My trip to California has been a pleasant one. I have enjoyed my stay here and I enjoy the chance that I have had to work with my father. It is a nice feeling having a job. I enjoy it a tremendous amount. With this being stated, it is incredibly difficult for me to go back to Utah where I don’t have a job and I am not being productive what so ever. The difference is very little between me here and me there. However I feel as though I am so much more productive here. While I know that it is just as productive, if not more so to find a job independently from my father, it is still just very frustrating to be disciplined enough to go ahead and find one.
Living in a heavily guarded mormon society does really have its perks though; especially in being able to make correct decisions. Swearing is far more common in secular society than the mormon monastery that I have called my home for the past year. So to is the temptation to watch uncouth and salacious television and movies. It is just so commonly accepted to watch these shows here that it is easy to accep the standards of others as your own. I think Provo is a fitting place for me at the present moment. With this in mind, I think provo has ripened me for satan’s harvest. I havfe loosened my standards while living in Provo in an attempt to be accepted into the mormon culture and as I return down to the real world I am more easily swayed to sin.
Regardless of what has transpired throughout this entire trip and my susceptibility towards sin, I have come to the conclusion that I am very glad that I have taken this trip. I have managed to both relax in a different way that I would be able to than in Provo and I have been able to work in a different way than I would be able to in provo. It has been a good trip.
It is my belief that this trip is merely a microcosm for how my colligiate life is. Since returning home from my mission I have been quite frustrated in regard to my lack of focus on others. It is frustrating to do things for oneself. It is frustrating to educate, feed, and entertain yourself without the thought of others. During my mission it was these actions which constituted a hedonistic lifestyle. Throughout this time I have felt frustrated and upset.
During this break I have been reading a book called Same Kind of Different As Me. It is a rather inspiring story regarding the friendship between a rich art dealer and a poor black homeless man. It was during my reading of this inspiring story that I began to reflect upon my future career as a teacher. For the past few months I have been driven to live out a benevolent dream. I have been inspired to help serve people from the ghetto by helping them as a history teacher. It is such a pure and wonderful dream. It is as if I will be stepping back in to my mission doing a thing that is far more worthwhile than just making money. I will be helping and inspiring children to transcend the racial, social, and economic fetters which presently keep them bound.
It was at that moment that I realized that my vacation indeed was symbolic of my college experience. Currently I am on a vacation in California, but in the same way, currently I am on a vacation from doing that which is benevolent and kind, but is also difficult. In college I am focusing upon myself and bettering myself in order to better those who I will serve in the future. All that I must now do is learn to enjoy myself and for the present time living for myself.
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