

Dear Family and Friends,

This week finally has been a little more relaxed, but still very busy.  Yesterday, was the highlight though!  I got to go to the Festival of Colors with some pretty amazing people.  And in the evening I was able to go to the Women's Conference.

This is what I want to talk about this week. The Women's Conference was amazing, and definitely what I needed. The majority of the talks focused on families. I've never wanted anything more than to be a righteous mother and to be sealed eternally to a man who is prepared to be a righteous husband and father.  But last night, that desire became so much stronger. Rather than seeing it as what I want most in life, I now see it as something I am entitled too, and I see it as God's plan for me.  Essentially, being a righteous mother, marrying a righteous priesthood holder, and raising a righteous family is not merely something I want, it is my destiny. That was a really cool realization.

President Henry B. Eyring was the concluding speaker and he spoke about comfort.  This was a direct answer to my prayers.  I have been seeking guidance about how to better comfort a friend and it was so wonderful to hear a talk specifically on that subject. He specifically said that we can play a role in giving comfort. We may not know who is in need or how we can help, but God does and He will guide us!  I LOVE that! I was grateful for the chance to hear a talk so directed to what I needed to hear!

I hope everyone has a great week!

Con amor,
S. Olsen

Stake Conference

Hello family and friends,

This week has been the busiest of my semester so far.  I had to write a huge paper for my Shakespeare midterm.  But with such a crazy school week, God has really blessed me with a fulfilling spiritual weekend.  I'm ready for next week (which might be just as crazy, if not crazier!). Bring it!

This week at Stake Conference, I noticed some definite themes, and a lot of what I simply needed to hear.  There was a lot about the temple and since this is a singles ward in Provo, there were a fair share of talks about dating, marriage, and family.  However, one of my favorite talks was about resolutions.  The speaker spoke about the importance of persevering in our resolutions.  If we start to slack or stop, we don't need to quit.  We just need to start back up again!  There were also some really good talks about being a disciple of Christ and the power of the Atonement.  I've been learning so much about the Atonement lately.  It's not something that always takes place immediately.  The biggest lesson I have learned this week is that we cannot sin and try to repent on our timeline.  We cannot say, "It's been X days or weeks, I don't feel better, I'm still struggling, it must be impossible for me to repent."  I have heard countless stories this week of people who persevered for years.  I have learned that the Atonement will make anything and everything better.  We just have to accept God's timing for it.  He will never deny us our happy ending, but He has the right to know we really want it.  And He is there for us every step of the way.

One speaker asked a powerful question, with which I would like to share with all of you, "Do you see yourself as who you are now, or who you have the potential to become?"  I LOVE this!  It's really got me thinking!  For me, I think I see myself as who I am now and long for who I can become.  But how am I ever going to become that person, if I can't see it in me?

I know this church is true, and I know we can see ourselves as who we are capable of becoming!

Con amor,
S. Olsen

The Temple is the House of God

Dear Family and Friends,

It's been a crazy and busy couple of weeks.  And  it's all a blur now.  School has gotten super busy. We are over half way through the semester.  We have just about a month and a half left!  So little time and so much to do! It's exciting but rather stressful.


I have been trying to put God first in my life and that started with me reading my scriptures first thing every morning rather than at the end of the day.  Making such a small change to my schedule has made all the difference in my weeks.  Somehow, I have more time.  I'm always able to get things done and I'm not getting bad grades.  They aren't always as good as I'm used to, but with how busy I am and with where my priorities are, I feel very blessed with every aspect in my life.  And I realized that I was being blessed for putting God first and making my scripture study a priority.  This led me to want to increase my temple attendance.  I have started striving to go once a week.  My previous goal was once a month.  I've been very successful, and have felt the blessing it is in my life.  The temple is the house of God.  I know it is.  It's as close as we can get to Heaven.  It's a wonderful place to seek extra revelation and support from our loving Father.  I'm so grateful that I have the chance to go to the temple almost every week.  The spirit there is so strong, and I need it to get through my busy and hectic life!

Con amor,

S. Olsen

It's Official-- I've Been Home For a Year!

Dear family and friends,

This Friday marked one year since I ended my mission.  I posted this on Facebook and would like to share it on my blog.  It's in Spanish and Enlgish.

Ha pasado un año desde yo terminé la misión. No he olvidado las experiencias que tuve. No he olvidado las personas a quienes conocí. Personas que ahora son mis amigos—mi familia. No he olvidado el cambio de corazón que sentí como misionera. Aprendí tanto del amor de Dios y el poder de la Expiación durante mi misión. Ne he olvidado los milagros que vi cada día. Siempre voy a recordar las experiencias y los sentimientos que me pasaban. Siempre voy a recordar las dificultades, pero aun más, voy a recordar el gozo que sentí. Me encantaba la misión. Nunca voy a olvidarla, y siempre voy a recordar los que conocí. ¡Les quiero mucho!

It's been a year since I finished my mission. I have not forgotten the experiences I had. I have not forgotten the people that I met. People that are now my friends--my family. I have not forgotten the change of heart that I felt as a missionary. I learned so much about the love of God and the power of the Atonement during my mission. I have not forgotten the miracles that i saw every day. I will always remember the experiences and the feelings that I had. I am always going to remember the difficulties, but even more, I am going to remember the joy I felt. I loved my mission. I'm never going to forget it, and I'm always going to remember those that I met. I love you all lots!

I am truly grateful for my mission.  I have such a strong testimony of the gospel.  I know my Savior lives.  He suffered and died for me and for all of us.  When we do wrong we can repent.  And he can help us through that painful process.  Not only did he provide a way for us to repent, but he doesn't ask us to do it alone! God is merciful.  He loves us so much he wants us to come home to Him.  If I know anything, I know the Atonement is real.  I saw its power working in my life.  I saw it in the lives of those I taught.  And I see it in the lives of those around me.  We all need its power.  Every one of us.  We are or were all broken.  But when we apply the atonement to our lives and repent.  We are made whole and as it says in D&C 58: 42, "Behold, he who has repented of his sins, the same is forgiven, and I, the Lord, remember them no more."  I love that.  God remembers our sins no more.  It's like it never happened.  If He forgives and forgets, shouldn't we do the same?  It's hard.  I'm not good at it.  I have the hardest time forgiving myself, but I can work on it.

Con amor,

S. Olsen

Poetry

Dear family and friends,

I am taking an amazing creative writing class and we just finished our poetry unit.  I have never considered myself a poet and was quite terrified to write poetry.  But I have come a long way since then, and although I do not consider myself an expert, I would like to share some of the poems I have not written.  They are not perfect, and may not even be good, but hopefully you can get something out of them.

Peace

Its euphoria trickles

 into your soul and

becomes a light

 that whispers,

 “everything is going to be okay.”

You close your eyes,

not because you want to forget,

but because you want to remember.

You want to channel that feeling

 into your heart,

so that it will seep

 into your veins

permeate who you are,

And you will have it forever.

But you know it cannot be.

Just as quickly as the feeling came,

it is gone,

leaving you with nothing

 more than a memory.

The Door that Haunts my Dreams

On the third floor

of an apartment in Madrid

there is a door.

A real door, made of fake wood

with a brass doorknob placed dead center.

If one were to put the key in the lock,

they would see the scratches—

a sign of the many people that passed through this door.

Upon opening the door,

They would be met with

a cornucopia of memories and emotions:

a handful of devastating ones,

like the wedding that failed;

a basket of sad ones,

like transfers separating companions

or the challenge of teaching a second lesson;

and a flood of joyous ones,

like the excitement after a long day’s success,

or the phone call when he tells you he wants to be baptized,

and the morning study where the perfect scripture was found.

I dream of this door often,

and it haunts me,

because I know I will never see it again.

The Hospital

His lips touching mine

no longer

lingers

with me.

All his memories

have faded

into

a blur.

My husband speaking

“I love you”

takes his

last breath.

Con amor,
S. Olsen

The Importance of Goals

Dear Family and Friends,

This week has been hard, but AMAZING!  I have really learned the importance of having good goals, and I have seen the blessings of the Lord helping me achieve my righteous desires.

I've been trying to balance school and the other important things going on in my life--some of which I think might be more important than school.  But, school is still important, and I've been struggling to manage my time in order to get everything done.

Although it has been hard, I have seen many blessings from the Lord.  Everything always ends up getting done.  And as I have prayed to be able to do everything, I have seen the Lord guide me.  He has helped me make time to do everything and he has helped me know that he is pleased with what I am doing and that I am on the right path to reaching my goals.

Today at church we were given temple recommend card holders and they had amazing goals for us.  I want to share them:

Discipleship
I study and strive to understand the breadth and depth of the Atonement
I study the scriptures and ponder daily.
I offer deep and meaningful personal prayers.
I pay a full tithe and generous fast offering
I strive to keep all activity contrary to the moral teachings of the gospel out of my life.
I magnify my church calling.
I seek inspiration and follow promptings.

Temple
I have a current recommend.
I understand and keep the covenants I made in the temple.
I am getting the temple in me.

Relationships
I am worthy and prepared for a temple marriage.
I treat the opposite sex with dignity, tenderness, and respect.
I diligently search for an eternal companion.
I am preparing to be a righteous parent in Zion.

Some of these goals are a little silly in their wording, but they are beautiful goals and I am making a personal commitment to follow them!  I invite you all to do the same.

Con amor,
S. Olsen

EVERYTHING Testifies of Christ

Dear Family and Friends,

I haven't much time this week, but I wanted to highlight a really cool principle from a devotional this week.  The speaker was talking about how everything testifies of Christ and he was talking about how sacrifices made in the temples before the birth of Christ had to be the sacrifice of a first born animal.

The speaker mentioned that there were shepherds who's job it was to watch sheep being born so they would know which was the first born and eligible for sacrifice.  With this background, he then told us that it made perfect sense that Shepherds would be visited by an angel and told to go visit Christ and witness his having been born.  Christ is the Only Begotten and first born of our Father.  So it made sense to have shepherds witness his birth, because shepherds witnessed the birth of first born's all the time.  And we know Christ is often called the Lamb of God.  We also know that he was sacrificed.  So it makes perfect sense that shepherds were there.  THAT'S WHAT THEY DID! That was their job.

I hope this made sense.  It's kind of hard to explain, but it really impacted me, and I wanted to share it.

The talk mostly deals with Scripture study, but if anyone would like to listen to or watch it, they can do so at: http://speeches.byu.edu/?act=viewitem&id=2221


Have a great week!

Con amor,
S. Olsen

My Testimony

Dearest Family and Friends,

I am SO sorry it's been over a month since I've last written!  Hopefully, that won't happen again.  This blog is really important to me, and I hope it is important to my readers.

So, let me try to catch you all up.  I cannot explain everything that has happened in the past month, but one of the most significant is my three new roommates.  They are all returned missionaries and a huge blessing in my life.  Tomorrow, I will have officially been home for 11 months!  My roommate that has been home the longest, after me, has only been home for 5 months!

It's such a blessing to have such recently returned missionaries to live with, because they still have so many wonderful habits from the mission that I vowed I would never lose, but I have.  They are helping me to be a better person, and showing me the different ways they have turned mission habits into every day habits.

One of my roommates still does weekly planning.  She gets her planner, looks at everything she needs to do that week, and maps it out.  So, it's different than weekly planning on the mission, but I've started planning this week and it keeps me so much more organized.

Another blessing about having all returned-missionary roommates, is that we can go to the Temple together and do Endowment Sessions!  We were able to do that last Saturday, and it was a very special experience.

I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the only true church on the earth.  I know it with all my heart.  The gospel is my life.  Without it, I am nothing.  I am so grateful for my Heavenly Father and the communication I have with Him day and night.  I am so grateful for His Son, Jesus Christ, who suffered for my sins and all my hardships.  I couldn't do what I've done without His help and guidance.  Whenever I've been lost and wondering what to do, He's helped me.  He is always there for me.  He is always there for you.  I love the scriptures!  All of them!  I'm currently studying by topic (right now I'm studying repentance) so I get to jump around the scriptures a lot and read a little of everything.  I know the Bible, Book of Mormon, Doctrine & Covenants, and Pearl of Great Price are the words of God.  He answers me through the scriptures.  I read them every day because I would be lost without them.  I need that daily spiritual boost in my life.  I love the gospel so much!

Con amor,
S. Olsen