Advice for the Mission Field?

That sounds like an awesome mission! Seriously.

You already got the advice I’d give. Don’t give quotas/numbers a second thought. The lord isn’t a red faced guy listening to a quarterly report in a stockholders meeting.

Don’t think less of yourself because you aren’t meeting someone else’s expectations. That may be a trap that younger people fall into but a mission can be a petri dish for cultivating feelings of guilt. Successes and failures aren’t tied to the things we often think they are tied to and whether we are experiencing “success” or “failure” has nothing to do with our self worth. Sometimes things just happen. Again, that might be for a specific personality type or for younger people but those are certainly things that brought me down on my mission and it was completely unnecessary.

Being older can both help and hurt. For a nurse specialist I believe the cut-off age for having a companion is 40yo. Under 40, companion. Over 40, no companion. I think I got that right. I’m sure there’s a world of difference between men and women. Women are probably much more mature at 19yo than men are at 18yo.

I feel like I’ve focused on avoiding the negatives. The positives:

Enjoy your mission. It’s an experience, not a test. Mourn with those that mourn and comfort those that stand in need of comfort. Sounds like the perfect mission to do that.

I must say you are probably a better person than I am – I’m not sure I could go on a mission post faith crisis. My own mission was also 30 years ago (ugh) and I am not a member of the “best two years club.” My mission was in the 18 month mission days and frankly I spent about the last 5 months just wishing it was over. As a convert, I didn’t have some of the “growing” experiences many of the Utah boys had (I already had a testimony), but I won’t say I didn’t get anything of value out of the experience. I have a son on a mission (in South America) and another planning on leaving this summer/fall.

Add me to the count of those who say don’t worry about numbers. It’s not about numbers, it’s about people and helping them come closer to God whether or not they join the church. Like Nibbler says, I don’t think God is interested in numbers at all. We didn’t have a mission nurse, but my son’s mission does (shared with another mission). It is my understanding that the rules are different for her – more like senior missionaries. Proselyting, as I understand it it, is around the same as the office missionaries – evenings and weekends. I also second the idea of performing real community service as opposed to knocking on doors – I think that does much more to build good rapport and see that we care more about loving people and serving as opposed to converting.

I also was in the “18 month” club – which I would fine if they had kept that for elders as well as the sisters. I don’t bring that up much as it just takes explaining. I am not sure why the experiment with the shorter missions wasn’t kept. Even with 18 months, I was very glad I went, but I was absolutely ready to come home and move on with life. We were a bit on the poor side, so I felt a real need to get back to making money so I could go to college (paid 100% of my college working full time and going to school full time).

I also was in the “18 month” club – which I would fine if they had kept that for elders as well as the sisters. I don’t bring that up much as it just takes explaining. I am not sure why the experiment with the shorter missions wasn’t kept. Even with 18 months, I was very glad I went, but I was absolutely ready to come home and move on with life. We were a bit on the poor side, so I felt a real need to get back to making money so I could go to college (paid 100% of my college working full time and going to school full time).

I was out of money, too. I was (and am) the only member in my family and financed the whole thing myself. These were also in the days before the cost was standardized – $50/mo for Mexico, $450/mo for Alaska. Mine was about $250/mo. I worked for a couple years after and went to college (also self financed, albeit I did get grants and veterans benefits).

One of the other pieces of advice I gave to my own son was that if this becomes the best two years of his life, he’s led a pretty sad life. Really – college, marriage, family, and career are all way better.

(Sorry if we are hijacking the thread – I will stop after this post)

I have had a few email chats with my son that is nearing the end of his mission about, “have faith that the Lord has quite a bit of great things post mission, so don’t hang on to the past.” I am thinking about emailing him on his last week, “Your mission will be a great time you will always look back on with great memories, but being able to have sex before too long beats it out any day!” 😮

@LookingHard

I have a few more kids that at not yet missionary aged and one of my big concerns when I was in full “crisis” mode was, “I can’t leave the church right now because that could cause my kids to not go on a mission – and I want that.”

Wow, that’s really interesting. Was your determination for your kids to go on missions because you viewed it as an opportunity for growth? And was it for spiritual growth or individual growth? Sorry for the questions, I just find that really cool and interesting that that was what you really held on to during your FC.

I do think if we spend less time knocking on doors and “bothering” people and instead were known as the group that serves others like crazy, I think the work of God would move forward more (and I am not saying “baptisms”).

Even before my mentor gave me his advice, I was still determined to use the mission as a means to focus as much on service as I would be allowed, because I also feel the same way. I think that as long as missionaries are helping to improve people’s lives through whatever means they have available, then that’s all we should really care about, regardless if they join us in our church.

Thank you for your well wishes! I’ve been working my first “real” job the past year while I debated over and over again if I really wanted to go, and now that it’s all ready and set in motion, I’m so excited for the opportunity to just spend a year and a half finding ways to serve people. It really, really is a great thing.

@nibbler

You already got the advice I’d give. Don’t give quotas/numbers a second thought. The lord isn’t a red faced guy listening to a quarterly report in a stockholders meeting.

Haha, I love that! No, he certainly isn’t.

Enjoy your mission. It’s an experience, not a test. Mourn with those that mourn and comfort those that stand in need of comfort. Sounds like the perfect mission to do that.

Thank you, thank you, for your advice. I hadn’t thought of mentally differentiating it from an experience and a test; I definitely entered my application from the approach that it was an experience that could enrich my life as well as others, but I can see it may be important for me to know I am appreciating it as such and not as a means to “prove myself.”

@DarkJedi

I must say you are probably a better person than I am – I’m not sure I could go on a mission post faith crisis.

Not a better person at all, just different, and that’s perfectly OK.

It is my understanding that the rules are different for her – more like senior missionaries. Proselyting, as I understand it it, is around the same as the office missionaries – evenings and weekends. I also second the idea of performing real community service as opposed to knocking on doors – I think that does much more to build good rapport and see that we care more about loving people and serving as opposed to converting.

That’s really good to know, thank you! I assumed I would still be proselyting due to my companion, and I don’t mind doing so, I just don’t want “conversion” to be the main focus of my days. The more focus I can put on real community service, the better. I was reading somewhere that some of the missions are slowly changing towards using community service to build connections rather than going door to door. Hopefully I can help that change along a little bit more.

One of the other pieces of advice I gave to my own son was that if this becomes the best two years of his life, he’s led a pretty sad life. Really – college, marriage, family, and career are all way better.

The mission shouldn’t be the best two years of your life. Try to find ways to consider the best two years of your life to be the most recent two years of your life that you’ve lived. That way the “best two years” aren’t something left behind in the distant past, they’re part of our present.

It just so happens that the mission does represent the best two years right at the end of a mission but hopefully it falls off the radar after an RM has been home for two years. :angel:

Life circumstances make that easier said than done but something to aim for. I’d be pretty depressed if I thought that my best years were behind me.

I’d completely forgotten that people call this “the best two years.” I’ve been viewing it more as another chapter to add to an already awesome and eventful book, and that seems like a much more realistic thing to change to. Maybe one day the culture might shift. I feel bad for missionaries who went with this mindset and had to come home early because of issues they couldn’t control or ended up not having “the best two years.” It doesn’t seem healthy.

I already have a long list of plans for what I’m going to do after the mission. I already have it set up to move out of Utah for a couple of years to go live with some friends in one of my favorite cities, and I’ve got so many other experiences to look forward to.

Thank you both for the insight on that. Perhaps I’ll need it to help another missionary out there in the field who’s feeling a little let down. ^^

Also, it’s really interesting to hear about the 18-month periods. I remember hearing about those, but I’ve never really looked into why the time periods are different for the genders. The 18-month period just seems like a good range, and I do wish that it was standard for everyone.

Thank you everyone for such kind words! I read them earlier this morning but didn’t get a chance to post in detail until my lunch break. I don’t know why, but I’ve been so surprised by how many people are so encouraging, even knowing how unorthodox and a little weird I can be. Hopefully I’ll prove my mentor right and surprise myself when I’m out there.

women are generally more mature than men at that age IMO.

I’ve been hearing that a heck of a lot lately, hahaha.

For those of us in the 18 month club, that was the “inspired” program of the day. I was only thinking about a mission when the announcement came (not in GC, BTW) and as I recall part of the reasoning was that there were people in other countries (i.e. not U.S.) who had military service obligations which precluded serving two years.

Oh yeah, my brother has dual citizenship with an Asian country that requires all males to serve two years military immediately after “high school.” I can tell it was a very difficult decision for him to go on the two-year mission even after spending two years in the military, delaying his college studies for four years.

And the Dark Side is OK, here, I’ll be hanging out with some of the Empire at the local comic con this weekend anyway.

My mission president (who I didn’t care for very much) explained the reasoning behind going back to two years was that missionaries peak at 18 months and they were losing their best missionaries. My experience was that I had peaked at about a year when I was a zone leader. As a side note, (and I guess this is all a side note to some degree, but you did ask), I think it would be OK to offer a choice to young elders and sisters – 18 months or two years, let the individual decide what’s best for them. Heck, I’d even be OK with a year or perhaps 6 months, just like senior missionaries choose.

Hah, you’re right, I did ask, and I’m still listening, so…

I would love if there were a choice of time. I wouldn’t know what to choose myself if there had been a choice, but knowing myself and how I am, I know I peak in my effectiveness in one position often a little bit before the year mark. Like your own example, it’s puzzling that they’re making it so generalized yet at the same time unsurprising with how black and white a lot of church culture is.

Thanks for sharing your experience! I like learning more about Church “history.” I assumed myself that the age change was more logistical reasons than anything else, even before my FC, so…kinda nice to see how things went another time they tweaked the missionary policies.

I’m just glad he was able to sign my letter!

he he he. I already knew he didn’t sign my letter himself as I already heard about “signing machines” (I was more interested in how they work – I am an engineer at heart).

Now you might understand why when Elder Evans goes around talking about the age change as a revelation I scoff at it. Besides the fact that the prophet himself never claimed it was a revelation, and it’s clearly just a policy shift.

Well I already promised once to stop thread-jacking this thread, but allow me to do it once again. My recent study leaves me in a place that I am trying to figure out if the church has received any revelation since Joseph Smith. It feels to me that the manifesto was forced by the government about to shut the church down and the “revelation” in the mid-70’s was to correct a “policy” (which does not need revelation to correct). If you want to reply on this, to respect West’s thread, create another thread and copy this over.

West, I wrote the following almost exactly two years ago. It is the talk I gave just before my oldest daughter left on her mission.

“The Advice I Am Giving My Daughter as She Departs on a Mission” (http://thingsofmysoul.blogspot.com/2013/01/the-advice-i-am-giving-my-daughter-as.html)

Also, your call sounds like a wonderful way to serve a mission.