Life-Correction

“Hey, Ivan,” Nikki said as she brushed her long dark curly hair behind her shoulder, “do you want to marry somebody like me someday?”

“Wait, what?” I said, as I straightened my tie and we stepped up onto the beautiful Provo Temple grounds.

“I’m not proposing,” she said with an “in-your-dreams” look on her face, “I’m just saying, you do want to marry someone devoted to God and immovable with things pertaining to religion, right?”

“Well of course I do,” I said, completely oblivious to where she was going with this.

“Well, girls like me don’t marry guys like you, so why would I date a guy like you?”

Wow, I thought, now that was quite a blow to take from my best friend as we walked underneath the October trees towards the temple to do a session. Prior to this conversation she had commented on the kind of music I listened to. We had agreed to disagree on whether listening to edited rap music was really affecting my spirit or not. I argued that it was just music that she didn’t like and she was too sensitive anyway.

After contemplating in the temple, I said, “Nikki, I’ll think about the music thing, but I want you to know that I don’t change for girls. If I decide anything it’s because I’ve changed my mind.” She just looked at me and said “Ok, do what you want,” with a look of complete victory in her eyes. I didn’t like changing for girls. I am very self-confident and firmly believed that there was a girl who would take me just how I was. I also didn’t like admitting I was wrong. Even after pondering to myself, I was yet again convinced that I was perfectly in the right.

 “I’ll see you tomorrow morning,” Nikki said as she headed off right before General Priesthood Meeting a few days later to give me time to get dressed. Since Wednesday afternoon a lot had happened. After our mission reunion Friday night, she had suddenly realized her feelings for me and we had decided to date. While putting on my suit for the meeting, I thought silently to myself about how glad I was that she realized the rap music wasn’t that bad, whether or not she wanted to admit it.

I started to listen to Conference and noticed that I had left all my note-taking supplies at home. I was in a side room packed with young single adult priesthood holders in the stake center near my apartment building. I have always loved Priesthood Meeting because the leaders are a little more relaxed and a lot more specific and straight-up in their messages, knowing that all of their audience is composed of males 12 and older. The messages are specifically tailored to help us as Priesthood holders.

To be honest, to this day I only remember one of the talks given that session. Elder Patrick Kearon of the First Quorum of the Seventy gave a talk that totally changed my outlook on life. As I listened to the other speakers I still felt good about my music decision until I heard a story about an old man who had served in World War II. Elder Kearon said of that man, “He learned that to survive in a minefield, you must follow exactly in the tracks of the vehicle moving ahead of you. Any deviation to the right or left could—and indeed did—prove fatal…….Deviating to the right or the left of the safe track ahead of us, whether because of laziness or rebelliousness, can prove fatal to our spiritual lives. There are no exceptions to this rule” (General Priesthood Meeting talk “Come unto Me with Full Purpose of Heart, and I Shall Heal You” Patrick Kearon Of the First Quorum of the Seventy).

For some reason as I listened to the rest of Conference, one thought kept running through my head--what kind of music would I be listening if I had to go through a minefield? More importantly, what kind of music am I listening to as I go through this minefield of life? Right then and there I knew without a doubt that I needed to get rid of all my distracting music. If I wanted the Spirit to guide my daily life I needed to give him the best environment to reside in so that he could be completely comfortable.

That night I deleted over seventy dollars of music that I had purchased recently over the last month. The funny thing was that even though I knew it was what God wanted me to do, it was still hard to just throw away hard-earned money, but I couldn’t put a price on my spiritual well-being.

After Nikki returned from an outing with her mom and two sisters, she came over to the apartment. I, to my surprise, proudly admitted my change in judgment on the music and my overall verdict. Admitting I was wrong also came surprisingly easy, which is a good thing because now it’s a part-time job of mine, since Nikki and I were recently sealed for all eternity on the 15^th of January 2011

Most AMAZING dinner EVER!!

 My wife is the most AMAZING cook EVER!! She really is. I mean, I'm pretty easy to cook for because I'm like a human garbage disposal, but due to my experience and love of food I can most definitely appreciate some good cooking! My wife can cook the best meal you've ever had in a half hour or less every time. She always cooks things that anyone will like. I mean, look at the meal below for example: Cafe Rio pork, corn, Cafe Rio rice, black beans, grilled caramelized onions, lettuce, tomato, Santitas chips, home-cooked tortillas, sour cream and most importantly CHEESE! I love cheese. I honestly think that cheese makes everything better. Even if I won't put it on my ice cream, I still could eat it before or after and the whole experience would be better! So, anyways, like I was saying, she really is a miracle to me. Now this little meal took a little longer because she had to put the pork in the crock pot but it was definitely worth the wait. She's not afraid to experiment either and I'm the perfect little guinea pig. Sorry to make you all jealous out there but I have the best cook in the world for an eternal companion!!

 

Taylor and Prince Kitty

 

This is a tribute to my favorite thirteen-year-old brother-in-law, Taylor, and Prince Kitty. Taylor is probably the sweetest kid I know. He loves animals and babies and loves to make people happy. He loves to dance and sing and get the attention of the "ladies" whenever they are around. Every time i come over to the house he runs and gives me a hug and a kiss and then reaches for the ceiling (I always lift him up so that he can reach the ceiling, I don't know why but he loves it). He's very strong and loves to play basketball outside. He's always down for some beans rice and cheese with a little meat for lunch (somehow it's always lunchtime). His favorite movies are from the High School Musical collection and he loves to sing songs from the Chipmunk movies, especially the "All the Single Ladies" one from Beyonce. When my wife and I were dating (and still to this day) Taylor would make kissing sounds every time we hugged or our faces got close. It used to quite kill the mood for my wife but now we both laugh and do it on purpose just to hear him make the noise. Taylor is a great kid and if you don't watch out he'll steal your heart so bad that no matter how annoying or physically painful he can get sometimes you will always forgive him! Prince Kitty, Taylor's sidekick whether or not the cat agrees to it, has an interesting gender-discovering story. Formerly known as Princess Rae-anna, Prince Kitty has gone through some confusing times. When my wife got home from her mission she bought a kitten for her brother's birthday. I guess from day one they stamped the kitten as a girl and never asked any questions. She was named and treated like a princess from the first time she was in the house. One day I found that the cat had grown up a bit and was definitely not a girl. To the family's surprise, Princess Rae-anna had been a boy all along. Finally coming to grips with his new found gender, Prince Kitty (now renamed) was neutered so that he would not cause a stink in the house. Although he has nothing to live for, Taylor keeps Prince Kitty busy by dragging him around the house and squeezing him to death!

The Grand Canyon

This was a long trip...



.....but so worth it!

This earth truly is a blessing to all of us who live here. I don't think we realize it with all of our needs for technology and modern gadgets. Don't get me wrong, I have a cell phone and a computer and I love all the new technology also, but I think we need to sometimes just stop and enjoy what God has already given us. I realized this when I went down to visit the Grand Canyon with my wife's family. As I looked down into the vast canyon I couldn't help but think about all of the creation and time that was put into the earth. Why would God take all of this time to make an earth so beautiful, functional and perfect? Then it hit me. God is our loving Heavenly Father. He loves us and that's why He does things for us. I had known that for a very long time, but it hit me harder that day as I realized that everything created on this earth was created for us. He loves us so much and no matter what we do, His love does not change. Now, He doesn't love everything we do but He will always love us. I know that my Heavenly Father loves me and that His son, Jesus Christ, is my Savior. I testify that we are eternally indebted to our God and as we make feeble attempts to pay Him back we are only blessed hundreds of times more in return for our obedience, service and charity.

Das a big DAM

Wow this dam was huge! I've been to a few dams in my life but this one amazed me just how it was built. It retained such a massive amount of water and it was built in a canyon! When we crossed the dam we got out to walk out onto the bridge in front of it and take pictures of the scenery (this picture is before crossing the bridge). As we walked out onto the bridge giant trucks were crossing, making the bridge shake and tremble under the weight of the trucks. I found this very exciting. As for my wife, not so much. I loved the design and human ingenious that went into the construction of the dam and bridge. Humans never give up one things. Well, individually we do but as a whole we keep trying until we complete magnificent feats such as this dam. I love that about our race. I love figuring things out and trying different ways to complete a task until it is done correctly. I don't believe anything is impossible and even if some things are I like to think that if I try hard enough I can make anything happen. This is one of the reasons that I chose Mechanical Engineering as a major. As engineers we work under set laws of physics and we use logical math to design all we produce. Although we follow strict laws we still believe that there are new ways to do everything that will improve the world. I love the idea of improving things. If I have a product I want to make it better. This is a natural human instinct to want to improve and I think it comes from before this life. We have wanted to, do want to and will want to improve forever. We are only in danger in this life when we think that we have "arrived" in any category of our life. We must always strive to improve and progress in everything that we can.

Research Thesis

Although most of the arguments over stem cell research are thought to be ethically impossible to solve, adult stem cell research nearly eliminates the ethical arguments against and is more than twice as productive in health improvement, cell regeneration, and terminal disease cure research.