prayers and prayers and prayers

 wow wow wow what a week!! lots of good, a few tough situations, but we made it through and hopefully became a little bit better because of it!! yesterday was a really tough day for me, one of the hardest on my mission, feeling inadequate and unuseful and pretty down on myself, so in the afternoon I decided to do what we always tell our friends to do, to talk with our heavenly father. I took a few minutes to compose myself (aka hiding in the bathroom lol) and then knelt down and offered my whole heart to Heavenly Father. There were quite a few tears and my thoughts were a mix of english and portuguese and confusion, but i asked Him to please help me feel loved. help me know how i can represent christ, how i can love and serve, and know that i am doing what i need to be doing. and instantly I felt a warmth around me, almost like a hug!! I usually feel the spirit through thoughts and feelings in my heart, so to feel this almost physical manifestation of god~s love for me was new, but it was exactly what i needed to feel!!

 i KNOW that God is real, that he is  my father (and yours too!!!) and that he loves each one of his children more than we can understand. Sometimes we have to go through trying experiences to rely on him, to develop attributes to become more like him, and to understand how some of our brothers and sisters here on earth feel in their own difficult moments. Our day was still a bit crazy and there were still moments I felt i wasn~t being the best version of myself I could be, but I KNEW that God was aware of me, and that he was helping me in every moment. please don~t forget how much god loves you and wants you to talk to him. Please, every person reading this email, talk to your heavenly father tonight.  if you can.... at this very instant, do it!! If not, the next moment you have alone, please talk with him! tell him how you are feeling, whether it is happy or sad or confused or upset, he wants to listen!!! and i promise, as a representative of Jesus Christ, that if you talk to him TODAY, he will answer your prayer in the way that you need to be able to feel his love and to grow into the wonderful person he knows you can become :))]

i hope you all have a wonderful week, look for the little tender mercies like straight lines and new paper and random bursts of laughter and seeing old friends and hugs from little kids!!! Know that I love you, but God loves you even more!!!
te amo!

<3 sis mill