Mental Toughness

Hello. I'll start with transfers. I am staying in 3rd ward and will be serving with Elder Stewart. He is the old ap who extended his mission for 6 weeks so i'll be killing him. Standard transfer call but wait................ They are also opening a temporary area in 3rd ward and they just happen to be living in our house. Yep we are going to have 4 elders in my house for 6 weeks. 3 beds and a pad. check. 3 large wardrobes and some dressers. check. 1 bathroom. check. Yes we only have one bathroom. Good thing I like cold showers right? It is going to a very interesting transfer. Buying food for 4 people, figuring out the bathroom,..... etc etc. Crazy how two more people complicates everything so much. Definitely going to be the most interesting transfer I've had. The other two missionaries are another missionary who is extending and an Albanian who's already served in 3rd ward so I'll probably be in 3rd ward for a while. The extending thing. The church stopped allowing missionaries to do it but because our mission is weird and we get a month cut off we can extend so that is an option now. I probably won't do it because of school but we'll see what happens when the time comes. There are 5 missionaries extending including my father and 4 going home this week. 

     Did I want to stay in 3rd ward? No. But I know the Lord knows what he's doing and i'm excited to have a really really really good missionary for a companion. Hopefully he can turn this area around because I sure haven't. Going to be honest if you can't tell I'm a little burnt out. I've been going hard for 6 months and have absolutely nothing to show for it. These last couple of weeks have been really hard and I'm struggling to keep pushing right now. I'm getting really sick of contacting. Not because I hate contacting but for some reason I can get no numbers from it. I feel like I do it the right way like I learned second transfer but I get nothing. It's really hard to keep pushing when you've seen nothing from your works. I've boiled it down to three things. I either lack faith, i'm a terrible missionary, or God is really trying to humble. I really hope it's the latter because the first two don't sound too great. I have thought  A LOT these last couple months and the hard part for me is I know God is the Lord of the harvest I understand that but when you try so hard to be obedient and hear all these stories of the blessings of exact obedience and you see nothing from it. It's really hard for me to not think i'm just a terrible missionary sometimes. I'm supposed to be a powerful missionary who teaches with the spirit and converts thousands but it just ain't happening. I apologize for being a hypocrite after all the trials are for our good and finding joy in the journey speeches but God is doing a real good job at humbling me and realizing I can literally do nothing by myself. I am extremely grateful for these experiences i'm having and have learned more in the last year of being in this country than the previous 18 years of my life but he's not making it easy. I realized it's all mental (hence subject line) It really is all about your attitude but it's hard for me to keep pushing and be Nefi when the I can't see any progress on the boat! Don't worry i'm not going to stop being obedient or stop working hard I'm just a little beat up and tired. I just need more mental toughness and a whole lot of the enabling power of the atonement. Strengthen me through the trials don't take me out of the trials. I apologize for the rain cloud of a letter but I thought how I actually feel is better than pretending. I'm still very happy and doing great don't get me wrong. I love my mission and wouldn't trade it for the world just going through a bit of harder patch. This next week be better. I testify of our Savior Jesus Christ and of the truthfulness of his gospel. Strive to feel his spirit more in your lives and be grateful for the knowledge you have that I fight everyday to share with others. I'll save you all my conference rant and just advise you to prepare by reading last conference (you should be reading at least a talk a day) and preparing some questions to be answered. Ladies and Gentlemen we have a living profet and we get to hear him speak. Those 8-10 hours(based off of how much you can stay awake haha jk!) should be some of the most cherished of the year. I love this gospel and the fact that we have a living profet. Don't let it just pass you by but use it to receive revelation for your life. I love you all. Have an incredible week and a wonderful conference weekend. We're on a week delay over here so I won't get to hear them for two weeks. Don't forget to smile and enjoy life. Elder Szabo 

I am BLACK PLAGUE.

Family, Friends, Citizens, Human beings one and all. I set a new PR. I know you thought it couldn't be done but I only had 1 lesson this week. With a recent convert..... It was honestly a pretty tough week for me. Just a lot of lows and not wanting to go out and work but before I talk about the rain cloud know it ended on a good note (this is a movie you'll enjoy watching mom.) I have been without work for 6 months now. Without work without work. This week it just really wore on me. I just struggled wanting to go out and contact and keep going. Tried to stay positive and give it my all that day but then I'd get out there and it would kind of just hit me again. Not to mention 5 people came to Family Home Evening even though we were expecting way more. It just seemed like everything I do just fails and I don't know what the Lord wants from me. Pushing against the rock and not seeing anything happen. It's been a long 6 months to say the least. I know it's all God's will but on the flip side I should be having success right? I'm being obedient, doing what I'm supposed to, and working hard. Why am I getting nothing. I go out and street contact and no one stops. We go tracting and no one lets us in. I plan activities and no one comes.... That was just the mood of my week... but it got a lot better Sunday. We had one of our area 70s that's over our mission come and speak in our sacrament meeting. He said he felted impressed to share his conversion story and he told the events leading up to the missionaries coming and teaching them.(he ended up being a mission president and is now a 70 so you never know who'll you'll teach on your mission) Then he talked about how we need to open our mouths and the Holy Ghost will do the rest. We don't do the converting we just open our mouths. I don't know what it was but he really lit my fire again and the spirit was just telling me the whole time You need to go out and find those prepared people. I need to give everything I have. Then after the meeting we were walking out and he asked how my mission is going and I said great! but I haven't had any work for a while. He told me about the Greece mission and at one point were averaging 4 lessons a week so they had a conference and only talked about obedience obedience obedience. A companionship after tried to be 100 % obedient and they had 10 lessons then 20 then 30... But said they couldn't keep it up and eventually their lessons fell again. He testified of the blessings of exact obedience then told me that I should only speak Albanian when outside and talk about the gospel to invite the spirit. Don't talk about your family, football, or your girlfriend. The spirit doesn't care about football. (he's British and super funny by the way so do your best accent while you imagine these stories) I feel like I'm pretty obedient but there is always more I can do and I was already speaking Albanian but need to start talking about things that invite the spirit. He really just lit my fire again and got me really excited to go out and just open my mouth. I have an unofficial goal this week to find a new investigator every day or 7 total. I think the black plague is coming to an end. These last 6 months have been extremely hard and long at some points but I think the Lord was just trying to humble me because I might be a little stubborn. I've been asking for my weaknesses so he can strengthen me and to give me everything he's got and I think he did a pretty good job. I"m ready to just tear it up now. I know it's always the will of the Lord but Sunday I just felt this fire and confirmation that it's time that I start getting work done. I need to sacrifice more and be more obedient. I only have 9 more months in this crazy place and I need to give it everything. It's time. So that was my week. The last month it has also been very hot here. it's supposed to cool down this week but we'll see. We had a pretty good storm last night. Next week I hit my year in country mark and I can't really believe a year ago I was being born in Shkodër. So much has happened and so much has been learned in the last year it's amazing. It's amazing what the Lord can do with you when you give it over to him. Also Transfers are next week so be expecting something crazy. We'll see what happens. I still have not been a senior companion and if I go leadership I have a 100% chance of co senioring so I might hold that streak for another transfer. Guess they couldn't trust me to be a senior comp. Being honest after second transfer I've felt like the senior comp with all my companions though... Not trying to be prideful I was just always the one pulling the companionship. S'ka gjë nesër ( direct translation doesn't have a thing tomorrow. it's a saying that means anyways or moving on) ha I totally speak another language! It's super kotë and i'll never use it again but I speak it! I plan on throwing it away and learning Hungarian when I get home so one of our languages can survive! Plus it's my mother tongue so... It's going to be a good week. I love you all. Keep climbing the mountain and make it the best week ever. Elder Szabo

 We have a new address so let everyone know. 

P.O. Box 2984

Blvd. “Gjergj Fishta”, Qendra “Alpas”,

Shk. Nr. 5, Apt. Nr. 14,

Tirana, Tirana, 1000, Albania

They didn't teach me that!

Good news. Things are a lot better with my comp. Does he still annoy me and do a lot of things I don't agree with YES. but we get along and it was a pretty good week. He still gets on my nerves but we are going. It was weird we walked out of the internet lokal and the weird I hate you vibe went away. We started talking and it got better. I think I realized a lot of it was my fault and I just needed to suck it up and make it better. I saw a line of his letter to president that said I feel like he doesn't care about getting to know me so I just went off asking him about his family and everything. I wouldn't call him my favorite or second or third or fourth favorite companion but things are going and that's all that matters. I'll put up with the rest for two more weeks. This week I had my best week lesson wise I've had in 5 months.... and it wasn't that great of a week. We had two really good first lessons this week only to find out that they weren't in our ward. One we were walking to meet the guy and another guy just started talking to us in English and followed us to the lesson so we taught them both and it went really well. They had both had contact with the church before so we just talked about the restoration a little and the plan of salvation and the purpose of life. It went really well. Teaching two completely different people is hard because you have to see where both are at. It involved a lot of questions and just following the spirit. It was really disappointing to find out they were in other wards. The other one the guy came and he had contact with the church in Elbasan a couple years ago and was a solid guy. Told us he didn't drink or smoke or anything even though it's all around him at his work and we talked about agency for acouple minutes but he had to go so we asked where he lived... In another ward! It was a real bummer and hopefully they will contact the other missionaries. If not it was one of their seven touches with the church and someone will benefit from those lessons one day. Things are still really slow here but slowly we're seeing more and more work. It's hard because I want to sacrifice more than my companion does so it's hard when he says well we did all we could it's in the Lord's hands and i know we could have done more. We had our choir performance Saturday and it went a lot better than I thought it was going to mom I REALLY ENJOY SINGING IN THE CHOIR, AND IN THE SHOWER, AND IN THE STREETS. Loud enough??? This mission is changing me in a lot of ways.... It went really well and we have a famous opera singer who's a member and he did a piece at the end and it made me want to cry and like I was being hugged by an angel. He has the voice of an angel and it was amazing.  Sunday we had stake conference. All the members from Albania and Kosovo came. We rented this big conference building and we probably still have more people in utah at stake conference ha. It was really good. The stake president spoke on the Sabbath day and how it's a covenant and how we need to honor it and a 70 came and spoke on a lot of stuff but an interesting thing he said was I've seen Albania has a lot of problems that need fixing and keeping the Sabbath day holy would fix all of them... Interesting words and how much the church is placing importance on that right now. Keep it holy people!!!! i'm out of time the internet guy didn't show up for like 30 minutes. I love you all. Keep doing what you know is right and live the higher standard. Blessings are waiting it's up to you to get them!!! Love Elder Szabo

Why am I not in Elbasan?

When you ask God for a lemon he makes lemonade and dumps it on you like athletes dump it on their coach after a big win. 

Needless to say it was a long week. Just a mixture of a lot of things. I really miss Elbasan and literally everything is happening this month. All the activities are coming back, the service project I planned is going to happen, the youth are just great, I was getting along super well with my companion. I was doing really good and I always forget what a shock it is when you transition so drastically. It's not like I hate my companion he just gets on my nerves and we have a VERY different way of doing a lot of things. I don't like the way he does missionary work for a lot of things and other things just bother me. I guess I can't really complain I asked for God to open the flood gates and give me the things that would test me and make me a better person I guess I just forget that it's hard sometimes. I learned I do not have very much patience or charity. I know I should love my companion and be slow to anger it's just hard. I don't really know what it is either there is just this weird we don't get along vibe in the air all the time. I guess it's mostly my fault because I get frustrated and shut down and I just need to be honest and discuss and communicate things better. I have a lot to learn... You never realize how terrible of person you are until you ask for your weaknesses and God whispers BE THOU HUMBLE!!!! I have really been thinking this week about the acquiring of Christ like attributes and how we get them. We talk about them all the time but how do we get them? have you ever thought about that? It's really not as easy as it seems. Third ward is good. We have absolutely no work again but it's a pretty good ward. I'm going to try to get a mission prep started here and get the youth more active. It went really well in Elbasan so hopefully I can get people here to come. We have stake conference this weekend and a 70 is coming so it should be really good. We're renting out this conference hall thing and everyone from Albania is coming to Tirana. As well as we are having a choir performance on Saturday. It takes a lot of time out of missionaries time. I love singing and being in the choir but it's just a lot of time out of our area. We have a famous singer that's a member doing a solo at the end. He came to the last practice and he has the voice of an angel. It was beautiful. I"m excited and hope both go well. Plus I'll get to see people from Elbasan at stake conference. I really hope I can find some work in this area and do something for the time I'm here. Don't have a lot to say this week. Just one of those tougher periods and hope it will improve. Which is partly up to me. I had a goal this week to try to always smile. Not a huge fake smile just a smile and it's really helped my attitude and everything. You don't really notice how subconsciously you're just not smiling most of the time and it's amazing how much of a difference it makes. I went tracting last night for the first time in 2 months. With the weather and when people were outside in Elbasan it just wasn't ever good to go. I don't really enjoy it. I feel a lot more productive when i'm on the street talking to people. Make it the best week ever. Elder Szabo