the world from this side of the weekend

Did you ever wonder what Jesus meant when he told Saul on the way to Damascus that it was hard for him to kick against the pricks? That's a phrase that's always confused me until approximately thirty seconds ago when I decided to consult the omniscient device in my pocket. So now I know that "pricks" refers to a pointy hook thing called a goad that was used to herd animals in New Testament times (and maybe is still used today? Not sure on that one). Sometimes if the animal was particularly stubborn it would kick back against the goad which only caused it more pain, the moral of the story then being that resisting the coaxings of the Spirit will bring us more pain than just following them.

But it's one thing to know the principle and another thing entirely to really understand it from your own experience, which brings me to a very fascinating story entitled "What I Did Last Weekend". Hold onto your seats people, it's going to be quite the page turner (page scroller?).

Okay, not really. But anyway, we spent last weekend out in the country with the fam and it was a BLAST. Funny how living among what feels like hordes of people in Utah and Salt Lake Counties for two years makes Lake Point seem like Hickville but it does, and I love it. I love coming home. Everything seems so much less important and stressful, and I'm not sure if that's 'cause I'm away from the pressures of my usual life or just 'cause eating my mom's cooking for a few days takes me back to the days when my biggest concern was whether the boy I liked would be at school the next day.

Apparently shooting one handed is not as easy as my handsome husband makes it look.

Friday night we went to a drive in movie, one of my all time favorite summer pastimes (although I've got to say The Secret Life of Pets 2 was a little underwhelming. Not a fan). Then last Saturday I was able to go to Nate's first cross country race of the season and I had so much fun cheering for him, and okay okay, I was a little jealous too. Racing is so hard but some of my best memories are of running races with my team. 

Saturday night we drove to Logan for a family dinner with some of my dad's siblings and their kids. I don't see them as much as I did as a kid and it was so much fun to catch up with a few of my cousins and aunts and uncles. We told stories and laughed and went on a walk and played a game and sang songs around the piano, and it was so much fun. 

The extra hour added to our drive home due to accidents and construction was a little less fun, although we did enjoy an unexpected firework show from the side of the freeway. Jason even set up camp for a minute. AND it gave me the opportunity to completely demolish my family in a game of Name That Tune, something I don't get the opportunity to do nearly enough these days.

Now before we talk about Sunday I need to give you a little bit of background info. Many of you know that I've wanted to serve a mission since the minute President Monson lowered the mission age when I was thirteen years old. I'd like to tell you it was because I had a burning desire to share the gospel, and I did a little bit, but mostly the idea of leaving my home and living on my own for eighteen months in a strange place with strange people, with no one around who knew me, thrilled me to my very core. I was so excited.

Then I met Jason, and my world changed. Because I prayed and prayed, and no matter how much I wanted it, I didn't feel a confirmation that I could serve my mission and still have Jason. I had to make a choice, and I chose him, and I don't regret it for a minute. The last year hasn't been easy though, and there's lots of times that the thought of spending the rest of my life in Utah without ever really experiencing another part of the world has filled me with utter dread. And so, a while ago, I started working on convincing Jason to move to another state for a few years once we graduate, and until last weekend we'd settled on a little town in northern Texas (Jason didn't want to go more than a day's drive away from our families).

He makes me happy

Okay, so Sunday we went to church in my home ward. I don't remember a lick of what was said really, but I do remember that during sacrament meeting as I reflected on my life, I had the distinct impression that my priorities at the moment are a little backward. There's only two things that really matter in the world, at least to me. Here they are:

Family is important.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is important. 

Everything else is just details. Important, yes, but not crucial to my eternal happiness and success.

Sunday night, Jason and I had a little heart to heart after he told me he did not, in fact, want to move to Texas. At all. I didn't like that one bit (because again with the feeling of utter dread). Now Jason has a talent of saying exactly what I need to hear exactly when I need to hear it, and this time, after I'd cried a little bit (okay, a lot) he told me, "Kiersten, I know the life you're living now is the life Heavenly Father wants you to live, and He wants you to stop focusing on what could've been and start focusing on what could be".

Jeez, what a sucker punch to the gut. He was right, of course. I have been guilty of kicking against the pricks, of trying to go back when the Savior is trying to guide me forward, and it hurts. A lot. To paraphrase a line from Tangled (a much better movie than The Secret Life of Pets 2), Jason and our future family and home and life together is my new dream. I have to learn to stop holding on to the past, and everything I didn't get to do, and start anticipating the future and all the beauty and wonder that it holds for us, because there's so much. There is so much good in the world. And I am finally starting to see it.