On Goals (and Mission Nostalgia)

Dear Internet,

Happy Thanksgiving! I hope your holiday was as glorious and gluttonous as mine.

This week my parents drove up from California to dine with me—and with other family members too, of course—and brought with them a giant box filled with goodies from my mission for the LDS Church, mostly letters and such. Having just moved to the Bay Area, the parentals were probably sick of lugging my stuff around California. Fair enough—I took the box off their hands.

Box of mission goodness

And spent the whole night reliving my beautiful mission in eastern Washington and Oregon though letters from friends, family, strangers, and people I met on the mish.

I also saved and read through all of my missionary planners—little calendar booklets with two pages for every day for six weeks, used by missionaries to plan appointments and set goals. I have thirteen of them, all decorated with stickers and family pictures and pages cut from Church magazines.

Missionary planners

Reading through these planners, I rediscovered the beauty of weekly planning. Every week missionaries take a few morning hours to review the week, discuss the people they're teaching, and make personal and companion goals. Some weeks I hated the tedium and time this required—but overall weekly planning was lovely and beneficial. (And not just because it meant spending a morning at home and not knocking doors . . . .)

Even more lovely was the practice of regularly setting personal goals. I learned that goals are how we become someone, how we develop from the person we were to the person we are. Of course, we can develop and change without trying. But if we don’t purposefully exert force or effort or action ourselves, then we will have no real say in who we become. We will instead be shaped by inertia or experience or circumstance. We will be acted upon.

By making and keeping goals, we act against inertia and shape our own selves into someone we choose to be. We claim our right to have a say in our own “destiny.” Goals are tools we leverage in creating our lives and our character—so set them often and set them well.

Fact from planner no. 2

I’m done preaching. Phew. Moving on.

So I got a huge kick out of reading though my missionary planners to find the weekly goals I set each week. These often silly, sometimes profound, goals gave me a fun way to remember and document my mission—and how a map of how it created a different, better version of the person I already was. My missionary service changed me—through experience, of course, but also through the ritual of consciously setting and consciously seeking to keep goals according to my current situation and struggles.

These goals gave me fun insights into myself and into the daily life of missionaries. I noticed that I set some of the same goals over and over again—for example writing in my journal, asking for referrals, and exercising. Many, many goals focused on smiling, optimism, positivity, and not complaining. Today I consider myself to be a relatively positive, optimistic, non-complaining person (hopefully you agree!)—one example of how my mission goal-making shaped me.

In a spirit of nostalgia, I’ve recorded below some of the goals I set as a missionary. Enjoy!

Sister Smith’s Missionary Goals

Pray for charity

Smile

Don't say things, houses, streets, places, or people are ugly (yes, this is for real, word for word, haha)

Learn and write down something new about each person I meet

Remember when it is my turn to give the dinner thought

Be myself

Put more trust in the Lord

Be happy in the morning

Talk more

Learn the streets where people live

Follow morning schedule

Don’t be sloppy

Be more charitable

Lose 10 lbs

Run 1 mile

Be grateful, not self-centered

Work harder

Do not eat sweets!

Ask for referrals

Stop complaining

No chips or pop (note the local vernacular creeping in)

Pray at 8 a.m.

Come home on time

Look happy

Make my bed

Stay clean and organized

Be grateful

Be on time

Be more obedient

Be less proud

No contention

Pray better

Go to bed on time

Write in the area book

Stay with my companion (haha! I don’t remember struggling with this)

Don’t be crabby or judgmental

Work harder

Don’t be lazy

Be more positive

Get better at tracting

Have a softer heart

Be more diligent

Organize stuff

Write to converts

Extend serious commitments

Involve the member more

Ask questions

Be happy (the follow-up to “look happy” above I guess)

Remember where things are

Be more bold

Expect miracles

Talk about positively about other people

Run 1 day this week

Be optimistic

Not get awkward (still need to work on this one)

Write letters

Optimism

Work on skills (wow, Sister Smith—so specific haha)

Ask for last names

Testify on door approach

Pray for people by name

Share personal experiences

Remember things my companion tells me

Not talk about myself

Focus more on the Savior

Don’t get frustrated

Follow my priesthood leaders

Don’t bite my pen (probably a request from a companion?)

Study Christlike attributes

Save money

Talk less (I can’t believe I ever ever had to make this goal!)

Be less annoying (again, probably a companion request?)

Study the Atonement daily

Don’t complain

Never let a problem to be solved become more important than a person to be loved

More Planner Goodness 

I wish I recorded why this day was so miraculous

Apparently on one P-Day (a missionary's "day off"), Harry Potter came to hang out with me.

A grocery shopping list—including knee-highs

A good day to go to church

Scripture of the transfer

Planner no.13. It was a tradition to decorate your last planner with a temple—a semi-facetious reminder that your next mission is to find someone to marry. 

The back of my marriage planner

I even recorded marriage advice for myself in this last planner: "don't ever let your mood get the better of you"

Running Body

This post might sound a little cranky. Please forgive the harshness in tone. #sorrynotsorry

It is inspired by three experiences:

1. When I ran a marathon this summer, I went to pick up my race shirt. While I normally wear a size L, I had requested an XL this time because some size-L race shirts I got in the past are poor quality and run short, so they ride up while I run. Pulling them down on a run over and over wastes energy and makes me feel fat, so I don’t even use those shirts anymore. I wanted to show off my awesomeness by running in a marathon shirt, and I wanted to feel comfortable, so I ordered an XL this time, as I had done for other races. Simple. However, I discovered that there were no XL women’s shirts for the marathon—but plenty for the 5K and half distances.

Because fat girls don’t run marathons, I guess. I took the large and now have another shirt I rarely use.

2. I ran a relay race this past weekend. It was great. While at an exchange, I overheard someone gloating about seeing two chunky girls in the distance and determining to pass them—easy “kills,” as passes are called in relay-lingo. 

3. Last night my roommates, both naturally thin without any effort on their parts (as far as I can see), decided that I needed a lesson in how to not look like a sister missionary. I’ve been home for five years. This lesson turned up gasps and exasperation when I mentioned that I prefer an XL in some brands. They were horrified that I dare place anything as distasteful as an XL on my body—so much that they couldn’t, wouldn’t, hear my objections that sometimes XL is the size that fits my body. Their disgust at the fact that I sometimes wear XL was very shaming, and it digressed into them squeezing their tiny belts around my waist in an attempt to make me look more modern and “sexy.” To be fair, their words came from a good, kind place. Yet I felt unbelievably young, dominated, shamed, demeaned, patronized, inferior, and fat as they praised: “Hey, this tiny belt actually fit you! Look, I can pull four inches of fabric away from your shirt! Even we have pooches!”

Begin rant:

Sizes are numbers that help me find clothes that will fit. They do not define my physical fitness, my worth, my self-esteem, my self-control. I wear a 10 or 12 in pants, depending on the brand and style. I wear a L or XL shirt, depending on the brand and style.

I am not ashamed of any of this. I have no reason to be.

 I don't consider myself to be fat, but I am by no means a small woman. I have broad shoulders, a large chest, a big ribcage, and yes, flab.  But I have completed three+ 5Ks, three+ 10Ks, four half marathons, one relay, and one marathon. I work out every day: I swim, I run, I go to weight training classes, I do yoga and PiYo. I love my body—it is a thing of miracles. It does what I ask without complaining. My knees are strong, and my sore hips get over themselves with a foam roller. I am very, very blessed to be free from any problematic medical conditions.

So please stop commenting on what my body looks like, good or bad. If I tell you I feel fat, you don't have to hush hush away my authentic feelings and pain by telling me I'm not fat. It's OK to tell me I'm beautiful and strong and fit, that I have value beyond my physical appearance, that I'm determined and inspiring and brave. 

My body is not always what I make it. In my battle with genetics and poor childhood habits, I try to do the very best with the body that I have been given.

Can you say the same?

Those chubby girls who ran in my relay race are so much braver than you skinnies, fit or not. I used to be too ashamed to run outside because I didn’t want people to see me—a fat girl trying to run. It took so much willpower and guts for me to even start in the first place, to leave the safety of treadmills and indoor tracks to run out in broad daylight. It wasn't until this summer, after running for two years, that I felt brave enough to wear running shorts made for women. Those "chubby" girls, I assure you, worked hard to be on their relay team. They fought against a social prescription dictating that fat people can’t run. Not only that—running with additional weight is so much harder physically. You try carrying twenty or more extra pounds when you run. I can even speak from experience here—I’ve lost about twenty pounds since starting to run two years ago, and it’s much easier now.

I recognize that I have a long way to go in shaping and nurturing my body to be its best. It's great to have goals to work toward: I want to run faster, I want to have more defined muscles, I want to hold a plank longer, I want to touch my toes, I want to eat more mindfully, I want to break my addiction to sugar. But along the way I (and any other woman who struggles with weight or body image) deserve your kindness, your respect, and your cheers. Not your patronizing "compliments." Not your assuming you know more than we do about our bodies. Not your judgment. 

In sum: No one should be ashamed to wear the clothes that fit them. You don’t have to be skinny to run. Don’t assume that fat people are fat because they want to be, and don’t assume that they need your help, or that they aren’t more in shape than you’ll ever be.

If you are naturally skinny, that’s great. If you’re not, that’s great. I just think the world would be a happier place if people of all body types can stop the comparing, the judging, and the patronizing.

Myself included.

Peace.

/rant