I am blessed and humbled to be a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I remember first really gaining a testimony of it's truthfulness shortly before I was baptized at the age of eight. My mother asked me one day if I was excited to be baptized, and I quickly responded, "I'm not getting baptized." A little stunned, and worried, my mother asked, "Why not?" To which I replied, "I don't want to get baptized unless I know the church is true." In the days that followed I thought a lot on this, and during church the following Sunday I felt particularly impressed by the lessons on the Savior. I felt in my heart that the gospel really was true, and so I decided to get baptized after all, much to the relief of my mother. ;) To this day I still have a strong and sure testimony of this church.
It seems that I go through little cycles in my life (I'm sure many will relate). I get to a point where I feel like everything is going really well, I'm happy and fulfilled, and I have to think really hard to come up with anything worth complaining about. It's times like these that The Lord sees fit to shake things up a bit and give me a little trial or two to keep me on my toes. Once I fight my way through, and even throughout my hardest times, I feel that I have blessings heaped upon me, even to the point that I begin to feel like I don't deserve them. But I know that I am a daughter of my Heavenly Father. I know that He loves me, and I know that He hears my prayers and watches over me.
Recently I've gone through this very thing. When I moved back up here to Utah, I was blessed to very quickly find a job nannying for a family I became good friends with. I love their children, and the work they had for me was a perfect fit for my needs. I planned on staying with them for the duration of the fathers schooling and possibly internship, which would keep me steadily employed for about four years give or take. Then, this Spring, they told me that after some hard thinking they decided that as a family their best option was to move down to Arizona to be near family and better schooling. Two weeks later, they were out the door. I've written previously about this and how hard it was for me to decide to follow them, at least during the school year, and to continue working for them in Arizona. As of right now, I'm still committed to returning to AZ for one more college semester in the fall, then I'll come back home and have to find something new. I seriously underestimated the difficulty of following through with this decision, however. I knew I would be home this summer, and I knew that at some point I would run out of funds and need to have some other source of income. What I didn't think about was how hard it would be to find employment at this time when I need it the most. My problem is that no one wants to hire a nanny for two months just to have their children get used to them and then have them leave anyway. Many of the retail, or otherwise, companies hired their seasonal summer employees first thing in May and are all full until school starts again. I feel like I have looked everywhere I know how to look and still have been unable to find a job. But the bills keep coming. The responsibilities don't go away just because I am now unable to keep up with them. And the stress can be overwhelming.
But at the same time, I am still also overwhelmed with blessings. My great car, that runs well and even has functioning air conditioning (a luxury compared with my last car!) has gone a full year without so much as a hiccup, and I know that I absolutely could not have come close to being able to get it without my wonderful Step-Grandparents. They came to my rescue when my car died in Arizona last summer and helped me get this new one. I now send my car payment every month straight to them, and their love and understanding during my unemployed summer has allowed me a little grace period to climb back up onto my feet again and not be too worse for the wear financially (aka, my credit will not be sabotaged). I also received a generous and selfless gesture from my Grandma Nielsen in helping to pay off a student loan. While I have been able to consistently write the repayment checks each month, the last few have been delayed this summer, but my smiling, understanding grandmother has not bat an eyelash of disappointment. I have been additionally blessed by a mother who has tolerated my coming over to eat most of my meals, and has even made a space for me in her home so that I can move all my things over from my apartment and not take up that space while I am gone in Arizona. This has an additional perk of eliminating the need for me to purchase groceries, as I am now able to be at home and eat with my family.
Yes, I've had a hard summer. I've been dealing with a struggle that many many people all around me are plenty familiar with. But through it all I have undoubtedly felt the love and care of my Father in Heaven. I know that He knows me, and knows my needs and weaknesses. I know that my Savior lives. I know that He died for me, and I know that He also knows me personally. I know that the church that is now restored to earth is the true and complete gospel. I love my family. I love my Savior and Father in Heaven. I know that in a few short weeks I will be well on my way up again. And I am grateful for the ride. :)
