Accomplishment

I've been waiting for this for a REALLY long time and I'm so excited to say that I have earned my Personal Progress award!  This feels like a huge accomplishment to me, and I apologize if it sounds like I am bragging. 

When I was of Young Woman age, I did not earn my medallion.  They changed the program my last year in Young Women's and I was told that none of my work would transfer, I would need to complete the new program.  Let me tell you something about me...I'm stubborn.  I figured there was no way I could complete the whole program in a year and that was that.  Instead of looking into maybe the leaders misunderstood how it worked for those of us in my situation, I just said forget it.  I realize that I should feel bad about it and ashamed of my attitude, but I don't.  That's not how I live my life.  In fact, the one and only time I ever really felt guilty about it was when Keith told me one of the first questions his mom asked about me before I met her was whether or not I earned my YW medallion.

Flash forward to now and the past 2 years of my life serving in the YW program.  I am so impressed with these young girls and their faith and dedication to the gospel.  They are truly amazing and such an example to me.  I want nothing more than to be an example to them.  They were huge motivatiors in my accomplishing this goal.  Not to mention, I have younger sisters who I feel I need to set an example for.  One of our cute girls texted me a couple of weeks ago and asked how close I was because we had previously discussed not wanting to stand up in Sacrament meeting alone when we received our awards.  As luck would have it, we were both at about the same place and set a goal to finish together.  I'm so glad she motivated me to finally finish!  I'm so proud of her for her dedication and for being a good example to me as well as the other young women.

For those not familiar with the program, there are 8 values and you need to complete 6 experiences from each value (it's a little different for leaders because they thankfully count our service in the program!).  These experiences range from some simple reading and journal, to some that take 2-3 weeks.  Then after you have completed the required experiences you must do a 10 hr project of their choice for each value. The exception is the project for Virtue, which is to read the Book of Mormon.  It's definitely a lot of work to complete all of this, but I really feel the program does help you to better yourself in so many ways.  I loved that I read the Book of Mormon and I had a personal goal to read it in 30 days.  I did it in 28 and was pretty proud :)  My very favorite project that I did was to memorize "The Living Christ".   If you are not familiar with it, just click on that link and read it. (And check out how long it is!)  I love it and love that I know it.  It helps me to recite it in so many different situations.  If you ever see me and are curious if I really know it or not...just ask me to repeat it!  No one ever asks (because why would they know that I know it?!) But I feel pretty cool that I can say it all word for word, so you should just ask me to :) It's cooler to say it aloud instead of in my head.

I'm very happy that I have completed the program and so glad that I have the opportunity to help our young women do the same.