I have never been the sort of person that liked to work with groups. In those situations, I tend to be the one to pick up the slack, I like to work on my own time schedule (which isn't really possible with groups), and there always seems to be so many more distractions and obstacles associated with groups. Unfortunately though, its pretty common in life to have work in a group setting and even as a college student, there's really no way around it. When Brother Holmoe, BYU Athletic Director, came to speak on teamwork, I have to admit that I had a couple chips on my shoulder: first, I was skeptical about people who encouraged group work and second, I don't really like football which I knew he would use as a comparison. I'm glad to say that my attitude did change almost immediately and Brother Homloe's lecture may have even been my favorite of the semester. Although Mt. Everest is a common example of a goal, Brother Homloe's comparison of the weather at the top to the stormy weather in our pursuits really made sense to me and helped me to really reflect on my own perseverance.

I also liked how Brother Homloe categorized people as simply firefighters who are more than willing to throw water on another person's fire or a firelighter who will help to keep another person's fire hot. It was however the idea of a firefighter that made me nervous about Wednesday's lab skits. In my experience, putting a group of "leaders" together to work on a project is a disaster because everyone shows up and know that they are supposed to be leading and usually are willing to put out other people's fire to do so. I was definitely impressed to see that that didn't happen. Yes, they were just skits and nothing was really on the line, but everyone in the group's ideas were used and my group was very laid back in its approach. There was one person in my group that didn't appoint himself as the team leader or anything, but he with every comment that anyone made, he was encouraging and listened and wanted to make sure that no one was ignored. You could definitely tell that he was a person that really focuses on the people he interacts with throughout the day and wants them to feel cared about.

He was what being a leader while also being on a team is all about, and I hope that I can do better with this in my apartment. There is still a lot of tension there, but I've realized that the only was to progress and progress well is if we are united in our purpose and evolve our relationships from one simply based upon our living in the same space to significant ones where we give beyond reason to lift each other up. I know that this isn't going to be easy to accomplish, but it's what I have to do in order for things to work out, so I am going to try my best. 

I 

a leader with integrity

Growing up in the Church, our youth tend to know more about integrity than most teenagers. Its a section in the For the Strength of Youth pamphlet, a value in Personal Progress and if we only had a dime for every time we heard a story in Sunday School about little boys and girls who steal gum from the store and go an apologize because they felt guilty about not being honest, we could have bought enough gum for each of those kids. The hardest part is realizing that not everyone has those same standards.


When I was in high school, I was involved in Student Council and our Freshman Orientation  program and a few other things, but they were always things that I cared about. At first, it was shocking for me to see that other kids were involved in those things just to put them on their college applications and had no intention of working hard or gaining anything other than a title. As I got older, I became less shocked and more annoyed because I tended to have to pick up the slack for those people. One of those times was the end of my junior year when we were putting on Prom. I was class secretary and another one of the officers was a girl that I had known since I switched schools in the first grade. We were friends, but some things had recently happened and we had had a falling out. When I was at the prom, one of my sponsors pulled me aside and asked if I had sold the girl a prom ticket the day before and I hadn't, but I guess she claimed that I did. Once everything was sorted out, we knew that she had stolen a ticket for her boyfriend and had tried to blame me for not having recorded it. What I hadn't expected was that the school's administration decided to turn the other cheek and give her a second chance so I was going to have to work with her for all of senior year againEspecially after writing this out, I know that it sounds really trivial, but it was a big deal to me and I struggled with the fact that my integrity didn't mean all that much in this situation and neither did her lack of integrity.


In Monday's lecture, I immediately thought of this when the question was posed, "Is it worth it to have integrity?" I spent a lot of time last year wondering the same thing. I always came back to yes because all that matters is what Heavenly Father knows about everything, but I still struggle with just accepting that things are not always fair and don't always seem to have justice at first. Because of my experiences last year, I sometimes think that it might be better to just quit sometimes. Similarly, I have been wondering lately whether or not I should just move out from my apartment because things seem to not be working out so well. I want to keep my integrity, but some of my roommates are so petty that its really hard to tell if it's worth it. I dont really know what the right answer is at the moment, but I know that I need to stay out of the pettiness and keep my integrity no matter what because my Heavenly Father would be really disappointed if I treated my roommates that way when I do know better and when I have been given so many tools to work through this.

servant leadership

Throughout all of high school, I was involved in student council and the school's freshmen orientation programming and National Honors Society and the green week committee and all of these organizations and clubs that had a couple of things in common. First, they were great experiences to put on a college application and they all offered opportunities to serve. While I acknowledge that being able to say I was a part of these organizations helped me as an applicant, it bothered me so much when that was the motivation for people to become involved, so for me, it was the service opportunities that I was in search of. After reading the scriptures, working through my Personal Progress, and living in a family with eight other people, I knew that serving others was not just the purpose of each of us, but my divine purpose and I was eager to finds ways to do so.


When I saw that Brother Cox's lecture on Monday was on being a servant leader, I was so ready to hear it because its something that I am truly passionate. I cannot say that I was passionate about planning the prom or counting votes for homecoming royalty, but fundraising to grant the wishes of children from the Make A Wish Foundation, that I could put my whole heart into. Although I had hear much of what he said before, I was really interested that he mentioned that while the results of serving are usually good, it is possible to selfishly seek to serve. If I am serving someone in the hope of gaining something back from them, then its not serving. I couldn't help but think back to the beginning of the semester when I was so ready to find the organizations at Y-Serve that I wanted to get involved in. I read through all of the pamphlets and even sent emails to a couple of the groups. I didn't receive any replies and the voice in my head saying if they don't reply, to call them began to disappear beneath the papers and midterms. So am I a selfless servant, or do I only do it when its convenient or when I can see some sort of future incentive for it?


I was truly disappointed with myself, but Wednesday's lab class was a chance to get back into the servant mode...by giving out cookies to students coming out from finishing their tests in the testing center. I knew that if I had been one of them, I would have stared at our class, frantically pretended to be on my phone, and walked away as quickly as possible. I thought that we should be doing something more to help people in the community and not just students. I am happy to say that I was proven wrong. Yes, it was a lot of fun for our class to hand out the cookies, but even if it was a little unexpected, people seemed to appreciate it. I realized that while it is really great to serve those that have a less fortunate life than you, the people close around you need to be served as well.


And none seem to be closer than my roommates, remember, the ones that I'm having so many problems with lately.I remember a talk that a girl in my stake gave in the Young Women's meeting on my trek. She said that when we have enemies and we don't know how to resolve the problem, serve them. I remember that because I knew she was right, but that I also struggle with that. I guess that that is the point of being here and being in this class. I need to work on my weaknesses and hopefully strengthen myself and those that I lead, and in this case, my roommates. I really wish that I knew how I was going to serve them so that I could write it in this post, but I'm really not sure right now. What I do know is that I need to be praying for opportunities to serve my roommates and learn to love them so that we can work through our conflict and get past it.