Sister Kinman!

So, Sister Kjirstin Kinman came home yesterday, and I got a chance to talk to her tonight. It was exactly what I needed after making my decision on Tuesday. Kjirstin was one of the girls who inspired me to go on a mission in the first place, and she's always been a sort of kindred spirit/someone I love and look up to. Talking to her made my soul feel a million times lighter. I feel like making the decision to go on a mission was the easy part; maintaining it is going to be difficult.

While I'm really, really excited to go, there are aspects of leaving for a mission that absolutely terrify me. It's going to be a lot of hard, hard work, and a lot of missing people, and a lot of emotional ups and downs, and a lot of personal changes, and a lot of big life changes in general. It sounds kind of strange, but I think my biggest fear is losing who I am right now. I know I'll come back a person that I could never be without the mission, but I'll be different. My gosh, I'm going to be so weird. But talking to Kjirstin really put my mind at ease. We talked about everything from preparing to go, to entering the MTC, to teaching people, to companions, to adjusting to life after the mission, to emotional roller coasters, all of it. Thinking about it all makes me really excited. Humbled. But excited.

I've been really blessed with the people I've been surrounded with lately. My parents couldn't be more supportive, my siblings are all for it, I have a ton of friends leaving for their missions, etc. My non-member friends have been really supportive as well, which feels awesome. It's been the perfect mix of the right people and the right timing. I actually never REALLY thought I would serve a mission, mostly because I was always really worried about leaving a few people in particular. I'm still worried about leaving those people, but it's also a really great feeling to make a decision based solely on what I think the Lord wants me to do.

Anyways, that's all I got.