You can't grow up to be anything YOU want!

You hear that phrase quite a bit growing up. Parents, teachers, etc. often told us that with enough hard work, we could grow up to do anything we wanted to. The fact is that this just isn’t true. For example, no matter how hard Shaquille O’Neil tried, he would have never been able to be a Jockey. He’s just too big, too tall. At the same time, Emmanuel Lewis (T.V.’s Webster) could never become an NBA star; again, he’s too small. (he’s still only 4’3”).

I once had a discussion with a missionary companion who held the belief that anyone could be anything that they wanted. He argued that, if I really wanted to, I could definitely wrestle for BYU if I just bulked up and worked harder. This guy was over 6 feet tall, 250 lbs of muscle and literally looked like an ogre. His brother was a professional wrestler; his whole family was very athletic. It was in his Genes. He claimed that, before he started working hard and bulking up, he was just a little skinny guy. Really, genetics had nothing to do with his size and power? Certainly he got as far as he did by working hard etc., but, if anyone has ever met me, they would know that I don’t have the right build, or the required agility that it takes to become a college level wrestler. If I were to work really hard, I could certainly get better, probably even mediocre. I would probably never be at his level no matter how hard I tried.

I learned a great lesson once in Science class. We learned about different types of muscle. There is fast twitch muscle and slow twitch muscle for starters. Fast twitch muscle is the type of muscle we use when we need to move quickly. Conversely, slow twitch muscles are what we use to move slowly, or use our strength. As you may have guessed, a sprinter will have an abundance of fast twitch muscles and a weight lifter will have more slow twitch muscle. We are born with both types of muscles, some have more of one and less of the other. That’s why some people are naturally stronger or faster than others. We also have some muscles that will change from one to the other, they can become fast twitch or slow twitch depending on how we train them. By sprinting, those muscles become fast twitch, by body building they become slow. Either way, there are certain amounts that will stay what they are. They will not change.

In other words, God has made us to do certain things. He has made us a certain way. We are not all made to be world class sprinters, wrestlers or basketball players. God has given us the tools for us to succeed; it’s just that sometimes we think we should succeed one way, while God wants us to succeed in another. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t work hard at things we aren’t initially good at, as a matter of fact I think God wants us to do that as well. We just shouldn’t get down on ourselves when we fail.

This long winded post was really a way for me to say that, we may not be able to grow up to be anything that WE want, but that we can grow up to be anything that GOD wants.

A couple of thoughts on the internet.

It's hard to remember how life was before the internet. How did we settle arguments? How did we meet strange people that we would never ever let into our homes, but still be their friend? I could ask these questions all day long.

If there was a stone age, a bronze age, and an Iron age, what age came after that? I'm guessing a steel age or something? Well, I'm pretty sure that it's definite that we now live in the information age, or maybe it's the Silicon age, i'm not sure.

Anyway, the information that has become more readily available to members of the church is vast. The things we can learn about our history is both terrible and wonderful. Wonderful because we can get a better portrayal of Church doctrine and history through the years, and terrible because of the same thing.

I read a bit about Joseph's plural wives the other day that I only vaguely about. Regardless of what Joseph had done, I still have faith that he was a Prophet, it's just that I have a different perspective of him. I'm sure that many people have lost their testimonies over that vast amounts of data available out there, I just hope that as many or more will join over the it as well. The other day, a girl I knew in high school asked through Facebook (I recently added her as a friend) If I knew how to get her a copy of the Book of Mormon. I sent her links to the web page. I'll probably follow up with her in the next little while. Hopefully it works out.

We live in a wonderful time, Blog on!