Hola

Hello Family and Friends What a great week here in the MTC. Surprise my P day changed to today for who knows why... but ya I got my flight plans to Chile. I leave next monday, 5 days AHHHHHHHH woooooooooo. Soooooo excited I can't wait. So this will probably be the last time I email you for about 13 days or so, it just depends on if they let me email when I'm there or whatever. I have a flight on Monday from Salt Lake to L.A at 7:05 to 7:55 LA time, so I'm going to try and call everyone I know there number. I have a 5 hour Layover in LA then I take a 12 hour flight to Santiago, Chile then a 2 hour layover in Chile to get to Antofagasta. SOOO AWESOMMEEE.

 

We got the new district of 10 Elders last week. Spending this whole week getting to know them was such a great experience, one of my most favorite times of the day have to be at 10:15 when I go to everyone's room and give them all goodnight hugs. I absolutely love every single one of these Elders here. They are giving up their life for 2 years just like I am. So I look up to all these Elders so much and love serving them as Zone Leader. I take this Zone Leader job as more of a blessing. I think of it as I get to serve 20 Elders and just be there friend for these past few weeks. I'm the kind of Elder that goes in late at night and just shares my experiences here with them, hoping in some way that they can relate to how they feel right now to how I felt my first few weeks in the MTC. I've had a couple Elders come up to me with teary eyes after I speak to them and just say how much that meant to them because that is exactly how they feel. Knowing that they have a leader that got through these hard times learing the language and learning to get along with your companion. A few of the Elders really I think needed someone to help them with that, and that's what I look at me being a Zone Leader for them is. That probably didn't make sense but I love these Elders soooo much. I think this opportunity to be a Zone Leader while in the MTC will strengthen my ability to be an example and just be a better missionary in the field. I know it will.

 

I love the MTC cafeteria food, sorta, not really but this week our District had the opportunity to do the sacrament meeting for the cafeteria workers on Sunday since they can't be at church. One of the workers said a prayer and in it he said that he's so thankful that we can serve all these amazing missionaries and give them the best, most nutrituous food that is possible. I kinda felt bad after that because these workers feed us so well and for 3,000 people every single day for 3 meals a day. They are seriously such amazing people so I'm learing to love the food. :) I gave a talk in that sacrament meeting too about the Book of Mormon in English, going from speaking Spanish to giving a talk in English was SOOO easy hahaha, English is so easy ughhhh. But Spanish is awesome and will get me the ladies. Just kidding, sorta, not really, Girls have cooties.

 

Something I learned this week was that "more important than what you say is who you are as a missionary". I'm striving everyday to become a better person so that in turn it will make me a better person. Unselfishness is a trait that I'm working so hard to get. Think about others before yourself. Something that is a lot harder said than done. I just got back from the temple. I love the temple. Oh crap, that was the last time I got to go through the temple for about 2 years though so that kinda stinks but I'll be alright. The temple breakfast is sooo delicious especially their biscuits and gravy OMG. 

 

I love you all so much, Dave is especially in my prayers every night and all of you as well. My prayers take about 15 minutes because I bless every single one of my family members and all my friends hahah and that they are in Spanish so they take a little longer. But just know I think about you all every night and I hope you feel that. Keep me in your prayers these next few weeks while I'm in Chile. It's going to be hard. I know it will but with the Lord's help I can do it. Thank you all so much for everything. Congrats Ciera on graduating You're sooo amazing and Tell Dave I love him more than any bonus dad can ever be loved. Dangit I just cried..... I turned into a crier. Jk only for Dave. Love you all

 

Elder Paxman

Life in the MTC

One Month Down

Hola Famila Y Amigos. Le Amas Muchas Y Orar a cerca de Ustedes Todos la dia.

 

First of all..... after being here a whole month and eating this food that I have come to realize is worthless, flavorless, repulsive food, that they probably could feed the cows. I just want to get out of the MTC mainly for that reason. I want to throw up threw my nose everytime I eat here. BLAHHHHH. That might be a little bit of an over reaction but ehhh Oh well...

 

I learned quite a bit this week. I feel like my knowledge of the language and my testimony are rapidly increasing. I'm probably gonna get demolished when I actually get to a country where they speak the 2nd fastest Spanish ever..... Who cares because I feel like with the knowledge I do have of this gospel and my knowledge of Spanish I feel I can baptize people with just what I have right now.... I don't baptize people, the spirit does.

 

My message today is something that hit me real deep this week. And pretend I'm sitting with you as I'm saying this.. As a representative of God I'm an instrument in His hands and I'm doing this work because Jesus Christ can't be down here right now and do it. My actions everyday need to be in harmony with what Jesus Christ would be doing and saying because I am a REPRESENTATIVE of Jesus Christ. Would Jesus Christ beat around the bush if His children weren't following His commandments and praying and reading and pondering His scriptures EVERY night? NO he wouldn't. Jesus Christ wants nothing more than for us to be happy. The only way for us to be truely happy is to live with him and God again. Can we live with them again if we're not keeping ALL his commandments..... My job and what I'm going to strive to be as a missionary is to be bold... I want to be an Elder Holland on my mission. I'm a zone leader, people are looking up to me so I need to and YOU all need to strive to be stern in keeping all of God's commandments. :) Okay That's my message haha. #Truth

 

In about 5 hours we are getting 10 new Elders who I'm gonna be zone leader for, for the next 2 weeks. I'm nervous but so excited for the opportunity to serve along side them and try my best to just help them out with any problem they might have. I just want to make them comfortable here so they can have a great experience at the MTC. I feel like I'm going to be able to talk and communicate with them well because of some of the challenges I had at the beginning of my MTC stay. I'm so excited AHHHH.

 

I've officially been out a month. I only have to do that 23 more times.... I GOT THIS!!!! Throughout the day I make goals to not speak ANY English and only Spanish. I have seen that with that my Spanish knowledge has grown tremendously. If I don't know a word then I look it up in the dictionary. I think the most I've gone is 7 hours without speaking any English which is flippin awesome. I've learned so much. My only problem really is conjugating the words... That is definitely the hardest thing for me but I know it will come in time.

 

I shaved my left leg..... Missionaries are weird, not me though... I'm just awesome. I found out that today there are 8 people going to Antofagasta the same day as me and my companion. That is so cool. It took me a month to find them but that's way cool. There is a kid from Desert Hills that opened his call the same day as me and were going to the same mission on the same date.. How weird. I didnt really recognize him, He played football, but all the Elders going to Antofagasta seem AWESOME.

 

By the way, missionaries aren't supposed to eat gum, so don't send me gum Por Favor. I do however love mints. :) and I don't need any more candy maybe when I get to Antofagasta but not now. I hear that letters take a month to get home and when you write back it takes about a month to get to me. So thats no good, unless i use the church mail system there. Whatever I'm confused I'm sure I'll figure it out when I'm there but just so you know it might take a while to get to me. I'll let you know in 2 weeks how to send letters to me in Chile. I am sooooooo excited to leave. 12 Days AHHHHHHHHHHHH I love you all so much. I'm sending My SD card or memory card whatever it is, with all my pictures on it today. So I'm sure if you go on my blog in a few days my wonderful, gorgeous sister will have put them up. Okay, that's all I think. I miss you so much :) #MTClife

 

Elder Paxman

Zone Leader

Hello Family and Friends,

 

I miss you all so much, everything is going pretty good this past week. So many crazy unexpected stuff happened. First I woke up Saturday morning to a new companion in our room. Ha ha ha that was very surprising so now I have 2 companions. His name is Elder Dykstra. He was here at the MTC in November for 5 weeks but he tore his ACL MCL while playing basketball so he had to go home and get surgery and recover for a couple months. He learned 5 weeks of Spanish before but he lost a little of it so now he's back here sorta reviewing so he can get ready for Chile. I have some good companions. We all have very different personalities but we teach very well together. Which is really all that matters. We teach an Investigator once a day so this is really beneficial practice for when we get to the field. 

 

I'm really liking the MTC a lot better now that I can speak the language a lot better.. I'm nothing near where I want to be but it's coming along really well. This computer is acting like a complete NOOB and is freezing every 10 seconds so I'm very upset right now, Lo Siento. I just finished my whole e-mail and It deleted it so now I have to write it all again..... AHHHHHHH I just punched the wall and now my hand hurts..... there were some amazing things happen this week. The new companion, and on Sunday me and Elder Butler were called to be Zone Leaders. A zone Leader is someone who just sorta looks out and helps in any way possible for the zone. We are here to welcome new zones, and just be good examples to everyone else. at least that's what I think we do. We're over about 30 Missionaries so that is so awesome to have this awesome opportunity for the next 3 weeks. Its going to keep me focused on being the best example I can be. I'm so excited for this opportunity. 

 

My official weigh in this week was very disappointing:( I lost 2 pounds... CURSE YOU AMAZING METABOLISM I'm very distraut( distraught? Distrout? Distraut?) about this tramadic experience. Looks like I'm gonna be skinny forever oh well. We also had this amazing opportunity yesterday to hear from ELDER RICHARD G SCOTT. How awesome is that. I was 50 feet away from an Apostle. I was in the choir so I had a really good seat. It was such a great experience to listen to him for our Tuesday night devotional. Elder Scott has a way of speaking that is just so calm and I felt the Spirit so strong yesterday. Something he said that really stood out to me was something very simple but amazing he said,  "I don't know a lot of things. But I do know that Heavenly Father loves you"... I felt the spirit so strong when he said that. Heavenly Father called me on this Mission not to fail, but to succeed tremendously. Spanish is very hard for me to learn but the challenges our Lord is giving me is making me such a better man. Spanish right now Is getting better for me. I can keep a conversation going ask people any question bear my testimony even better and pray sincerely. And to think I'm halfway through my MTC experience I still have so much time to master this language. I'm so excited for this opportunity. 

 

There are some awesome Elders here and I've became good friends with a few of them. My roommate, Brad Hauck and I grew so close, just sharing our hard experiences here, helped us come really close to each other. He's in Denver, Colorado right now because he's waiting for his Visa to Brazil. I'm lucky I don't need a Visa for the first year of my mission to Chile. I'm going there on like a Visitors Visa or something. I don't know I'm lucky because every single person going to Mexico or Brazil or Argentina are getting denied their Visa. 

 

Another awesome friend I made here is Elder Creer. He lives In Kenawick, Washington right in Chase's Mission. He was at BYU while Chase was there so he probably didn't see him. But him and his family are moving to St. George after his Mission. So we're gonna be very close for a long time I can tell. Missionaries are seriously such studs.. AKA me..... There is this Elder, Elder Christoferson imagine a 6'2 300 pound Teddy Bear. That's him. He has the most amazing voice you will ever hear, I will record a video of him and send it home to you guys with some pictures. He comes into our room every night and sings us to sleep... No joke ha ha ha I absolutely love it. My favorite songs I've learned are Come Thou Font and I need the Every Hour (in Spanish) I am absolutely loving my time here in the MTC and thank you for all your support. Keep me in your prayers You are all in mine. Love you guys so much.

 

Elder Paxman

2nd Week in the MTC

Hola Familia Y Amigos.

 

I GAINED 5 POUNDS... I'm so fat.... I'm up to 133 pounds. BOOOOM. If i keep this up I'll be like 350 pounds by the time I get back.... That is my new goal. I have "weigh in day" at Gym everyday to see how fat i've gotten, The food here is seriously so unhealthy and fattening and I eat SOOOO much of it hahahah. LOL out loud. I love gym time. I demolish little Elders In basketball and volleyball. My main goal is to embarrass them and cause as much pain as possible to their faces in volleyball... I am the Best (Nacho Libre) I'm very humble as you can see. I'm totally kidding... sorta...  

 

Everything this week has gone a lot better one of the most needed and best weekends of my life with General Conference. I feel like I could do 1,000,000 spiritual push ups right now. It seems like Elder Holland Knows exactly what to say to get me through everything. He has not once given a bad talk. Elder Bednar is the same and I absolutely loved President Eyring's talk about missionary work. Those talks were MUCH needed.

 

I'm becoming a lot more comfortable with all the Elders in my zone and have made some really good friends. All I can say is Elders are very weird in the MTC and between 9:30 and 10:30 it gets pretty Cray Cray in the MTC.... Nuff said.... Anytime the Elders see a cute girl, (which is 100% of the time) we all yell INIQUITY and run away cause girls are of the devil....missionaries are weird.... 

 

My departure date has been set to go to Chile, May 6th. That might change but that's a good estimate. That means I can talk to you on Mothers Day, Mom. Sweet! My coming home day is March 10th 2015. Not that I'm looking forward to that day or anything just for future reference ha ha. 

 

I miss all you guys so much. You are all in my prayers. Every night I look through all my pictures of you guys and just wish I could share all of my feelings with you all of the time... I'm getting the Language down pretty good. It's coming along slow and steady but looking back on my first day here to now, it really is an amazing difference. I can Pray in Spanish I can bear my whole testimony in Spanish I can keep a conversation going. The only thing that is difficult is the conjugation and a few key verbs that I don't know but that will all come in time with the Lords help. As soon as my head hits my pillow at 10:30 My mind goes INSANE with all the Spanish I learned that day. I'm going 1000 MPH throughout the day, when I finally relax my mind replays all the Spanish I learned and all the Emotions come out.... Oh well.  

 

We teach an Investigator everyday (fake Investigators) but we pretend they are real, they are just our teachers but they are playing people that they taught on their mission so it's real life people sorta not really, IDK whatever. Its such good learning experiences though. It helps with the language and also my ability to get to know people better through the spirit and Spanish.

 

I absolutely love Tuesdays and Sundays in the MTC because we get the opportunity to hear a devotional from someone awesome. There are always rumors saying a General Authority is going to come but it never happens ha ha ha. Yesterday one of the best messages I got out of the devotional was this, "If you want to talk to God get on your knees. If you want God to talk to you, read the scriptures"... Powerful. Prayer has helped me so much these past 2 weeks and I'm growing so much in my testimony. One of my favorite parts of my day is personal scripture study for an hour. I made it a goal to read the entire book of Mormon before I leave the MTC. I'm already in Alma Chapter 2. I love the scriptures. I can actually understand them now ha ha. Once again, I have never felt the Spirit quite like I have this week. I'm sure the Lord will throw a challenge at me soon to humble me but this work isn't easy. I can to it. Endure to the End. We have an hour on the computers now cause we can email friends and I've only used 25 minutes of it so I'm probably gonna get on Twitter or something. #SorryNotSorry JK EXACT OBEDIENCE.  

First Week in the MTC

Family and Friends,

 

I miss you all so so much this week has been THEE hardest weeks of my entire life, I hope that's a good thing but just know that I have a lot of support around me and I'm working hard and putting my faith in Heavenly Father. My daily schedule is so busy. I don't have a time any part of the day where I have a break. I wake up at 6:10 get ready, go to personal study in my class, I spend about 8 hours a day in my class with my district. we have 10 missionaries in my District, we're all going to Chile, 6 Elders and 4 Sisters. After personal study every day we go to breakfast, then we begin our first section of Spanish Study for 3 hours, then we have another hour of language study on our own. Usually I just read my scriptures in Spanish during that time. After that we go to Lunch and then GYMMM wooooooo I flippin love gym so much, it gets me away from all the stresses and it's so much fun. We have an awesome zone, our zone has about 50 missionaries and we all have so much fun together. One thing I have learned while I've been here is that Missionaries are kinda weird.... just kinda.... not really... they are all flippin weird. Except for me. I'm awesome obviously, totally kidding, not really. After gym we go to TALL which is another language study on the computer I really like TALL it helps me so much and its such a great resource. We do that for about an hour then we go to dinner and then we have another 3 hours of Spanish classroom instruction then we go back to our residence at 9:30 and prepare for bed... and we're in bed by 10:30. This past week I get in bed and my head finally gets to slow down but yet I can't stop going over Spanish phrases and mental ideas of what I'm gonna do tomorrow. I'm weird I know.. so Its hard for me to get to sleep right away, I don't ever stop thinking about all of you. I have a book of photos that I look at right before I go to bed and it relaxes me.

 

The first 3 days in the MTC were so hard for me. We have an investigator that we teach. His name is David. The second day we were here we had to teach him a lesson in all Spanish... He doesnt speak any English, so you can understand my stress and frustration when that didn't go very well. Me and my companion, Elder Buter, he's from Arizona, we prayed so hard that night that we could just have the Spirit to help us teach David and that we could have words put into our mouth because we don't speak any Spanish... It went so much better for our second lesson with David, it just goes to show that if you humble yourself before our Savior, He will give you all things. Without His spirit we couldn't have gotten through that lesson and He was helping me with words I had NO clue how to even say, just goes to show the great power of the Lord when your humble yourself.

 

I feel like I need to share this with you, but not go into deep details. This past week I have had so many emotions from trying to learn the language the best I can, to not agreeing with my companion on everything. We have completely different personalities so it's kinda hard but were working on communicating. Anyways, all these emotions have been building up this past week, and the other day I had to let it out, in the middle of class... how embarrassing I know. lol jk. But I feel like I just needed to get all these emotions out and that's exactly what I did. I have some great support around me and I know that God has a plan for me. That night we had Tuesday night devotional and someone from the quorum of the 70 spoke to all 3,100 of us missionaries and he spoke on something that I really needed at that point. He spoke on enduring to the end. We are learning to be such great men and we are maturing so much by having this expierience and we all need to endure to the end. SALVATION IS NOT EASY. And another thing he said was I know that I have all this support at home praying for me to have strength. and I need it so much. I picture all of you every morning/night kneeling down and praying for me to have strength to get through this hard hard time in my life. So please, please pray for me to have strength. I need it. I love you all so much and would love to hear from you. Missionaries love letters, so please send me some by either Dear Elder, or mail. I really like getting mail. I will write back I promise hahaha. My address is:

 

Elder Mason Craig Paxman

MTC Mailbox #118

CHI-ANT 0506

2005 N. 900 E. 

Provo, Utah 84604-1793

 

I would love to hear from all of you, keep me updated on your life and sports Jk but seriously. The food here is SOOO delicious I honestly haven't eaten this much EVER. I have eaten more this week then I have in the past 2 months at home... and I'm being 100% serious about that. Mason Es Muy GORDO.... jk I still have a rocking body.. #GetAtMe anyways I probably forgot some stuff but oh well. Write me, pray for me. Love you all. Love you Mom. I'm okay.

 

-Elder Paxman