Facing Fears

Singing in public is one of my greatest fears! It stems back to a traumatic experience way back in the 4th grade. My class was in music and we were practicing for our PTA program that was the next night. We were arranged in parts (which is a little intense anyway for the 4th grade), and our teacher was walking through the group listening to us sing. Now, I have to say that even as a 4th grader I was well aware that singing was not one of my gifts. So i was super nervous as my teacher approached me. As she listened to my feeble attempt to sing on key "Fifty Nifty United States" she says in front of the whole class, "Kristin, why don't you just mouth the words when we are all singing tomorrow night for the parents". I was so embarrased and traumatized, and my tender little fourth grade feelings were hurt! I spent the rest of the day trying to keep it together and not cry infront of any one. So that, by the time I got home I could barely contain the emotions. My Mom, being the amazing mother that she was, knew instantly that something was not right, and with in minutes got me to tell the whole story. Like a mama bear, she was ANGRY, and instantly ready to go and defend and protect her cub. I had to beg her not to go to the school and chew my teacher out. She told me that she would be sitting as close to the front as she could get and that I better be singing as loud as I possibly could. She said she wanted to hear me singing out of the whole group. The next night my confidence wasn't to the point where I could sing loud enough for my Mom to hear in the audience, but it was enough that I did actually sing out loud.

Needless to say, that experience ruined any and all ability to feel comfortable singing in front of people in any form. Which has been problamatic when weekend activities with friends have often included karaoke singing or Rock Band as the main attractions. I typically stay home or go and refuse to sing. But last Friday, my old singles ward had a ward activity that was at a Korean Karaoke place. (Korean karaoke is where you can rent a room for only your group instead of singing on a stage in front of alot of strangers, it also normally has a few microphones so multiple people can sing together) I had already decided that I was not going to attend this activity. But during that afternoon I got 5 texts from 5 different people all telling me that I should go, and that they hoped to see me there. I'm still not sure if this was a carefully planned scheme to get me there or if it was completely random that these friends all texted me telling me to come, but in either case it worked and I went. I was adamant that there would be no singing from me. It worked well for about an hour and then Coldplay's Viva la Vida came on. It's one of my favorite songs, and my love of all things Coldplay has been well documented among my friends for some time now. My friends pulled me to my feet, and made it so it was more embarrasing to keep refusing to sing rather then just stand there and get it over with. By the time the chorus started I was singing and bouncing awkwardly along and while I was still embarrased, I realized no body cared, and that I was actually having fun singing one of my favorite songs, and pretty soon I didn't care!! It was a huge moment for me!! I even sang an old school Maddona song later on with my room mate. I felt like I had faced my fears and found out that they were really no big deal. Although I'm not sure facing my fear of the uknown in the ocean or space will be quite so easily conquered!!!

Primary is Awesome!!

This has been a crazy week! It started with Sunday, which since I started teaching Primary has become my favorite day of the week. I teach the Valiant 1-12 girls. They are entertaining to say the least. Boy, can those girls talk and talk and talk about everything and nothing at the same time. They crack me up. I have 2 girls in my class who are converts with in the last 6 months. So they have a lot of questions, some of them on topic, but the vast majority completly off topic, and come from outer space. The random questions make it difficult to cover the lesson, so we made a deal, they all have a page that they keep folded in thier scriptures and as they have questions durring the week they write them down so they can remember them, and then each Sunday I will try to answer one for them before we start the lesson. I tried to explain that they need to be honest, sincere, not silly questions, I guess we'll see how it goes.

After class the older girls go to Young Women's and the younger girls go with me to Sharing Time. Let me just tell you that when you put kids infront of other kids crazy things happen. This last week we had a sharing time by the 9yr olds, about eternal families. They had a cute idea of making strips with different family members on them and then putting them on someone's wrist, and then connecting all the strips so they are sealed together. When the "dad" was picked he yells out to the little girl that was the "mom", "hey, now that we're married, let's kiss"! It was pretty entertaining. All of the adults in the room tried valiently to hold it in, but most of us failed. The poor teacher trying to keep things going lost them at that point. But she was smart and made the group sing and sit back down again before trying to bear her testimony. All in all it was pretty funny!

Next week I have to give a talk in sacrament so wish me luck!!

If you have enough will power you can defy the laws of physics

Yesterday I got to experiance my first Fast and Testimony meeting in my new family ward. I have to say it was quite different from the Fast and Testimony meetings I have been used to for the last several years. In singles wards you don't get a lot of children or teen agers. And this new demographic certainly made things interesting! We had the standard children that are all gung ho to share thier testimonies and then when they actually get to the pulpit they are struck dumb or begin to cry, which is pretty entertaining. My favorite by far though, was the teenage boy who got up and talked about the car accident that he and his friend had gotten in over the weekend. No one was injured and apperently most of the ward already new about it, because it involved 2 priests, so there was already some laughter when he got to the pulpit. I guess the accident involved them running a light, because it was late and they figured if they drove fast enough they wouldn't get hurt. A lot of his testimony was hard to follow but he did drop this little gem that had me laughing out loud from my seat in the back of the chapel. He said and I quote "I had always believed that if you had enough will power you could overcome the laws of physics". For some reason that cracked me up, the thought that it was only our lack of will power that lets gravity keep us earth bound! It was pretty entertaining.

I found out on yesterday that I'll be the Primary teacher for the Valient 10-12 girls. I'm really excited about working with these girls. I taught them this week and they are hilarious and really smart. It's such a fun age, they can't wait to be in young womens and are all so excited about everything. I think they will keep me hopping though as far as preparing lessons that keep them interested and involved. I'm really really happy about it though!! We have our primary program next month and our class has to come up with our own presentation so that will be interesting! I'm just thouroughly enjoying primary right now.

Anyway there is the update on my new family ward