I am now 19. I have grown in ways I didn't know it was possible for me to grow and all of it was through trials and mistakes I made and thing I inflicted upon myself.
I know for a fact that no one checks this blog, so I guess I will use it as a little journal entry. This is a little bit of an odd time to be writing, though, because I am in my barracks room on the Naval Submarine Base in Groton, Connecticut, and just finished a small work out in my room.
I signed up to join the United States Navy in September of 2015, the fall of my senior year in high school. I was signed up to be an aviation mechanic, but as life seems to enjoy doing, I was thrown a curve ball that put me in Connecticut going to Submarine school to be a Radioman. I will be dealing with communications on and off the boat. The longer I am here, the more time I spend in this field, the more I like it. The more I seem to feel it is right for me. So, that is the current update. I am a United States Sailor and a proud servant of my shipmates. I serve them more than anyone else and wouldn't change it or have it any other way.
My mom and dad have been divorced for a while, and my mom has been remarried to the best man ever for almost two years? I think so, I may be wrong, though. I think it has been almost two years but oh well. Wilson Blackburn is the best thing that has ever happened to my family. He is loving, kind, beautiful through and through, and I am extremely grateful to my heavenly father for making this man the way he is. Nothing comes without trial, though, and Wilson has had his fair share of those. I do not mind one little bit, though, because it made him the way he is. I could not be more grateful or proud of the father figure he is for my family. My youngest sibling, Joshua, is the most effected of all the children. He spends every day with Wilson learning honor, courage, commitment, responsibility, love for the earth and life, learning to work hard and grow strong in the mind, soul, and body, and learning to just grow up to be a strong, faithful man I know he is capable of becoming.
Every man God put on this earth is capable of much more than they know. One must put forth all possible effort to become what one is meant to be before God will intervene and perfect him/her. I know this to be the truth. One must strive for perfection, knowing he/she will never reach it without the help of our loving Father in Heaven. He is always there, but we must search diligently and with faith. We must know that we have to do all that we can, and only when we can do no more must we faithfully seek for the help we need. My family has found and felt God's hand in our lives. But again, it was not without trials. Mistakes and trials. Never stop starting, though. No matter how many times you must pick yourself back up. Get. Up. It is never too late to start again, no matter how far down the wrong path you are, you can always turn back. God IS all forgiving, but you must do all you can before he will help. If you live your life in sin and go by "YOLO," my brothers and sisters, you must reevaluate the decisions you are making. The atonement was put here for our use, but we must use it. We must utilize the tools God has put here on earth for us to use. Why would we have them if they were not intended for our use? We cannot live in sin, not paying attention to our actions and not utilizing the atonement, and expect to be so easily purified in the end. Our life on Earth may be short, but it is the deciding factor in our eternity. It is where we will decide how the rest of our existence will be spent.
I am not saying I am perfect. I know I am not. Not by a long shot. I have made many, many mistakes. The difference, though, is that I got back up. With the help of my mom and much help from my bishop and most importantly my Father in Heaven, I have repented of my wrongdoings and know with a surety that no matter how far you have gone in the wrong direction, no matter your decisions, if you truly want to change for the better and want to make a positive difference in your life and follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ and our Heavenly Father, you must start again. You must get up from where you have fallen by the wayside and move forward. Don't get comfortable with your sins. See them for what they are: sins. Recognize that those are things that are weighing you down and only hindering your possibility of being with your Father in Heaven once more and you have no room for them in your life.
This is not exactly the direction I was intending to go with this entry, but I got a little carried away. Everything I have written so far is the truth. I know this with a burning passion I can feel in my heart. I know it is the Holy Ghost testifying the truth of my words to my soul. I know that if you recognize truth for what it is, if you have an open mind and a willing heart, you will see the truth in what I have said. I would like to say that I know, without a doubt in my heart, that God lives. Jesus Christ, my brother and Savior, lives and breathes as easily and you and I. He came to this Earth to die for us, to give us the atonement, that we might utilize it as we need. No one is perfect. If any human here on Earth thinks he/she is perfect, then he/she is wrong. No one is without sin. We all need to use the atonement on a daily basis. But the most important thing, is that we cannot use it until we are ready. I know the time will come when we are all ready, but it is always there if we find ourselves needing it now. Heavenly Father is always there, though he may seem to be in our imagination, and I have felt his presence only a few times before, we must never forget he who created us. He who gave us breath and life and love and all things precious to us. I know it is never too late to start again.
