Lessons From a Non-Dater on How to Find Your One & Only (Segment 3)

It was Sunday, April 22, 2012 and I was—to put it one way—freaking out. In less than 12 hours I would be on a flight to Mexico and the main thought going through my mind was that the moment I stepped off the plane I was going to get mugged. Add to that irrational fear the fact that I was leaving to do research in a foreign country for several months where I believed there was no possible chance of me finding my "one and only," and you can start to understand why I was hiding under my bedcovers at that very moment trying not to cry. I heard my brother come in and start asking me what time I would be ready to leave, but he stopped mid-sentence when he pulled the covers off my face and said, "Oh, you're crying." He quickly put the covers back over my face and then fled the scene, calling for the family "emotional-emergency responder": MOM.

My mother did come to the rescue that night, but I was still doubting myself as I boarded the plane to Mexico the next morning. I had felt so strongly since coming home from my mission that I needed to get married, but I also couldn't deny the direction I had received to go to Mexico and do research. So, naturally, I felt conflicted. How in the world would conducting research in Mexico with an all-female research team help me find my "one and only"? According to my logic, it wouldn't help at all.

As I waited for a connecting flight in Texas, however, a text message arrived from my mother with a quote from one of my favorite books. She wrote: "A sailor chooses the wind that takes the ship from a safe port. . . . [But remember], winds have a mind of their own." For some reason, I understood her message and I suddenly felt at peace as I realized why I was leaving my safe port.  I had chosen the "wind" I would follow because God had led me to it. And though I did not know where that wind would take me, I could trust in the Master of the wind to direct my course for good.

In reality, I had learned that lesson a thousand and one times over the past year; God was just good enough to teach it to me one more time so that I could arrive in Mexico full of faith instead of fear. Looking back now I can clearly see the path God created for me to travel so that I could find Beto. While I could trace the path quite a ways back, I'll begin where CHOICE Humanitarian came into my life. When I was in high school I participated in Model United Nations (MUN) representing the refugees of Guatemala's 30-year civil war. That experience was so powerful that when my cousins informed me of their upcoming service expedition to Guatemala at the end of my senior year I practically begged them to take me with them. And they did.

The humanitarian agency that directed their trip just happened to be CHOICE, the Center for Humanitarian Outreach and Inter-Cultural Exchange. The experiences I had in Guatemala shaped my studies throughout my four years in college and continue to influence my life today. For example, within two weeks of returning from my mission, I contacted CHOICE headquarters in Salt Lake to see if they would take me on as an intern before I headed back to school in the fall. They accepted my offer and I soon began working on everything from fundraising to event planning to translation and more. My main project while at CHOICE was connected to a project in Mexico that had been evaluated by a research team from BYU. At the end of my internship I organized a meeting with the professor from BYU who oversaw the research to make sure both the research team and CHOICE were on the same page.

To make a long story short, the opportunity to go to Mexico practically fell into my lap as a result of that meeting. After discussing the current project, I told the professor I was interested in doing research like his students had done, but that my real passion was for education and development. At that, the professor pulled out a stack of papers and placed it in my lap and said, "My colleague and I are working on a paper that looks at dropout rates in Mexico. Why don't you take a look at our paper and see what questions or insights you could add and we'll send you to Mexico to research it." I don't think I'll ever forget that moment.

I worked closely with the professor to obtain a research grant, draft my proposal, form a research team, and secure the plans to go to Mexico. At the beginning, however, I realized the colossal time commitment the project would require and hesitated to go. I remember going to the Lord in prayer and having a conversation that went something like this:

Me: "Heavenly Father, if I do this research, I'm not going to have time to date."

HF: "That's okay. You should do this."

So I moved forward with my plans. Every time I questioned what I was doing I would go to the Lord and get the same exact answers: 1) I am mindful of you, and 2) Go to Mexico. I learned to take comfort in the first answer, but I struggled to understand why I was going to Mexico. I am a very studious person and I could see myself using research as an excuse to avoid the dating world for pretty much my whole life if it were necessary, so I sometimes wondered if me going to Mexico was just my subconscious trying to get out of dating. One night, as I was pondering over this very issue, a little light turned on in my head and I could almost visualize my answer. I wrote in my journal that night:

I just made a connection and recognized a pattern of God's hand in my life: I work pretty hard to do many good things and make things happen in my life, but my effort usually seems in vain until God touches whatever it is I'm doing. I was just thinking about how everything with CHOICE, from representing Guatemala in the MUN to my internship to working with my professor, have all just fallen into my lap. Things have simply "worked." I have worked and worked and done my part, but many of the opportunities I have received have come as others have guided me along or in response to promptings of the Spirit . . . The connection I made tonight was that I may work and work and work at finding the right guy, but there is also a need for divine help. I know that God will bring "us" together. I will do my part, but I am pretty inexperienced in the "field" and so I need a power beyond my own. And just as in the past when I have given my all, God will bless my efforts. Not because I am entitled to those blessings, but because that is His character. 

While CHOICE/research/Mexico has required a lot of work on my part, it did seem to just fall in my lap once I was ready for it. God has a way of guiding my life by opening the doors that need opening right at the opportune moments. I try to keep most of the doors before me so that I can prepare myself for what lies beyond, but until God opens the door, I will wait with patience and with faith that he will open the doors at the right times. In other words, I'm going to keep working at being a disciple of Christ, preparing myself for marriage, and strengthening myself for motherhood so that when God opens the doors of marriage and family I will have done my part so as to be ready to walk through the door. For now, I can see that God has opened the research door, so that is the one through which I'm going to walk. – January 27, 2012

In essence, Lesson Number Three is really just the second half of Lesson Number One (which was to trust God). Lesson Number Three is to act! As James teaches us in the New Testament, "Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone" (James 2:17). The other half of faith is works. The other half of faith is to walk through the "door" God has placed before us even though we don't know what is on the other side. For me, I thought the research door was simply a door I should be walking through at that specific time in my life; come to find out, the research door was also the "find your one and only" door too!

If you're reading this, chances are that there is a door the Lord is waiting to open for you or that he already has open. It's most likely not a research door, but it is the door that needs opening in your life. So walk through it! Even if you have moments where you hide under your bedcovers because you don't understand where the Lord is trying to guide you or why, walk through that door.  Faith without works is not only dead, it's not faith. Faith means leaving a safe port and choosing the wind of which God is both the mind and the master. So choose faith, choose discipleship, and then choose to act against all odds. Walk through the door.

Lessons From a Non-Dater on How to Find Your One & Only (Segment 2)

As I mentioned in my last post, my first year back to school after my mission had a very miserable side to it. Amid that trial, however, I learned several incredible lessons that made the misery worth it. I began to learn one such lesson as my best friend and I drove back to school after celebrating our birthdays together at home. The date was Sunday, September 11, 2011. After several failed attempts to find a stake center along our route that was playing the CES devotional, my friend began streaming the talk through her cell phone and we even figured out a way to get the sound on the car speakers. By the time we had overcome the technical difficulties, however, Sister Oaks was already speaking. While I missed a good portion of the talk, what I did hear became my guiding light during that difficult year.

Sister Oaks specifically directed her talk toward the single adults of the church since—having been single until she was 53—she considered herself an expert on the subject. In her talk, she discussed several eternal truths that will protect us from discouragement. It was the third truth she shared that began to change my approach (and attitude) about finding my "one and only." She taught:

Our responsibility is to become the best disciples of Christ we can become. On one occasion, full of worry and frustration about my single situation and my advancing years, I went to a priesthood leader for a blessing to strengthen me. The words spoken in that blessing stay with me to this day and ring truer to me as time passes. I can still quote them: “If you cannot bear the difficulties and challenges of single life, you will never be able to bear the difficulties and challenges of married life.” I sat a bit stunned. Those words were a call to action for me to make my life wonderful regardless of any situation or difficulty I faced. If I made a happy single life for myself, it would determine the happiness I would have as a married woman." (Sister Oaks, 2011)

I add my testimony to that of Sister Oaks. Her words would come back to me time and time again as I faced my own single-life challenges. If I could not be happy as a single person, why would I expect to be happy as a married person? I began to understand that while great happiness is found in marriage, happiness cannot depend on another person making me happy. True happiness comes from the Lord. If I was unhappy as a single person, it was not because I had failed to find my "one and only," it was because I had failed in my relationship with God. The happiness that He gives us is good whether we're single or married.

I remembered Sister Oaks' words one night after an especially hard day when I realized I had gotten my priorities all messed up. It wasn't that my desire to get married and have a family was bad, rather, I had let my worries cloud out my most important duty: discipleship. I made a commitment to myself that night to never get so miserable over my dating situation that I would forget to be a disciple of Christ. I felt as if a great burden had been lifted from my shoulders. I didn't know how (or like) to date, but I did know how to be a disciple of Christ.

When I began to focus on my discipleship instead of my dating inadequacies, things began to change. When I had focused on dating, I felt like I had to become like the girls who seemed to go on lots of dates, but I didn't want or feel like I could be like them. When I began to focus on discipleship, however, God began to change the things about me that really mattered. Suddenly, it wasn't about being flirtatious, it was about being charitable. It wasn't about how many dates I could get asked on, it was about how many people I could serve. It wasn't about another person or any one relationship making me happy, it was about how I could make others happy. When discipleship became my focus, I found happiness.

Then, once I got my priorities straight, the Lord taught me one of the greatest lessons about marriage I have ever learned in my unmarried life. Christmas brought me home and face to face with the reality of being one of the last single children of the family. I watched my siblings with their spouses and with their beautiful little families and I couldn't help but feel like I was still missing something. Yes, I was happy, but I still wanted to get married. What had changed, however, was that I now knew the reason why.

January 2, 2012 I wrote in my journal, "I need to find a husband, not just because I need to get married and have a family like a good Mormon girl, I need to get married and have a family because it will help me be a better disciple of Christ. . . .People are the material of our molding. We need each other to be successful followers of Christ. I need marriage, not because I am lonely without it; not because it is what is expected of me in my culture; not because of a whole lot of reasons that people conjure up when they desire to be married. No, I need marriage so that I can become more like Christ.

When I finally met Beto (my "one and only"), one of the first things I noticed about him was that he was one of the most sincere disciples of Jesus Christ I had ever met. He loved people and he drew others to him with that love. He loved to serve and he loved God. (Plus, he was incredibly funny and handsome and . . . well I don't want to give too much away. I've got to save something for the next posts!) I know that we will face challenges and that neither one of us is perfect, but I know that with our focus on discipleship we can find happiness and make things work. So, from a non-dater who managed to find a really amazing guy, here is Lesson Number Two for finding your one and only: focus on being a disciple of Christ.