"The Lord's way is not hard. Life is hard" (Hilary)

It arrived on September 29th! A personal birthday/missionary message for each day of her birthday month!!!

Dear everyone,

Happy October!! Do something awesome today in honor of the greatest month of the year. I love you all. I hope you all know that life is so good. Realize that, okay? Sometimes we get so caught up in the little things that we forget how blessed we are. If you think life is good, keep thinking that way. If you don't, refer to the quote at the bottom of this email.

Thanks to everyone who participated!

Thanks for writing. Mom, I received your packages :) and I met Sister Hess the other day. She is so sweet. Tell her thanks for me once again. And thank YOU for everything you have sent. I got my birthday package Friday and this morning opened the first envelope! WOOOOO. A letter with a whole bunch of fun stuff from Jesslyn. I felt like I spent the morning hanging out with her. She is so great. She sent me a ton of quotes and a picture and a few missionary comics and fun stuff like that. Oh. How great. I can't wait to open the rest. But I will. But it will be hard. 

So, not too much happened this week. We haven't had too much success, but we are working on finding our flaws and weak spots and improving there. My companion is great. She is so sweet and has taken really good care of me this week because I have been super super sick. Mom, remember that one time that I was so sick and Dr. Seamons said that some of his nurses had been sick with the same thing and they explained it as if they felt like they were hit by a truck...? That is exactly how I felt Saturday and Sunday. Saturday my companion was able to go out and teach and I stayed with some members, but yesterday we were basically stuck in the house all day after church. I literally could not lift my head or walk or talk or eat without a lot of pain. My companion has been super helpful. Friday President Ghent and Hermana Ghent and Hermana Hess were here in Otavalo and he gave me a blessing. I am definitely getting better now. And the elders in our zone have been so concerned. This afternoon they knocked on our door with a handfull of balloons and this box of a whole bunch of chocolates and confetti and random stuff like that. They were like, "Get better! Be careful! Don't work if you shouldn't! Take care of yourself!" That was so so sweet. These guys are so great.

Here is part of my letter to President from this week.

Saturday and Sunday I was super sick, and was not able to go out and teach. Hermana Marca and I were able to find members to do splits with us so that she could accomplish something Saturday, but Sunday we were both stuck in the house. We didn't have the weekend that we were hoping to have and numbers-wise it wasn't so great. But I finally feel like I am getting better and I am really ready to be able to work. I have already learned a lot from Hermana Marca. She is loving and caring and willing to do whatever she needs to to get this work moving. She has a lot of enthusiasm and I am really grateful to be working with her.

At the moment we don't have any investigator with a baptismal date, but we are working on that. We have a few who weren't able to attend church yesterday because they were traveling and we are going to put more baptismal dates this week. That is one thing that I have learned the importance of. I remember before the mission I wondered why people always talked about "numbers." I remember thinking that I wasn't going to put so much focus on the numbers, so much as just helping the people here. But early in my mission I realized why the baptisms are so important. We're not just helping people here, but we're helping them to make saving covenants. That is why there is nothing more important. There will be nothing more important that they do, than to be baptized.

I know there was more I wanted to say, but can't think of it now, and we're out of time. I love you all. Hope all is well. Thanks again for everything.

H. Norton

"The Lord's way is not hard. Life is hard, not the Gospel. There is opposition in all things (2 Nephi 2:11), everywhere, for everyone. Life is hard for all of us, but life is also simple. We have only two choices. We can either follow the Lord and be endowed with His power and have peace, light, strength, knowledge, confidence, and joy OR we can go it some other way, any other way, whatever other way, and go it alone - without His support, without His power, without guidance ... in darkness, turmoil, doubt, grief, and despair. And I ask, which way is easier?" - Elder Lawrence C. Corbridge

Yeah, life is hard sometimes. But I can't imagine how much harder it would be without the gospel.