"I testify that bad days come to an end, that faith always triumphs, and that Heavenly promises are always kept."

-- Elder Jeffrey R. Holland

(Lessons From Liberty Jail, CES Fireside, September 7, 2008)

I just love Elder Holland! That quote really spoke to me and helped me through some hard times these past few months.

I've spent the majority of my life fighting change because I've always associated it with bad things, but I've never been good at remembering that there is opposition in all things and so if I'm experiencing some hard times there is good coming along with it and I'm just choosing to focus on the bad. When I left for BYU I was really nervous and anxious. I was leaving friends and family and a job and a life that I had built here in Denver and I was sure that I was going to hate BYU, and for a while I did, but somewhere along the way all that changed...the funny thing is I'm not even sure when.
It has been refreshing to be home this past week and a half, to be able to go to Church in my Home Ward and see familiar faces, people that I know, who are really interested in me and how my life is going! And I'm reminded of how much and why I missed and still do miss this place. Because in all reality this place is my home. I know that the rest of my family considers me crazy for thinking it such, but this is the place where I feel like most of my growth, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally occured. But I have also come to a realization: each chapter of our lives has a natural beginning and ending, and I was to the point where my time in Denver (at least living here) was at an end.
This morning I was able to see a good friend of mine who I credit, at least in part, for helping me grow during my time in Denver, if only because he was the first person my age that I met who really had a testimony of the gospel. At nearly 17 when I first met him, I guess you could say that I was somewhat disillusioned, it seemed to me that when most people my age bore their testimonies they were saying things that they thought sounded nice, not things that they actually meant, and I think that I had begun to think that it wasn't possible for a person my age to have an actual testimony of the gospel, that it was only something that you gained as you grew up and had more experience. But then I met this friend of mine and there was something different about him. When he bore his testimony, you could tell that he actually believed the things he was saying, he wasn't saying them for show or simply just to say them, and that changed me. He helped me realize that you can have a testimony at any age, and it left me wanting to know and have the same conviction that he did. We have stayed in touch throughout the years, even when he was gone on his mission, but as this last semester progressed we gradually lost touch. But yesterday, as I was leaving Church, this same friend caught up with me and asked me if I wanted to meet him for Breakfast at IHOP, and despite all the crap I've taken from my family when it comes to him and I, and despite all the hurt and confusion our friendship has endured, I still wanted to see him, so I aggreed.
So, this morning at around 8ish I found myself sitting accross from this friend talking and catching up on things that have happened over these past few months since I left for school. It was good to see him and hear about the things going on with him. At one point during the conversation he asked me "So how's the social life at BYU?" When I first moved he received some not so pleasant e-mails from me, venting and whining about how miserable I was, and about all the 'trials' I was enduring. But today it was nice to be able to look at him and report that everything was ok, and that though I had been really nervous and anxious and miserable in the beginning it seemed that the decision I had made to go to BYU was really the best thing for me in the end.
Going to BYU this last semester has been one of the most difficult things I have ever done, and I endured some of the most lonely times in my life. But those times were always tempered with the reassurance that I was never really alone, no matter how much I felt like it, because the Lord was and is always right beside me. It helped me prove to myself, once again, what exactly I'm made of; exhibit my determination. I like to think that when the going got tough I had the grit to get through it. And I have also been given the opportunity to make new friends and renew relationships with old ones, all of whom have in many ways helped me just as much as my first friend has.