Adam - July 20, 2010

Hey Family and Friends,

This week has been pretty much the same as every other week. Nothing super exciting happened. The biggest thing I guess is that I got released as the District Leader. Don't worry, I didn't do anything wrong. They just switch everything up halfway through the MTC. We lost a few of the Elders in our Zone though. One of them had to go home after his 8th week here because he had some anxiety issues. We also send 4 more Elders to the Peru MTC tomorrow morning. And finally the oldest district is leaving. They are all going to the Nicaragua mission and they leave on monday. That means that there will be two new Zone Leaders called. Since I was a District Leader, I have a good chance of being it. But let me remind you all, It doesn't really mean much to have a leadership position here. It just means you can give a good testimony. Ha ha, It'd be really exciting to be a Zone Leader though.

It's good to hear that everyone is having fun on their vacations. I wish I could go with you all on them. But the MTC is great, I guess you could call it a vacation. I feel like i'm staying in a hotel sorta... I mean you wake up really early. Leave by 7 with a day packed with things to do. And don't come back to your room until 9:30 at night. And it's been really hot this week so I guess you can qualify that as a vacation.

So this week the gym has been closed so we've had to go outside during our hour of gym. Yesterday we started playing kickball, the most AMAZING game on the earth. I thought the MTC World Series of Softball was great, but I didn't know about the joys of kickball. As usual, my district dominated everyone we played against, but it was so much fun. One time, while I was up to kick, i ran at the ball in hopes to kick a homerun of course, but did... something and my shoe flew 30 feet in the air. I didn't know what to do, but I just ran to first. No worries though, I was safe, but my shoe ended up going farther than the ball. Ha ha ha.

We also have started what I call the MTC Olympics. Everynight we end up doing a different "Event" that involves odd skills. The first night was "High Jump". The goal was to jump and hit your head on the ceiling tiles. That was pretty fun. I was one of the few Elders that was tall enough and could jump high enough to do it. The next night was "Pull-Ups", it was just to see who could do the most pull ups. I found out that I'm not very strong. It's a good thing I can use my height as an excuse. The next night was "Candy Catching". We got in a circle and would throw a piece of candy to the person next to you. Then you would have to catch the piece of candy coming at you. We did a long distance competition, and a multiple persons competitions. The longest catch was by Elder Koons which was about 25 feet. We also had a maximum of 5 people throwing and catching at the same time. It's alot harder than you think!

Well, the MTC is going great. I love all the people here and what I'm learning. I've learned so much Español and I know that I have a lot to learn. I can´t wait to get to Coast Rica and share this gospel with the people there. I know that if I have the determination and faith, that I can do anything. I heard a talk this last week by Elder Halverson about missionary work and I really liked what he said. My favorite thing was "Satan wins when you decide that you can't do it." I loved this because I know that I can do anything. That I've been called as a representative of the Lord and that with his help, I can do anything. That my success in the work is determined by ME. I've also learned that "The Spirit is the single most important part of this work" -President Benson

Love you aalll.

Elder Adam Paulsen