Losing and Finding Yourself

Serving a mission changes you… if you let it. This change is good… at least it was for me.

However, when you come home, you start to feel that person fading away. You’re like “Hey! What’s going on here?? I worked really hard at becoming this person. Why am I slipping away?”

I’ve had people tell me that I just need to adjust back into real life and “come back to myself”. Come back to myself?? As in, I lost myself somewhere on the mission?? You mean, go back to the person I was before the mission? The person you knew before I left? What is this tyranny!!? What’s wrong with who I am right now!!!??

I changed. I am different. I don’t want to go back to who I was before. I feel pressured to though. I’m not quite sure why I feel pressured, but it’s hard not to give in!

So, am I supposed to come home and “find myself” again? Or can I just stay awkward and be the best “spiritual, missionary minded, quoting Book of Mormon scriptures rather than current movies kind of person “I know how to be?

Perhaps the answer is this: We should constantly be losing ourselves. We shouldn’t be trying to remain “true” to our “definition” of self. We should always be losing ourselves… and finding a greater self.

We should be taking what we learned and the changes we made on to each new phase... otherwise it was all in vain! Heavenly Father will keep re-teaching us the same lessons in a different way if we aren't taking advantage of the learning experiences he is handing us.

It’s hard. It’s scary. It’s not fun! But feeling God’s love and patience for me every time I tell him I am lost… every time I tell him what my breaking heart feels… with that powerful confirmation, how can I not have the determination to move forward? When that feeling of love comes (and it does every time), I end my prayer with thanking him for all my blessing and ask him to be patient with me as I work through this mortal probation. I ask him to help me become who he created me to be.

Perhaps we will never truly "find" ourselves in this earth life. We still have so much more to learn and become hereafter.

Just remember this simple truth: I am a child of God... and all that this statement entails.