My faith journey

 Good morning readers!

Lately I have been thinking a lot about my faith journey and I have made it SO far.

We have eight missionaries in my city and they often ask me to tell them a story from my life. 

I have experienced a LOT and I have a lot of fun tales and events to speak about. That is one reason why I blog and write my book on Scrivener, journal and keep notes and write talks and lessons for church. I love writing, it's my most important and fun hobby! 

I listen to music 24/7 if I am not watching some YouTube videos, listening to audiobooks or talking with people. Music is SO important to me. It has made me who I am. I have always loved music, my biological dad was a musician so it's in my genes.

My third important hobby is reading. I read a lot. I am often in a reading slump though... I try to choose the best books, the best stories by the best authors and I DNF a book fast if it's not up to my standards. I used to be less picky with my choices but nowadays I am more selective.

My faith journey started when I was adopted by my parents at the age of 3 months from the orphanage in Nykarleby. I grew up in Tammerfors and Jakobstad. I spent most of my holidays and summers in Jakobstad and Larsmo, with my grandparents, aunts, uncle and cousins. I have 15 cousins on my mom's side, all lived here when we were growing up. I am the oldest cousin. 

My dad baptized me when I was eight years old, on my birthday. He is now in palliative care, my mom takes care of him and I help when I am visiting here in Jakobstad. My parents have thought me a lot of good principles. I am so grateful for my parents.

I have been mostly active in the church, there was a time when I was 23-24 years old when I didn't go to church because of my mental health situation. I had a psychosis when I was 22 and it impacted me still for years, to get back to normal. When I kept a break from church attendance, I had really difficulties saying anything, because I was so tired and my brain was adjusting to new meds. I have been having mental health problems since I was 17 years old. I became sick on my mini-mission. I spent two weeks with two companions in Jtväskylä. It broke me down, I couldn't sleep and it made me all messed up. My biological mom did have mental health struggles so it was in my genes...

I love the Gospel and Jesus Christ. 

My health has become a lot better these last few years. I got a nerve damage last year, even the intense pain from that, in my leg, doesn't compare to anxiety and depression. I would rather have somatic problems, like pain and other things, than mental health problems. The brain affects everything. In case you don't believe me or just think it is not possible to feel so much anxiety it is worse that intense pain, maybe you have not felt anxiety?

Now I need to go wake my parents up. 

More later!

Cinders

Preparations for the Eternal covenant in the House of the Lord, i.e. Celestial Marriage 2025

 Good afternoon peeps! 

How goes it? I am happy. I do have anxiety every once in a while, and it can be pretty severe, but since I have started a kind of "new phase" in my life, my mood has been more stable and less chaotic. It is a huge blessing for me. 

SO. The title is not clickbait.

Last year in the spring my friend from Manchester gave me a special blessing with his missionary companion, from Utah. I am still flabbergasted and very surprised that I could receive such straight inspiration and a message from Heavenly Father. My friend was the messenger. WOW. He is a great guy.

The blessing told me to start getting ready and prepare for the next covenant I am to enter in the Temple. 

 I have all of them received EXCEPT marriage.

So... I first started preparing a little half-heartedly by buying books about the Temple when I visited Utah last year, tried to study marriage more and try to prepare myself. Lately I have been upping the efforts and started to really study marriage with intent. Really hyperfocus on it and the Temple.

I also started LONG AGO to plan my wedding. Just for "fun". LOL.

I have a lot of ideas... but I am still "right here waiting"...

Some things I have been better at is cleaning at home ( I moved lately and have a completely own place now.)  Organizing my stuff, planning how I spend my time during the day, I mean I don't watch or read aa lot of unnecessary movies and books. I am more picky with the entertainment I choose, music too. I could say, that I am kind of living like a missionary! :) Good goal for me...

I have made some music lists on YouTube and Spotify with songs for the wedding and for just being married, like beautiful romantic music. I love music. I also have SO many relationship and marriage and dating advice books ready at hand. Also about sex of course, from a more spiritual perspective. 

I am happy. :) The guy who marries me is one lucky fellow. :) and I will be a lucky lady.

More later!

Answers to my questions about the gospel

 Good morning dear reader,

For the past few years I have been studying the gospel by myself more and more. I think the pandemic kind of kicked it off. Something awoke in me and I started to grow and learn more rapidly and fully immersing myself into my faith and beliefs. I was and have always been a liberal person, I have tried to NOT judge, NOT assume and NOT have strong opinions about anything before I figure it out for myself. So, after beginning this journey, my faith journey if it will, and I started to learn and grow SO MUCH. I participated in a lot of zoom meetings for the Single Adults in the church, both for my home country of Finland and all of Europe. There I got the chance to teach and lead discussions about faith. Through that, I became invested and ALL IN, into the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints. I have always had a testimony but I wanted to learn more, strengthen it and become strong in the faith, also by actually studying and learning for myself. 

I found friends I had not met before, both here in Finland and in all of Europe. My friends taught me.

I kind of had to deconstruct most of my beliefs in order to "get them right" and strengthen them. It took me approximately five years, from the moment the pandemic hit and up until this point. I realized so many new things. I learned that God is not always as we think, some people who try to follow Jesus, are not showing or understanding some of the things I feel are true doctrine. I do not think God only loves white people. I know, members think they are not very racist and discriminating but they sometimes unfortunately are. I started realizing that because I am a very "weird" or different kind of member, at least here in Finland, I was bullied in church, slandered and bad mouthed by some members. I know, we should all remember no one is perfect and people did remind me from time to time VERY clearly how I wasn't good enough.

Flash forward to 2023 when I met this amazing elder (a missionary) who encouraged me and was really kind and appreciative of me and my efforts to help the missionaries. He was sincere and he has such a good, beautiful heart. Meeting him changed my life and my whole perspective on myself. He taught me about my worth. I don't really know what happened, but I started to seen myself as a precious daughter of God. Whether my friend meant it or not, I felt loved by him and my Heavenly Father, so completely and just the way I was and am. Thank you, you know who you are. My friend changed my life and I will be eternally grateful. I am tearing up a bit. It was a good time in my life.

You may ask, HOW did I not know my worth?

To tell you the truth, I was bullied in school and in church. I thought I wasn't worthy of love or true friendship and acceptance. I thought I needed to fit into the box, be one of the colorless, boring and solemn people that I often saw surrounding me. I know, that is a generalization but that's how I felt. My time in Sweden (January 2001-December 2012) had helped me see other different people and I got very "international" more outgoing and "fun" to put it simply. I didn't really grow up in Sweden, but it laid a foundation of aspects of my personality which help me be the person I am today. I am a lot happier, more smiley and outgoing. I learned to "small talk" but at the same time be honest and straightforward but not in a mean way. I was bullied in Sweden too, at church. But far less than here, which I am very grateful. 

The missionaries have been my "guiding light and inspiration for decades now, I am so grateful for the ones who are still serving here and for the ones who went home already. I love them so much and I want to help and support them always.

Deconstructing my foundation of faith has helped me to build it up again, from the very corner stone and base. I have built it on Jesus, my rock. He is the best friend to everyone! Some people don't understand what it means and to me it's very abstract but I have thought of it this way:´

"Someday I will understand"

I think I will have the possibility in the moment I see Jesus descending from Heaven, during the second coming, I will understand at least most of it and I will understand why I went through all the difficulties in my life and why they changed me as a person, changed my soul. I needed to take a step back and look at everything to appreciate it all and gain an understanding of all the basic teachings of the church.

Understandably it sounds WILD that I would kind of deconstruct most of it. I know, it was a risky path, but it has helped me so much. I needed to know, feel and have faith in my faith, if I may put it that way. I know some of the people reading this will either judge me or roll their eyes or something. It's ok. You don't need to understand my life, because it's not your life, it's mine.

After considering many of the teachings of the church, there are no explanation that I completely understand. I just trust God and what He is doing in my life. I am a lot more mature and a lot more hopeful and optimistic about my future... I might even get that "happily ever after" with someone. Stay tuned for more about that later, when I know more stuff than I know now. LOL. It will be SO great. I believe I have a incredibly bright future ahead of me. A lot of challenges but also a lot of blessings. I am feeling like my time has come. My time to get married, be happy in that marriage and attain exaltation together with my husband. Nothing is impossible for me anymore! I have all the potential and worth and tools to get there.

That's all for today, hope you have enjoyed this blog post!

God bless us everyone!

Are you there God? It's me, Cindy...

 Hello there! 

During the last few years in my personal life, I have had a lot of trials and some difficulties I honestly didn't think I would ever experience. I have kind of had a little faith crisis because of them. I didn't understand why they are happening to me. I know, such a cliché thing to say... But I really felt like I was completely alone. The illness that was prevalent during the last few years didn't help. I had to be alone. I had to stay home alone a lot. My anxiety was high and I had some visits to the hospital too. 

Now, on the other hand, I am feeling a lot better. I haven't been to the hospital since October 2023! :D That is a new record in a long time. I have gained a lot of self confidence, I know myself better, I have finally started to become an adult.

Needless to say, my faith has been fortified a lot. Like, so much.

I read the book of Mormon more often, I remember to pray more, I have decided to:

TRUST GOD

CHOOSE THE RIGHT 

BE BRAVE

I have made my own kind of spiritual quote...

"Overcome all your trials by trusting God, being brave and choosing the right".

But what do you do if you don't trust God? What if you don't even believe there is a God? What if you are afraid? Where can you go, who can you trust? I have friends who have a lot of illness and difficulties. I want to support them and be their friend. I think that's my purpose and task here during my life.

Because I have been having trials too. I have experienced bullying at school, I have become ill on my mini mission and subsequently spent eight months in the mental hospital in my area. I was 17 years old. People have not understood my health problems, because they are not visible. 

For five years my back has been hurting a lot, even longer but in August 2019 I got a walker. I used it a lot, because I had bad balance, pains and my scoliosis made it feel like my back was kind of tilting backwards. It all started to change last year... I met some really lovely new friends and they lifted me to another level, so to speak. I fell back a little now and then, my progress was slow at times. This spring my pains were so bad that I used a wheelchair outside and my friends helped me get around. 

Then another miracle happened. My faith in humanity, God and myself was kind of restored. I met some new wonderful friends and they changed my life some more, in a very huge and positive way. I didn't feel so depressed anymore, my anxiety was and is mostly gone and I got good medication, that has helped me loose weight so now I can walk a lot more without my walker! I haven't needed my wheelchair for a few months now either.

This all has been made possible by the fact that God loves me and has given me the strength I needed.

I have gotten a few awesome blessings from God through my friends the missionaries who have been so important to me. They are so important in fact, that my patriarchal blessing mentions them twice. I was made to be a friend of the missionaries and we cheer each other along.

I needed to learn a few things, still do, but I needed and still need to develop more trust in God. I need to learn how to forgive and how to love others the way God loves us all. This is no easy feat! If you think so, maybe think again lol.

Thinking is good, but I am free most days, because I am on early retirement and have a little too much time to think. It is not good either, for anyone, the least for someone like me who overthinks all the time and worries too much. Some things that help are writing, music and reading.

Faith is important. Often when I wonder what I believe, I just think about that I really WANT to believe. And that helps me get back on track. There are so many different differences between people and they get emphasized often. I think instead of looking at differences, we should focus on our good things that we have in common, the difficulties we have in common, so we can help each other understand others. It is not easy, but it is definitely worth it.

More later!

When you believe

 Good morning!

Today I have something to say about how faith can move personal mountains in each of our lives.

We are all equal and valuable. Everyone on this Earth has an inherent value, a priceless value and we all have the potential for greatness. We all can move mountains in out lives and make our lives better, enjoy our life whatever the circumstances, but many times it is really freaking difficult to be happy and grateful at all times.

We all have different set of difficulties. Some of us are in really difficult circumstances and it seems impossible to be grateful or happy. I often think it is so unfair that we're all kind of given the same commandment to become better, when some of us have so many trials and can't even live long enough to learn how to become better or really enjoy life.

This is a thing I have been thinking about a lot lately.

If we're all on the same starting point, why do some people die early, suffer through pain and hunger, war and abuse? I have not quite found the answer to that one. I am sorry. But I know that when we leave this Earth, we will be healed in the afterlife, at least I personally think there must be some good hospital and doctors to take care of us, or we will never be happy and feel fulfilled, even in the afterlife.

So, no matter your trauma, difficulties and struggles, we will be healed at some point. Our spirits and minds will be ready to be resurrected at some point and both our spirit and body will be at its optimal form. 

Therefore, when we are faced with mountains of trials and difficulties here during our lives, we can feel peace and trust God that it will all be fixed and made perfect at some point. I know this has to be true or God wouldn't be fair and just. 

I started to try to feel more grateful and happy a few years ago, and it has made all the difference.

I got more things to be grateful for, more reasons to be happy and smile.

This isn't always easy. I even try to be grateful for my difficulties! It is amazing how that has changed my life. Now I know God loves me and wants me to grow and learn. I know to some that doesn't seem like a blessing, to constantly be bombarded with trials and problems. I have felt that way. But it will shift at some point and you will feel joy.

A big change starts with small steps. I have written in my #give thanks# journal since 2010 often and it has helped me a lot. Also keeping a prayer journal, where I write my prayers sometimes, has helped me so much. I don't always write in these, and sometimes it's so dark and depressing in my life, that I feel like I can never go on from this situation. But I have always been able to. There is always a new dawn. There is always a fresh beginning. I truly believe and know this to be true.

Happy new year! (new year's advice for myself)

 Good morning from Finland! 

When the year of 2024 started, I was on a short cruise with my friend and we watched on TV in our cabin when the new year arrived first in Finland and then in Sweden. We were on a cruise from Åbo to Stockholm. Really lovely ship (Viking line m/s Grace) and the best service ever! They are really helpful and kind.

I wrote in my notebook some advice for myself for 2024.

My motto for 2024: TRUST GOD.

My own advice for 2024:

Live in the moment

loose weight 10-15 kilograms

save money

read the Book of Mormon every day

Be brave, choose the right

don't judge anyone

be kind

develop:

-spiritually

-emotionally

-mentally

-intellectually

So far I have listened to the book of mormon yesterday on the 2nd of January 2024. I am going to try to follow all my own advice . Wish me luck! :) I used to make new year's promises but they have never actually helped me because I can't follow my promises 100%  and get easily discouraged...

More later!

Good Sabbath Day from Finland! :)

 Good morning!

Welcome back to my spiritual blog! 

I started a new kinda religion themed blog this spring: 

https://swefinnmissionarybonusmom.blogspot.com/

It's about me and my missionary family! :) I started adopting missionaries in 2021... Take a gander at my blog, there you can see when and why etc. I love the missionaries, always have and always will. They bring so much joy to my life. (Of course they have almost all left back home now, but there's always new ones arriving.

I have just learned that it is not common for members in the church to have a lot of friends outside the church? I didn't know that was a thng... I have always had friends outside of church. First of all, there were  no other mormons in my school (svenska samksolan, the Swedsh school here in my city, the only Swedish school here) and I have been to the hospital often during my life, I have found friends there too. And all my friends from church are working and I am on early retirement. They don't have time to meet me but I have a lot of time.

It's not good for me to be always alone, I can get anxiety and feel really bad.

That being said, I love to be alone at times. More time to think. :D

I have been feeling weird lately, my health has been weird lol. I feel a little better now.

I have been in a scripture-reading slump for a long time, I don't know where to start/continue... It is really challenging. I have a lesson next week on Sunday in Gathered in, the group for all European singles aged 31+. I am 43 so I fit the requirements lol. I will talk about some books in the New Testamment. I had the choice to choose my area and I chose those. My friend from Norway: Josef, will be my voice.

More later! :)