John - November 15, 2010

Hola familia.
well this week we had changes and I´m in a new area, Nueva concepción. So i have a new companion Elder Canaza. New stuff. One thing i would like to say is that my companion is the branch president, so im the first councler. Ha dad, good job on the second councler, but i won. hahah no i´m just joking, but seriously im the first councler, My first sunday and a had to give a talk and teach the gospel class. So that was interesting.
Well right now i don´t have time to write we got into apopa late. So bye. Oh and don´t worry about my camera charger i found it.

Elder Paulsen

Picturas!

079- The temple
080- My district in the mtc
094- in front of the temple
109- Adam And I! In the MTC
125-My MTC district
145- My first day in El Salvador146 our study area
147 The front door
149 The bathroom
150 The back door
153 the baprism of my first person. José Luiz
170- A way cool Dragon fly!

John - November 8, 2010

Hola mi familia,
Hello, well this week we have changes, so i don´t know if i will be leaving or staying. I hope i stay, but honestly i wouldn´t mind a new comp. its not that i don´t like him, its just that sometimes he wants to do things that are a little bit against the rules. Like for example he drinks pepsi. Stuff like that. But i love this area that im in. The members are really cool. I´ve decided that our cook reminds me of Teresa prater. Ha just the attitude she has, is like the same. Haha. Yeah and all the members are pretty cool. So mom to answer your questions, well it hasn´t rained in a while, like 3 weeks i would say. Atleast i haven´t noticed if it has rained. Yeah my comps are doing fine. Having two latin comps has really helped me learn spanish faster. I remember when i first met them, i could understand about 60% of what they were saying. And now i can pretty much understand what they are saying, like 85%, but of course there are always words im still learning. And plenty of words that they say that i don´t know. but from where the conversation is going i can tell what they mean. I still have a bunch to learn. But i know that it is all by the spirit. I have days when i think that this is me talking, and then everything goes down the toliet! Hah. Oh and also about katherine, of course i would want you to go to the showing. I actually knew Jay before i knew Katherine. Ha. Oh but that news brings sadness to my heart. Give her a hug for me. Jay was such a special person, he was great. I know Katherine is going to miss him...
So there are a few things here that i really love. One is the pan dulce, and the other is called ¨Choco-bananos¨ Oh! they are so good. Its just a frozen banana dipped in chocolate. Oh goodness its good. And they are only 15 cents for one. What a deal. So i got a few pictures i can send to you today. A few are old pictures, but there all great. I just hope this little gadget works for me. Well i love you all. Things here are going great. I can´t believe i´ve been out for 4 almost 5 months now! Time is starting to go by so fast. Well i love you all. Till next week. -Elder paulsen-

Adam - November 1, 2010

hey Family,

I´m on today. I´m still feeling like i want to go home. So much has been on my mind this week... as usual. But i feel like my reasoning is a little different. I feel like i´m trying open my heart and listen to those promptings on what I should do. i´m trying to be more obedient and trying to listen to the spirit. The weird thing is... i still feel the same. I still feel like i want... i´m supposed to come home. It´s really odd, but i´m trying to have more faith and less fear in the things to come. I´m still constantly thinking and praying to know what is right.

Elder Adam Paulsen

Hey family,

This week has been... odd, but i can say that i´m feeling a little better. I´m still not great, I have a really hard time pulling myself out of bed, eating a lot, and being happy. This week has especially been hard on my sleep. The last two nights I can´t sleep very well, which is really weird for me. Usually when i lay down to sleep, i´m out until the alarm goes off, and even through the alarm sometimes. But this weeks i´ve been having a hard time sleeping. Getting to sleep, staying asleep, getting comfortable, it all just makes it even harder to be obedient. I usually wake up about 5 times a night.

Well, on a better note. Yesterday was Halloween. In Costa Rica, nothing happens on Halloween. It´s just another day of the week, but my comp and I felt like we needed to celebrate it. So we went to the candy store and bought a Kilo of candy for 3,000 Colones (6 bucks). We have so much candy and it´s nice to have some little snacks all day long.

I´m sure you´re all wondering how i´m feeling about my decision whether I´ll be coming home or not. Right now i´m feeling like I´ll be coming home. I´ve been thinking so much about an answer, and thought back to the temple. I realized that I had an answer. That I need to have faith in what i´ve been told and continue being obedient. I know it all sounds a little weird, that my answer is to come home, but i´ve prayed about it, and still felt the same. I´m sure that you might be thinking that it´s just me making me feel like that answer I want. But that´s not how i feel. I feel like that´s what i should be doing.

I talked to Cami this week. She was really really nice, and i opened up to here and listened for advise. It´s actually pretty cool what happened. We had just gotten back from lunch, we decided to walk back to the house really quick to finish some numbers for the month that we didn´t finish the night before. We weren´t planning on coming home, but 5 minutes after walking in the door, she called. I thought it was really odd, but somewhat inspired. So I listened to what she had to say and took all the advise she had to give. She said that Costa Rica is really hard, and she couldn´t even imagine how hard it would be being on a mission. That she had it hard enough that she got really depressed, and after 3 months, still doesn´t like it here. But it is getting better. That it doesn´t just click, that you slowed get accustomed to everything.

She also said that I did have a tough situation. That she didn´t know what to say concerning my decision. That what i need to do is pray, with a decision in my heart, asking if that´s what i´m supposed to do. Asking for a confirmation from the spirit that I´ve made the right decision. So that´s what i did, and i´m not going to say that i got some huge answer/confirmation. But i did feel a small... i dunno... feeling of... good. I felt okay. The only reason i´m not 100% positive of saying that I am coming home is because i´m afraid of it. I´m scared of what will happen, what people will think, how things are going to work out, that I am making all these feelings and promptings up in my head.

One thing that i´ve that´s stuck out to me this week is this: that ¨Fear and Faith cannot coexist¨. Two people, Mckell, and my comp, both told me this, and it´s been in my head a lot. I need to have faith in what i feel. Faith in my answers. I can´t fear, by having this fear, I´m making it harder on myself.

Everyone seems to say that I haven´t given this decision enough time... enough though. I don´t feel that way. #1- I´ve been thinking about this 90% of the day, everyday. #2- I´ve been deciding on this since September 27th. That´s a total of 35 days, about 900 hours, 6 weeks... however you want to look at it. I´ve visited with the Mission President 3 or 4 times. I´ve talked to him about 15 times. I´ve talked to Mom and Dad on the phone twice, and John once. I think i´ve given it enough time/thought. I´m done waiting and putting all this stress on myself. It´s making me sick, physically. Just know that I have thought about EVERYTHING! About all the things i´ll be losing, all the regrets i might have, and all the opportunities and people i´ll be letting down. I know it all.

Well, I love you all so much. I haven´t gotten a phone call from Brayden´s Grandpa, but i´ll be looking forward to it. The changes meeting is on the 10th of November. They will probably be sending me home on the 11th if that´s what happens. I´m sure you´ll find out more this week whether it be through my President or what. I love you all.

Elder Adam Paulsen

John - November 1, 2010

Hello everybody,
I´m sorry that everybody didn´t get the email from last week, but i thought i sent it, it was in a draft addressed to dad. So i don´t know if it got sent or not, but i sent it out, just before this one. Well this week, has been good, i have pictures i can send you all of you. So stay tuned after this email. My comp, E. Ramos has a little thing that can transfer the usb to the memory card. so i can use that and send them to you all :) Well this week i have written that oh ha. So Last week after eating, we went to a little restaurant called, Pollo Campero, or chicken camper in english. ha well there we shared a big plate of chicken and bread and salad(kolslaw) well one of the pieces of chicken i got had the brain in it... So i showed everybody and they said to eat it... ha so i did. It was a bit softer than the normal meat. Hah so now i have eaten chicken brain. This week we had a multi-zone meeting. So 4 out of the 6 elders (including me) that were in my district in the mtc were there, so that was cool to see them. This meeting was a basically a big machete party, ha i mean that they just said a bunch of things that elders shouldn´t be doing. Like listening to inappropriate music, or having girlfriends on the mission. Ha seriously there are missionaries that have had this. Like legit girlfriends here in El salvador!! Rediculous right? well thats what i thought. Oh and while there i they gave the missionaries who baptized families, ties. So i got a tie from president Perez. Cool. Ha its a missionary mall tie too. But it looks good, I like it. Only 3 or 4 other companionships did this, in our multi-zone. So that was cool.
This week we have two possible baptisms, Billy who is 19! only 6 months younger than me. Like Brayden! So thats cool. And María. She has been to church a bunch of times, before, too.
Well yeah, that about does it. If you still have questions about El salvador, tell me. I don´t know what i´ve told you, and what you know. Love you!!
-Elder Paulsen-

John - November 1, 2010

hey
things are going good this week, I can´t really complain. I have tried to keep my head in the work this week after the bad news. I talked with adam on monday, which was a suprise for me. I knew from your emails that he was going to call me sometime, but i had no idea when. So after i had written adam, we were all walking to play soccer as a zone, as usual. Then Elder Salinas comes walking next to me talking on the phone. I was so Suprised to find out that it was adam. Ha we really probably talked for an hour or two. It was really hard to hear him, because i was riding in the back of a pick-up, so it was windy. But we talked and basically there was nothing i could say to change his mind. He was siting with the president while talking with me, so the decision was already made. After that phone call i tried to forget it and keep my mind off it by playing soccer with the zone. So that was that.

Ha well i´ve got a few things to report this week. First on my list, Ha it is so hummid here that those letters that i got from lana have all sealed up. Ha all of them. But don´t worry i have plenty more that are of a different kind. So they didn´t seal. also something that i noted in my agenda here. I have to shave every day or it just looks terrible at night. oh also when you send the next package put one package of superglue in it. The super glue here is a discrace Its terrible. So ha those are some things that i put in my agenda this week to tell you.
Ha dad the story about ¨Star Trek¨ ha just cracked my up when i heard that! Thats awesome. So wait if your the second counsler then who is the new bishop?! Doug is gone? Hey and with the FHE thing yeah i´ve realized how we never did that, ha. Its okay. There is nothing we can do about it now. But I think the meal thing with the families is very important. I loved eating together. I made us more of a family, and playing board games together. I miss those moments...
Right so to answer your questions dad. We do get exercise here. We have a half hour in the morning to do whatever. And on P-DAY (today) we play soccer usually, but sometimes we play basketball, but thats rare. So i get my exercise. and with walking everywhere, yeah im good. So today i did my pull-ups and i did 9! wow! Last week my record was 6, and in the MTC it was 12... but those days are long gone, haha.
And wow im suprised to hear that alta got 2nd. I bet Bingham is going to crush them this year. But i hope Taylor Eyring does well, its good to hear that he was one of the big scorers on the team. I always though he was going to be something great. You could just tell with his size, Ha like when we would play dodgeball with him, im not going to lie, i would have a little fear with me. haha

-Elder John Paulsen-

Adam - October 25, 2010

Hey fam, i´m doing good. I´m having a lot of different thoughts right now. I don´t know what to think exactly. It seems like every monday i come and read all the emails and get all emotional and don´t know what i want. I was thinking just 30 minutes ago that I was 95% sure i was coming home. Now i´m just not sure. It´s so frustrating.
So here´s what´s new. I had interviews (as a zone) with president Gálvez. He offered me something really... odd. He offered me a secretary position. That would mean that i´d be in the office most of the day doing paperwork and talking on phones. I don´t know exactly if i want to do it or not. I told him i would, but 5 minutes afterwards i had a really bad feeling about it. I don´t know exactly. Being a secretary would mean that i´d be around president all day, i´d drive a car around, i´d eat fast food a lot more, and i´d live in a really sweet house. The thing is, that´s not really important to me. Yeah, it´d make things cushier, but i´d still be hating life, and after 6 months or so in the office, i´d have to go back out to the field. I just want to go home, but i kinda feel like everyone would feel differently if i did. That i´m not as good or that i´m a bad person if i do. Nobody but missionaries understand really how i feel so it just makes it hard.
I probably spend 5 hours a day thinking about why i want to go home, or what reason i have, but i can´t really think of an exact answer. I think it´s just that 2 years is a lot of time, I don´t want to give that up. Just imagine stopping your life for the next two years, and you are stuck in... jail or something. It´s just so hard.
So today i´m thinking i´ll be telling president that i´m not going to take the secretary position and i still want to come home. We´ll just see how i feel next week though.

My Dear Family,

So this week has been extremely tough. More than usual actually. I´ve been trying to work hard, trying to forget myself, trying to be the missionary that God would want for me. I tried hard, Elder Squires and I walked everywhere because we´re running out of money (It´s the end of the month). We tried making appointments with every one of our investigators, we visited all the people we could think of, and probably had the least successful week a missionary could have. We had a total of maybe 5 lessons, that were mostly with recent converts that are completely active, and the lessons with the investigators were mostly just check-ups. Every appointment we made fell through, seriously every appointment. It was really depressing, and it seemed to follow me too. I went on divisions with leader of the Zone and we only had one lesson out of the 5 or 6 that were planned.

That´s all fine though, I´m done with it, and somewhat getting used to it. What´s been tough is that President threw a curveball at me on Friday. We had a meeting as a whole Zone and Presidenté Gálvez was there. We had individual interviews and the Zone Leaders gave a lesson or two about the work. Well, in my interview, President offered me a new position. He offered me to work in the office as a secretary. I´m not sure exactly what i´d be doing, only that i´d get to drive a car, be in the office all day doing paperwork and talking to people on the phone. I told him that i´d give it a try, but 5 minutes after saying that i felt horrible. I felt sick to my stomach and really upset. I spent the next 2 or 3 hours of the meeting thinking about it, praying about it, and considereing how it would change my mission. ´Maybe that if i´m struggling with the whole proselyting thing, teaching people, that if i take a break, i´ll feel better about it. But i realized that i´m having a problem with other things. It´s that i don´t want to give up my time. That my time here has been the most depressed, worst time in my life. I don´t want to feel this anymore and I´m ready to come home. I said that i´d try the office because it had a lot of ´´perks´´. i would get to drive, i´d have a cell phone, i´d use a computer all day, get to listen to music, not be outside walking all the time, and i get to eat a lot more fast food.

Anyways, I don´t think i´m going to be doing the office thing. I need to tell Presidenté that i still want to come home. That means that i´ll probably be coming home on the 11th of November. I´ll probalby have a more concrete answer next week. Love you all so much. Know that I do have a testimony of this church and I love the church. I know the book of Mormon is true and that Joseph Smith is one of the most amazing prophets ever to have lived. (Just behind Jesus Christ) I love you all so much. Until next week.

Elder Adam Paulsen

P.S. Today we made a cake, it was pretty fun and tasted great!