The Walking Wannabe Dead: Lessons Learned

One night after visiting the Pasar Malam a month ago, we needed to call an Uber car (Taxi service) to get home. However, we instead ended up reading the feared phrase: "Can't reach the Uber network" on the app. After trying for some time, we realized we were stranded! My dad figured we were only a mile from home, so we decided to just walk back. Technology can't stop us...

A few minutes into the walk, I realized this was no simple task. We had to walk a mile at 8:30 p.m. with 5 kids, the very day we moved into our house in a new town. We were already very tired. As time went on, me and my younger siblings started asking “Have we walked a mile yet?” or “how much longer do we have to walk?” As you can imagine, my parents started getting a little impatient, so we eventually stopped asking. 

Now to be honest, the walk was hard! All I wanted to do was rest my feet and tired body. But the faster I walk the sooner I get there, right? 

As we walked on, I tried to see things in a more positive attitude, therefore soaking in life lessons with each struggled step. I began to think: pioneer children walked about 30 miles every day. How fortunate am I to be safe and only 1 mile from home.

What We Can Learn from the Pioneers

When LDS pioneers walked across the plains from Illinois to Utah, it was bitterly cold and many of them died. One day a rescue company came and found a little girl (Emily) freezing in the snow. She grabbed the hand of a rescuer expecting to be pulled into the wagon to rest. However, the wagon sped up making her run alongside since the man was holding her hand—it was so hard and unfair! Just as she was about to collapse, the rescuer pulled her up into the wagon to safety. He purposely forced her to run; It was the only way to get her blood pumping enough to keep her alive throughout the cold journey. Though she didn’t understand it in the moment, without this trial at her weakest moment, she may not have survived. 

I think this story perfectly demonstrates that trials will come, but without them we will not progress much in life. All people, good and bad, have struggles. No matter how hard things can get, they will get better at some point. And I would not trade my trials for anything (easy for me to say right now, hehe). I know that trials are necessary to learn important skills and even to avoid later mistakes and trials in the future. Interestingly, we usually don’t understand hard life experiences until the trial has passed, if then at all. But they do make us stronger.

Remote Control for Life

One important thing I learned was to cherish the moment of trial and burden. Now that sounds kind of funny, but think. If you had a remote that could zap you into the future skipping past all your trials, you wouldn't have hard times yeah, but without challenges you would learn so much less and you would skip  important lessons that will help you in times in the future that you can’t predict beforehand, such as:

•  A job in the future
• A chance to understand and comfort a person
• A time to learn about yourself and/or your companions
• A time to find your weaknesses and correct them
• A time that will give you spiritual strength and bring you closer to God
• A chance to make yourself stronger (both physically and emotionally)

Now that you see all these beneficial possibilities, would you still press that button? When you think about it, you start to realize there can be no real joy without trial and hardship. Sure, you wouldn’t feel sad, but if you don’t have any challenges or burdens you can't feel happy because nothing got better. You would always be in neutral mode.

Conclusion

My family got back to our home safely and we all slept well that night. I know that this experience was necessary to remind me of these important things that will help me to not get too discouraged in my future trials. It is very important to never give up, and to try and look back at our trials to search for lessons that can help us no matter how difficult life gets.