Faith over Fear

Recently I have had one thing that has always come up and of course, is expected to, and of which is so difficult. The question of marriage. It is the Lord will that everyone be married and after all, that is what brings most blessings, especially the most powerful: The sealing blessing at the temple. This is something I want. Or at least, I try to want. Marriage seems wonderful. To fall in love seems like a fairy tale. But as of recent as I have thought about it, it as been dark and grim. The person I really like seems to not want to give it a chance at all, but won't say No either.

Which means I am on a clean slate. The faith that I am good enough for anyone or if anyone will acknowledge me, let alone date me or marry me, or heck, FALL IN LOVE with me seems ridiculous. Seems outrageous. And sometimes, impossible. But I have to believe and I have to try and so that is what I am putting my faith in. I know that God will help me. It is possible. This article is to help assert that. I know it will be a trial of faith, I don't know why things have fallen into place the way they are, but I know it's because there is a wonderful, incomparable future ahead for me and for those I love. It will all work out in the end. If it hasn't worked out yet, it isn't the end.

Love

I just wanted to do a general post about how I am feeling at the moment. I'm sure you don't need anyone to tell you this, but life is really hard. But don't worry. Calm down. It's not something to freak out about. It's hard for everyone. This is an acknowledgement I have learned is okay to make. Yes. Life is hard. But that doesn't mean it's bad. After all, aren't the challenging games the most exciting ones to play? I think so. And we have help.

Today, I was given a very very very large challenge. To be honest, I have yet to fully face it. But one thing I know is that God will help me. This morning I was studying in Mosiah 14. Abinadai is teaching the Priests of Noah about the atonement of Jesus Christ and it is one of the most touching and personal chapters in my opinion. Here are some of the things I learned.

First: There are people out there that I am sure you can relate to. They feel like God has abandoned them. You've felt that way before I am sure. It's a common tool that the adversary will use. But you can be the tool of helping others know God loves them. You can be a tool for God! I have been doing all I can to get in the habit of helping and complimenting others so that way others can feel loved and often time, I catch them on hard days and bless them! I find especially when I have a hard day, there are others with a hard day too

I really know God does love everyone, all the time. He will help us with our challenges. He really, really will. I have seen him help me before, and I will again today.

Faith means Action

Today while at Sunday School I was thinking a lot about that actions that have led me here. I remember that I felt the plan I had was the one that needed to happen. I would go to SLCC and work on getting married, an education, a job, a future really. And I remember as soon as I got to Utah, it was like I hit a wall. Everything was going wrong and for some time I remember the question, that dark question came to mind: Should I just go home to Nauvoo. It was a hard thought to face. And I remember that immediately I had to choose. Many times I felt the voice of the spirit asking me: "Where is your faith?" and so I made the choice. I will stay here and make something. I will have faith and so it shall be. 

Since that decision I have had more walls and I have had great blessings. I will never fall, I will overcome. I will feel God's love and trust him. 

I feel great opposition to getting married which means that for sure that is what I need to do. I will have faith. I can do this and I will be full of charity. It's my choice is it not? I am choosing right now. Charity. Love. Christ. Faith. 

The Decay of Virtue

Frankly, I am horribly horribly offended by the things I have witnessed. How many times I have sat down and watched a TV Show or listened to a song, or read a book and have been interrupted by disturbing images of darkness, either in the form of terrible sexual misconduct or the form of inappropriate violence. It it sickening. Several times while I was on my mission, this thought came across me as I watched investigators that were ravished with pornography, or suffering from the guilt of sexual misconduct and really, it is very sad. We live in a day and age where the common hero of the show is someone who is praised for their obscene love of blood and killing, who say horribly vulgar things and who participate in unchaste and provocative things on a daily basis.

Why?

Because that is what the mind of the natural man wants.

There is nothing more tragic than to see a perfectly beautiful story, told with talent and with poise be terribly mangled and hacked at by the ax of transgression and immorality. I can give you a very long list, but lets just mention a few.

Revolution: Fantastic story, realistic and genius, spoiled by loads and loads of mangled, hacked up, or shot bodies with literally over twenty people dropping dead in the first episode only to have more including slit throats, shooting and torture by knives in the second episode.

Lost: A wonderfully told story spoiled by buckets of blood splashed on things, drugs used often and more mangled bodies up in trees and that's just the beginning. Deaths include buried alive as well.

Supernatural: A very intriguing and fun scary show, unfortunately butchered with gore and violence and disturbing satanic images.

And recently the most tragic: Sherlock: My favorite show. I finally found a show that I can love. Intense. A little dark, but totally clean. Right? WRONG. Season two begins with a new reveal of tons and tons of swearing and completely nude women with more references to gay things than the first season.

Do I have a delicate mind. Likely. Does that change something wrong to right? No. I am saddened beyond belief and that is exactly why I decided long ago that I was going to be the one to make all of the stories that are good from Zombie apocalypse stories to detective stories and do it right! Do it morally right. And so that is exactly what I am going to do and I pray to my Father in Heaven that he will forgive me for the shows I have tried to justify even more a second and to give me the strength to write the stories that people need to hear. Things that are safe.

Here is a quote of what I feel worded by Jeffery R. Holland: "Most days we all find ourselves assaulted by immoral messages of some kind flooding in on us from every angle. The darker sides of the movie, television, and music industry step further and further into offensive language and sexual misconduct."

What we need is morality. What we need is the old moral play. We need pure love. Real love. The love between God and Man and between Man and Woman that is real. That is pure. That is clean. That is chaste and selfless. Not this false, putrid lust that throws up all over my favorite shows. I won't stand for it for another second. I won't do it. I believe in Christ. I believe he has power to overcome all these things and that he will help me. He will help anyone who comes unto him and believes.

And I commit that I will never flinch in the face of sacrifice. Not even for a second. As for TV shows, I guess I can never find one that is for me. So, with Gods power and with the atonement to help, I will make one.

Individualized

I am not totally sure if anyone read this blog anymore. I highly doubt that they do, so this as become almost a personal journal site for me. Hahah! I don't mind. Anyway, today I went out for a walk. It was one of my goals to spend more time meditating and reading scriptures and such in order to understand some spiritual truths and to come closer to Jesus Christ. As I walked out in the warm sun, (thank goodness its warm in Utah.) I came across very randomly an idea.

I was taking in the general beauty of the neighborhood and thinking to myself of the fondness that I had for this place. And that was when a thought came to me that went something like this: God the Father knew that one day there would be a little boy who would be born in Price, and grow up in Heber, become very fond on of the place and so he wanted to make everything surrounding him beautiful because he likes to see this little boy happy. And that's me! And I thought, that can't be right. Why would God make Heber just for me? I don't own it. And that is when the other thought came, he did it for everyone. But he did it for me.

Here's a good analogy to this idea. A parent loves their child. So they surround that child with good things. Nice clothes, colorful room, fun toys and shows to watch and good food to eat. Good surroundings, or in other words, a good home to live in. Now, when a second child is born to that same parent they do the same thing for that child, right? of course! But they do it for both of them. But they do it for their child. Not just children. He does it for both children. So, for the same reason, PART of the reason God made Heber was for me. Just like how part of him making Heber was for my siblings and for my friends, each one of them that lived there.

How grateful I am that we have an Individualized God. Not a collective God. Does it not make sense, that a perfect, omniscient God would want EACH child to have something good around them? Would it not make sense that wherever YOU are, he made, partially for you.

And so that leads to the final part. How often do we take the nature around us lightly. We are too busy with our phones or our ipads or our computers, or our thoughts (I'm guilty, I admit it.) but today, I noticed. I noticed that the things I was looking at, the trees, the clouds, the grass, the warmth of the sun, it was placed there, partially because God loves me. And the other parts of why he did it is because he loves everyone else experiencing it. He loves the human race. I know and testify that he is an individualized God. Meaning that we, each of us, are like only children to him. I really believe that. That doesn't mean we ARE only children. It means he gives the same undivided attention to us. And because he is God he has the capacity to do that for each of us.

I love him.

Those are my thoughts today. Now go outside and drink it in! :D

The Win/Lose Theory

So, we all know you've heard something like this, but if you think for just a few seconds, can you remember any conversation, any incident recently where someone HAD to win. Even in something that was never made to be competitive? Well, let's just say that I hate competition and you'll know where this train wreck is headed.

Ever since I was little, I not only hated, I loathed sports and games. Happy to say I have since been cured of that, thanks to young single adult activities that are just too fun to pass up. But the real question is why? Heck, I was a young boy, boys like sports right? Right? Wrong. I hated sports so much because there always had to be a winner. And I despised that. For two reasons. One, there had to be a loser. Two, if there has to be a loser, than if you are the reason that people lose, everyone hates you. It goes from grassy fields of a sport to the dark fields of your heart as people's morals are cut down, people ridiculed in public and a whole lot of other nasty stuff. 

So I never played a sport all the way up till High School. Then I considered trying out for the swim team. I like swimming. But that idea got halted in less than a week because I realized if you swim to WIN then I will hate it. Then I was going to do basketball. Same effect. Then the Golf team. Same thing. I have just always hated that idea! 

Well, here's the real kicker and it comes out in lots of us, if not all of us. I'm gonna get religious here, but it's truth, and I like truth. Satan has a similar plan. What if he could make our goal of getting back to heaven look like a competition. It's not, mind you, but Satan after all is a great liar. Elder Jeffery R. Holland said,

"Brothers and sisters, there are going to be times in our lives when someone else gets an unexpected blessing or receives some special recognition. May I plead with us not to be hurt—and certainly not to feel envious—when good fortune comes to another person? We are not diminished when someone else is added upon. We are not in a race against each other to see who is the wealthiest or the most talented or the most beautiful or even the most blessed. The race we are really in is the race against sin, and surely envy is one of the most universal of those."

Now, I am not being so adamant about this point because I have seen this in others, although I am sure I have. I am writing this blog today because sometimes I have seen it in myself. God does not look at you any different than anyone else. I wrote this little quote not over a month ago, but I am gonna be awesome and quote myself to finish this post:

"We need to learn that we are all on different playing fields. The cards that you have been dealt are face cards. I got uno. Someone else got rook cards. None of us are playing that same game. We were all born in different families in different locations, under different circumstances and will go to different schools and meet different people and do different things and think different ways. Therefore any comparison is unrealistic in all truth. The only comparison that is important is the you of yesterday compared with the you of today. Nothing else matters. It doesn't matter if someone is higher up in callings, or if someone has more money or if someone looks better or if someone gets more blessings. It doesn't matter if someone succeeds at something more than you, even if its something you like. We are all on different levels in different things. It's likely that the someone you are envying for their skills is envying you of some skill you have! If you want to be happy, be happy with where you are and who you are, but not satisfied. Keep learning and doing your best, regardless of what others do! Let God be your coach. He will root you on. "

My rant is over now. Love you. XD 

To Cleanse and to Cultivate

Happy Sunday! Oh, darn, it's not Sunday anymore. But oh well! I was meant to do this one on Sunday, but I am going to do it today. So just pretend for a few moments that you reversed time a day or so and you will be set! So, when I was on my mission, we had a huge mission conference. My Mission President at the time was President Baird. He was awesome and he introduced to us the 12 step addiction recovery guide as a pattern we can follow our lives after in order to First: Cleanse ourselves from impurity and from bad habits and sins and Second: Cultivate within ourselves the Christ-like attributes found in Preach My Gospel. I found this very enlightening and a great commitment and have never stopped this process, even after coming home. I still use the Addiction Recovery Guide in my daily study as well as Preach My Gospel, the missionary manual, and of course the scriptures. 

Today in my study I learned a little bit more about this. I found, by the help of the Lord in my study that this can be rephrased from Cleanse and Cultivate to Repent and Obtain Spiritual Gifts. This meant so much to me. It gave me a hunger for the gifts of the Spirit and I gained further understanding in my study and my reading of "The Infinite Atonement" (one of my favorite books by Tad. R. Callister) that in order to obtain gifts of the Spirit we must have it as a constant focus in our day. We must give our attention frequently and persistently to this. We must truly desire them, and then ask for them. And when we do so, living the commandments and striving to understand these gifts, we will get them. 

In this condition you will find that the law of Karma applies. Whatever amount of force you put into something will return to you. I am so excited now to continue to pursue spiritual gifts! I am focused on three right now and in order to obtain I have made a daily system! 

1) I will frequently pray throughout the day, earnestly, for these gifts. 

2) I will frequently throughout the day, ponder and meditate concerning these gifts and try to align my actions to it.

3) I will frequently study each day, more than once, gifts of the spirit and the gospel through scriptures and books. 

4) I will have a changing daily goal to push myself closer to one of these goals. 

Oh how consuming it is, but I feel that if I put this effort into it, God, my Heavenly Father will grant it unto me! I'll let you know how it goes! 

Power of Perspective

Once upon a time, there was a little boy with copper hair, just newly becoming a boy scout and he HATED it. Absolutely, totally and completely despised and loathed scouting. Why? To be honest, I don't remember why I hated scouts so much at the young age of twelve, but I hated it. From the very first day. I still have a picture, I wish I scanned it in so I could show you--its hilarious. It was a picture they took of my first day and it is by far the most miserable expression ever! It is like hatred and angst are leaking out of it. So maybe it's a good thing I'm not posting it.

Today, I was called in to be a second substitute leader for the boy scouts. Luckily in the last 9 years I have grown a little bit and I happily accepted the call, although I wasn't sure what to think I was determined to make this hour at least amusing to me. When I got there, I found we were working with knots and my heart sunk. If there was something I was AWFUL at as a young boy, it was knots. I dreaded those more than anything else in scouts. (Except maybe week long camp outs.) But I of course, didn't want to show that to these two young boys, so I confessed I had forgotten how to tie the square knot and that I was willing to learn.

It was so simple!

I am still amazed. I don't think its really a brain thing. Back then it was like torture to do knots and now, in less than three seconds I had done it on my first try. I found it so incredible and as I sat in the car on my way home, it taught me a lesson I have learned many times. Perspective is everything. Going into something if you decide to hate it, trust me, you will hate it.

I hated camping as a scout. Later, when I was almost 17, they had a trek and on instinct, I decided to be excited. And so I loved trek, which is significantly more grueling and hard than a week long. Another example of that. I know that it's the same with trials in life. With faith. With everything.

A helpful hint on learning how to do it well, is learning how to trust God. When you trust God, you can look at everything with an optimistic attitude. Even difficult trials and temptations. They work for your good. I know it's true. Keep your smile on, and keep your covenants and Gods commandments.

Fulfilling the Prophecy

So, there was this long prophecy, millions of years ago that Ethan would actually go back to his old blog and fix it up so it wasn't a piece of garbage anymore. Today, that is fulfilled! I am back to my blogging ways likely because I have been doing nothing every single day for the past four weeks! :D Yay!

Anyway, back to the blogging! If you have visited this page frequently, which I am sure you haven't, you will notice that I deleted a lot of my old posts that were generally terrible to read and bothersome for me to look at anymore! Haha! I assure you, this blog will do good for at least a week! I will do my best! Lots has happened, but we won't recap on that right now, we can do that later when the conversations come up!

Here's your interesting though for the day:
Are you a dog person, or are you a cat person, or....are you a chupacabra person? Hmm..?

Excitement for You-Know-What!

Haven't updated in FOREVER. So here I go!

This week almost killed me. I had a few major projects to prepare for and I work every day from Tuesday to Saturday. I'm happy for it to, though. Lot's of cash that i need. Well, the holiday is in the air and I have never been so excited! I get to go home to my parents in beautiful Nauvoo for Christmas. Also, with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows only a week away, how could I not be exstatic? PLUS if you thought it doesn't get better, it does, I found a song that actually everyone already knows, but I still love it to death. It's "Just the Way You Are" and it is such a beautiful song!

As for school, Psychology runs its regular course, as does Freshman experience. For British Literature we read a very disgusting but interesting short called "A Modest Proposal" in which the narrator suggests that the way we deal with overpopulation is by eating babies that are exactly one year old. Evil right? Yes, I find it nasty too. He was trying to be humourous so I guess some of it worked. It was the original dead baby joke.

Tai Chi is going lovely!  It honestly looks a ton like waterbending in Avatar: the Last Airbender. Which is exactly what it should look like because Waterbending was based off the stuff. Very relaxing too, and in my last class the teacher told us a way to hold our keys. I think his exact words on the matter of self defense were: "If it's between you and this attacker, you KILL that sucker." and he explained how we would effectivly ram our keys into his neck. Yum.

So remember children, if you're attacked, jam keys into their throat or their chest cavity and then call the police and try to explain that he started it.

(Btw, I found this picture rather hilarious and thought i would share it.) :)

The Black Cult of Teachers

So, I was walking down the school hallway late after one of my classes when I heard hushed tones behind a half opened door. The room looked like it was lit by candles and as I peared in, I realized that it was. A strange draft came from that room and inside was a circle of teachers. They wore black robes that hung off of them like some sort of dead thing. In front of them was a text book, written in unholy languages.

"How much homework shall we give the fool this week?" one hissed their voice coated over in pleasure as they flipped the fragile and old pages.

"I say three essays or so. It will be difficult for him to study his other classes material if we give him more essays to write. After all, it takes him several drafts to get it right. He will never find time. Then we will win his soul." another simpered.

One looked up, "And with his hometeaching and desire to go to the temple as well as attend some of the places he needs to gain points, it will be impossible to finish the essays. Not to mention his church calling and part time job."

"By the time we are finished with him," the one holding the book laughed, "He will have straight F's and no time for church and will be fired from his job, unable to pay rent and on the streets!"

Together they shouted: "DOWN WITH ETHAN, ALL HAIL EDUCATION!"

I think I'm in trouble.

The Phrase That Kills Puppies

So, just the other day I got a haircut. Half of it was for work and I still am stuck between "does my hair look better longer or shorter" but either way, I had to have it cut because it was starting to take full on bottles of shampoo to clean. Which in college you can't even afford q-tips.

My job requires me to try and get people applied for a card. Strike that. A credit card. In short my managers are saying "Get at least two cards today...or else." and then when I walk up to someone and this is what it sounds like:

Ethan: Hey, would you like to sign up for a card today?

Customer: Um...well...

Ethan: It will give you ten percent off every time you shop!

Customer: Really! Awesome!

Ethan: I know!

Customer: Wait...is this a credit card?

Ethan:.........................................................................yes.

Customer: HAH! Screw that!

See! The phrase credit card is like you just said, "Hey there! would you like to sign up for me to stab your child?" honestly at the sound of that phrase people run for cover with their food storage! And then I don't get a card and my managers press on me moooore. I'm tempted to start threatening people to sign up for the card. Haha.

On top of it all, my haircut was cut short and when that happens to my hair, I get a big rooster tail that poofs up in the back of my head that makes me look really stupid. (Although in High School I was told by many that it was cute.) I feel really stupid with a little POOF coming out of my head. Besides that the anime convention was lots of fun! That's a blog for another time though!

Sanity, Music, Luck, and Distance: My Painting

Alright, so are you curious about what's going on in my life? ARE YOU? Well, I'll just tell you some of the recent things that have happened that either I found funny or note worthy. So, as usual my day began with waking up, showering and going to Psychology.

Psychology is weird. He far too easily sways to the conversations of the students whoa sk completely irrelavent questions that usually I don't want to know the answer to. Example: "Hey teacher, can you explain in detail how exactly I would test if men or women get a sex drive faster?" After a long winded conversation of exactly the things they do, which are nasty and deal with nasty things, he informs that they actually get a sex drive at the same pace. GREAT! I hope that changed the life of students everywhere, because that answer will change the very fabric of humanity.

Today, it was about dreams when the lesson was about Arousal (how awake you are). If you've ever even talked to your friends about dreams, you'll know that the conversation will go on forever. The end answer is: You simply can't judge anything about dreams. What they do, what they mean, how they work, YOU CANNOT ANSWER IT. And frankly, who cares? Dreams do what they do and whether it effects you or not, you will have dreams, so yay!

After that, it was time for my story about luck. And what is my lucky moment? I didn't do any of my reading for a quiz today in British Literature, which I was rather panicked about. But guess what? We did an open book quiz because she had to leave early. Victory. Victory for me! I'll try to not procrostinate my next assignment. Maybe.

Last, I spent the rest of my victorious day writing and finishing a six page short story I'm entering for a scholarship about the Cthulu Mythos and a man who falls asleep to a horrifying city. I might post it after it's been corrected a ton. I also bought the song: "Love the Way You Lie" (clean version of course) and thought in a very paranoid way about the distance between me and another and what could happen when I'm not there to be with them when they need me, want me, ect. and how I can't be there when I need them and want them. Yeah, i'm deep! Well, that's all for now! Jaa Matta.

Dream Analysis

Have you ever had a really realistic and completely terrifying dream? I don't get em often, but if I was gonna say which dreams I remember most, it's one were my brother becomes possessed by fungus, and two in which black people with guns find some sort of entertainment and in chasing me and attempting to splatter my brains across a wall. It's always an apocalypse looking moment too and I'm always very terrified. However, in the first dream, two people I know got shot down, and in this more recent one, nobody got shot, yet I was more terrified.

Maybe that's because I was alone...does that mean I'm a selfish jerk? Perhaps. So how should I think about this? My dreams are telling me that I'm selfish, that my friends and parents don't exist, and I'm racist, thinking that all black people want to kill me. Hahahaha!

As the dream was more fresh this moring, in the shower, I half conciously thought about not going to Tai Chi, or getting my hair cut because both of those locations were in my dream. I almost got the crap shot out of me at the Hair Cut place and TAi Chi is where it began...I think. So, I very much considered not going like it was some sort of revelation. I'm paranoid. But I'll be going, so if I end up getting shot, all I got to say is: I totally called that. :D

Btw, I'm not racist. If you're black, I still love you, even if my dreams tell me to run away! <3

Hey! Check out my other blog for a full summary of this dream and other more serious things! http://zaridia.tumblr.com/

The Dangers of Packaging Systems

Th

If there is a single bad habit that I have developed over the year, it is most definitaly that I love to buy packages and hate to wait for them. Why is this such a bad habit? Well first of all it drains funds for things I likely don't need. After that, my mood gets increasingly worse as I don't have the package! It drains my life so much with the desire for the package, that by the time I have the package, it's not fulfilling at all, and then I must punish myself with guilt trips.

Speaking of complaining about money, I have none! I work for Old Navy which is awesome because I get to randomly dance around while folding clothes, however it takes time away from personal life and also from homework time. So I am suddenly being crushed by financial issues, while trying to earn money so I don't have to worry about that and then in result neglecting my schooling giving me bad grades which is wasting money so I get more worried about money and then by the time I'm done I have no sleep and no personal life!

IT SUCK!

Well, that's all for now kids.

Welcome to the Creeper Cult

I have increasingly noticed as the days go by that something awful is happening in my complex.
Something...sinister.
 at
It's actually blatantly obvious. Anyone with eyes could see.

The pool at my complex is a convergence spot for Creepers. Definition of Creeper: Someone who practices the arts of Creepery. And there are many who fit into this catagory at my apartment complex. First of all, one of the things you should know about my apartments is there is the "Light Side" and the "Dark Side". It recieved this nickname due to the sun always shining over on the "Light Side" and it never really being on "Dark Side." I live in Dark Side which surprisingly seems safer as the "Light Side" happens to have the pool and in that package deal you get the Creepers too.

I was sitting out in the sun yesterday by the pool with my friend Cara and my other friend Cara #2 (Yeah, I know, confusing.) I sit there, typing away at my computer and logging onto my usual sites when I look up to see one of the many sub category's to creeper.

Sub Categories:
Stalker
Pervert
Awkward Person
(Who knows when more will show up)

And much like pokemon they evolve from Stalker to Murderer, Pervert to Rapist, and Awkward Person to Menace and before you know it, they'll be breaking into your window and sacrificing you to their Creeper Gods.

So, the sub category we got on that specific pool day was "Pervert." It's some guy who seems to be autistic and first sight, but rumors have spread that he uses that excuse to touch girls. I totally believe it. Although he may act autistic, he doesn't show any of the physical traits found in most autistic people. But Autistic or not, he shouldn't walk up and touch Cara #2's butt. Which he did. So we fled immediately and now he has deemed himself as a Creeper.

In all honesty I don't even think he's living in our apartment complex. He just enjoys finding victims here. So I'm gonna lock my doors.

The Third Son :)