Career Fair

            A few days ago I was privileged to attend the Career Fair here at BYU. It was something I was looking forward to because I had never been to one before. It was not what I expected either. There were at least a hundred different booths all around the WILK ballroom, and each booth was a different company. For example some that I saw were Target, OrthoPro, Girls Scouts of Utah, Aspen Grove Family Camp, Hertz, Novell, Air Force ROTC and many more!

I went around to several different booths asking the hosts questions about their company. The one I asked the most was, “What makes you hire someone? Is there a certain characteristic you look for?”  In my head I thought I already knew the answer. I thought they were going to say: dedication, efficiency, responsibility, communication skills, etc. However, that was not the case. Most of the companies said that they look to see if that person has a passion for that job. Without passion, a job is just a job and it’s no fun. They want their employees to enjoy going to work and be engaged in what they are doing. The other skills will fall into place because of their passion.

I have been thinking about this a lot lately. I am not the best at communicating with people, I get shy and sometimes it is hard to open up to people I have not met before. This has be a worry for me because I was afraid from my lack of outgoingness I would never get a real job.  What I heard about passion though helped me feel a lot better. Let me explain why. I love to dance, and I love to teach dance, and because I love to do it and be in the studio, I AM good at being with people, and I open up very easily to the dancers and their parents. In another situation I don’t if I would be like that, but because I have a passion for dance, the other important skills fall into place. I am glad that I went to the Career Fair, because it taught me this valuable lesson. 

Angel

       Today I went out to lunch with my friend Michelle. When we were standing in line to buy our food, I pulled out my ID card because that is where my money is. I gave the cashier my card as I was checking out and then me and Michelle went to go find a place to sit. As we were finishing up our meal, I realized I could not find my ID card! I looked in every pocket of my jeans, my coat, my backpack, I retraced my steps and was looking all over the floor for it. As I was looking I said a quick little prayer in my mind that I would be able to find my ID card. With no luck I decided to go ask the cashier if someone had possibly turned in a lost ID card. She said no one had and so I sadly walked out of the cafe and Michelle said, "Are you sure you wanna leave? We can keep looking because you don't want to have to buy another ID card." And as she said this I had a flicker of a thought come into my head that my ID card would turn up and not to worry about it. So we left to go to our next class and right before class started I went to go use the restroom. As I was taking my backpack off to put it on the little hook on the back of the stall door, my ID card fell onto the tiled bathroom floor. I stood there for at least ten seconds in complete shock, trying to register what just happened. How on earth did it just fall? And second...where did it fall from?? I had looked everywhere for it earlier and it wasn't there! It was almost as if someone had placed it in between my backpack and my coat as I was walking to my class. And I honestly believe that an angel put it there, a guardian angel looking out for me and helping me with little things such as a lost ID card. Today I was apart of a little miracle and I am so grateful that I have the power of prayer in my life.  

The Human Body

       The human body is amazing. After taking physiology, anatomy, sports med, psychology and nutrition I am awe struck at how perfectly everything works inside our bodies. The processes are so complex that only God could make something so perfect and intricate. Things like: digesting food, sending pain signals from neuron to neuron, our bodies fighting against bacteria and infection, our heart pumping, our sympathetic nervous system providing adrenaline, etc. 
       Something I struggle with is that I get frustrated that my body is imperfect and that sometimes it hurts. Aches and pains, cramps, the flu, cavities, broken bones, stomach aches, headaches, allergies, etc. I want my body to be perfect but I am starting to understand that while we are living on earth our body isn't supposed to be perfect. We are supposed to learn through our body and gain knowledge through it that we would not have gained any other way. I am so grateful to have a body! It is a gift from God and I want to treat it the best way that I know how and show God how grateful I am for this body. Here are some things I want to work on to help show my gratitude: eating a nutritious, well balanced diet, exercising daily (not just in dance but finding new ways to get my heart beat up), serving others, smiling at people, being productive, etc. I know that God created each and every one of our bodies and that he is happy when we take care of ourselves. 

Happy Birthday Mom!

       This is a shout out to my mom. Today is Wednesday, January 23, 2013 and it is my mom's birthday! I am so grateful to have her in my life. She does so much for me and I just hope that when I become a mom one day that I can be as amazing to my kids as she has been to me. Here are some reasons why I love her:
1: She is pretty inside and out.
2: She has a testimony of this gospel and is willing to share spiritual experiences with us.
3: No matter how bad her day was she always looks happy to see me when I come home.
4: She notices the little things I do.
5: She is mindful of events happening in my life and checks up on me often.
6: She always thinks of others before herself.
7: She is such an example to me of having charity.
8: She is humble in all that she does.
9: Her hugs always seem to fix problems I am worrying about in my life.
10: I make mistakes, but she loves me no matter what and helps me be better.
11: She has a lot of will power and motivation.
12: She is one of the most stylish people I know (:
13: She taught me through her actions that family always comes first.
14: She is a busy person with lots on her schedule but she always finds time to talk to me.
15: Good, efficient, hard worker!
16: Taught me that I need to help clean up until everything is done and put away no matter the event.
17: She has taught me things about the home: laundry, washing dishes, ironing shirts, folding bath towels, dusting pictures, cleaning baseboards, etc.
18: She is a color coordinating girl just like me (:
19: She's the best mom in the whole world.
20: She's my best friend.
       Thanks for all you do! I love you to the moon and back mom!

Realization

       Well today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day. What a good day. Not only are we remembering the bravery of an incredible man...but we also have no school (:  
       Because of the three day weekend...I decided to spend it at my house.  It was so nice to sleep my own room and be in my own bed! So this morning was pretty chill....woke up around 8am, watched a show with my mom, ate breakfast with the rest of the family-which happened to be one of my dad's amazing green super drinks! Then around eleven we decided to go for a hike up rock canyon. Yes it was cold, very cold...but hiking up the trail actually kept you pretty warm. It was absolutely beautiful up there! The air was clear and fresh, there was snow on all of the trees and rocks-it looked like a huge white blanket. My brothers and I were having snowball fights and trying to push each other in the huge piles of snow! It was a blast being with my family-even my lab Lexie got to come!
       Ever since I left home for college I realized how awesome my family is. I am so grateful for them and I feel like the luckiest girl to be apart of something so wonderful. Happiness does not come from clothes, phones, cars or other material things, but  happiness comes from family and friends. The past few months I have been more appreciative of the people around me. I have truly been more happy and blessed when I did things with those I loved then when I sat myself in front of a computer or tv screen.

Cereal: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner.

       Cereal. This was my breakfast, lunch and dinner everyday last semester. Why? Well I'll give you a few reasons...it was fast, simple, easy to prepare, tasted good, there were healthy choices, no dishes (everything I used was disposable) and it was relatively inexpensive. 
        Let me tell you about how this worked. I have a desk in my room, and this is what became my kitchen table. I had my spoons in the drawer to my right above my sock drawer. (Yes I have a food drawer). The bowls were above my head on the book shelf. The cereal was in a compartment on the right that was apart of the desk itself. It was wonderful see, I had everything within my grasp. All I had to do was sit down, reach, lean over, open a drawer and wa la....! A meal ready to eat in 30 seconds. The only irritating part about this process was the milk. The milk was a whole 8 ft away from my desk in a baby refrigerator. So this part did require some physical activity. Bummer....but it seemed a little over the top to move the fridge either on top of or underneath my desk. So I just left it where it was. 
        Breakfast. Lunch. Dinner. Yes always cereal, all the time. And I loved it. But when I went home for Christmas break I did NOT have one bowl of cereal. As flings come and go....my cereal crush went away. Now I have a thing for sandwiches. 

Winter...

Cold. Frigid. Icy. Subzero. Arctic. Frozen. Emotionless. Frosty. Snowy. Slushy. Black Ice. Miserable. Layers. Slippery. Freezing. Bitter. Glacial. Polar. This 5 degree weather should be illegal. Winter is not exactly something I care about. You may be thinking well she only listed all the bad things of winter...well....hot chocolate you drink to unfreeze your insides. Sledding is fun until you realize your fingers don't work anymore because they are frozen. Snowboarding is fun until you fall on your rear or your face on the ice. Snowball fights are fun until the snow somehow manages to get inside your layers of clothing. Building a snowman is fun if you have a child, but currently I am childless. I am a grinch when it comes to the cold...Can we just shift the equator north a bit so it is closer to Utah?!?! I personally think that is a brilliant idea (: Or everyone I love and care about could just pack up and move to Hawaii (: Either one works for me. I am definitely looking forward to spring and summer! Shorts, t shirts, light jackets, tennis shoes and flip flops! No boots, gloves, hats, sweatshirts, scarves, earmuffs, coats, sweats, wool socks, etc. There is one thing about Winter that I like though: winter clothes are pretty cute (:

116 pages

       In my D&C class we recently talked about Martin Harris the lost 116 pages (the Book of Lehi). Martin asked Joseph Smith 3 different times if he could borrow the pages and take it home to show his family. The Lord told Joseph no the twice the third time Joseph asked the Lord said yes, but...Martin must make a covenant that he would only show the pages to FIVE people! If he did not follow this promise the pages would be lost. Sure enough Martin did not keep his promise and showed the pages to many many people. This is indeed how the pages were lost, because of disobedience  To this day we don't know who took them or where they are. But let me back up....
       When Nephi was recording the history of his people the Lord had him record exactly what his father Lehi had done. Nephi did not know why the Lord was having him do this, and the Lord never told him, but obediently Nephi did. Then when Mormon was abridging he noticed there was an extra record. The Lord commanded him to put it in with the rest of the books and Mormon like Nephi, knew not why, but he was obedient. So when Martin Harris lost the 116 pages...the Lord was NOT surprised. The Lord knew what was going to happen 2000+ years later, and he had planned ahead! "The works, and the designs, and the purposes of God cannot be frustrated." (D&C 5:1). This is such a testimony to me that God knows each and every detail of my life. He knows exactly where I am going and how I am going to get there. When I put my trust in the Lord, I will not fall. It also strengthens my testimony that God is a merciful god. If the Lord can forgive Martin Harris for loosing the 116 pages...then he can forgive me when I make repeatable silly mistakes. I know that what I have learned in my D&C class is true and I know that God is in each and every one of our lives. 

College

College is a lot harder than I thought it would be! People always told me not to get too stressed about it because it was just the next step....! Well they missed the memo because it's more like a free fall. The classes are intense and every minute counts in class! I'm scared to even miss a class...I guess that could be counted as a good thing though. The homework is there...definitely there and is killer. It was a very hard transition for me to go from living at home, relying on my parents, having a chill fun life to....homework all the time, no parents, having to work 2 jobs to keep cash coming in to help pay for this education and no free time. And if there is it's spent with the fam, friends or catching up on sleep-if that's even possible. Lots of tears happened in my car to and from places. Because we all know how awkward it is to cry in front of your roommate...so I try to just avoid that at all costs. Only slipped up once-but that time I had a valid excuse. As I am starting this new semester I honestly do feel better because I know the impossible standards that the teachers are looking for and I know that no matter how many hours and hours of studying I do....getting a B on a test is the best I can do. It's hard not to compare yourself to the complete strangers around you. Sometimes I feel like a bug that was squished with a really heavy rock. Like I said above though...this semester will be better in that I will be able to handle the pressure better than I was able to last semester. Well...at least I'm hoping for this to happen. I wish I had been emotionally prepared for college and that someone would've set it to me straight what my life was going to be like for the next 4 years. I want to say that I will prepare my children for college so they know what they're getting into...but I don't want to scare them away and I wonder if they would learn more if they were just thrown out there. But as I finished writing that sentence being thrown out into the world is scary and a buffer would've been nice. There are a few nice things about college though that is okay to say the least: 
-you can kind of do whatever you want when time permits 
-your vocabulary improves because of the way the professors talk 
-you don't feel like a bug under a microscope-referring to reporting to the parents of the 5 W questions: Who, What, When, Where and Why. Now I'm not saying that is bad when parents do it (I will most definitely ask all of these and probably more when I myself become a parent) but it gets really obnoxious when you're the child. 
-you aren't in class as long as you were in high school...but the homework makes up for that, but still it's nice to only go to 3 hours of school a day! 
-the religion classes here are probably my favorite. I've learned so much because the scriptures are something I really care about! 
-lots and lots of freedom, but that goes hand in hand with lots and lots of responsibility. So I am learning a lot through the experiences I have. Most of which are slightly humiliating, stressful and frightful....but if I could change the past of deciding to come here to BYU....I wouldn't change anything. I am glad to be where I am even if it is kicking me in the tush! 
-This school is hard hard hard but it's a good school and if I can stick it out then I will be a different person when I finish.  Hopefully a better person. 
-I like being away from my family....well not really.... I only say that because moving out made me realize how much I really love them and that material items don't make you happy. I have been so blessed throughout my life to have nice things (clothes, car, shoes, accessories, etc) but when I came to college none of those things mattered, none of those things made me happy. I was miserable the first semester. It's hard to find happiness here....for me at least. That's one of my new years resolutions though...is to FIND happiness in PEOPLE not things! Even if the people here are super arrougant and annouing I am going to at least try....yes I will try to I don't know open up and try new things. But see that's where I get stuck. I tried soooo many new things the first month I was here trying to make friends and enjoy college life...but i discovered that I am kind of an independent hermit. I like being by myself and doing things alone, it gives me time to think out loud (aka: talking to myself)  I would  move back home though in a heartbeat because I now know the dorms are really not my thing. Too many hormones, too many screaming girls, too much fruity decorations everywhere, too much to handle with the whole community shower/bathroom thing. I mean seriously...how hard is it to flush a toilet?? 

 So all in all....my college experience has just kinda been lame. I miss high school. I miss my friends. I miss my house. I miss living with my two crazy loud brothers. I miss my mom always checking on me. I miss my dad's hugs. I miss my other life. But I can't go back so I've got to start looking forward and making the most of what I have.

Book Work

      Dear Students: Don't Let College Unplug Your Future. This was the chapter I was assigned to read and write on for one of my classes.  I really enjoyed reading this not only because of the information that was given, but because of how it was written. Gideon Burton was the author of this chapter and he pulled me in, let me tell you why....

       First: He wrote to his audience. He knew that the college students who would be reading his work would all be from different backgrounds and all have different thoughts and views on issues in the world today. Since he knew this beforehand I really think he tried to incorporate many ideas and solutions as well as being very specific.  

       Second: He was entertaining. The subject he spoke of was deep at times and definitely needed a few light parts to keep the reader going. Here is a little section of what he wrote: "Students, you digital natives shouldn't put on the thinking cap of those digital immigrants who think the internet is mostly a DANGER ZONE. Paleo-pathetic." I was able to relate to him because we shared some of the same thoughts.  

      Third: He was bold. Even though a lot of what he wrote about I didn't necessarily agree with, I respected and kept reading because I was able to understand and see his point of view because of his honestly and boldness. 

       As I write papers and essays throughout this semester, I hope that I can incorporate these principles and ideas into my writing to pull my reader in as well. 

My life in a medium sized nutshell...

       Lindsay Clegg. That's my name and has been for eighteen years now. I was born in the fall, in Walnut Creek, California. My dad was in school to be a podiatrist so after he finished up in California we moved to Michigan, and from there Utah. More specifically Provo, Utah, and have been here ever since. 
       I was always a child who didn't know what to do with the energy I had. In response to this, my mother put me into my first dance class when I was three years old. Since then I have not stopped dancing and I do not plan on stopping. I wonder sometimes if my mother ever thought I would dance as long as I have. Growing up I participated in a lot of different things: soccer, gymnastics, track, cheer, art classes, swimming, clubs and dance is the one thing that has always been constant. 
        I am currently dancing and teaching at a studio called JIVE. I have been there since we moved to Utah, which was when I was six years old. So twelve wonderfully spent years of my life have been at JIVE and I hope to continue to dance and teach there throughout my life. Teaching is such an amazing experience because you learn so much from the kids! I have been teaching for two years now and it has definitely challenged me and tested my patience. However, I love seeing the progression in each dancer as they master choreography and technique. Dance is my passion in life, and being able to share that with others and help teach dancers is what I live for. Dance is my stress reliever. Dance is where I forget about everything the second I step in the room. Dance is what makes me happy. Dance is what makes me smile on a rainy day. Dance is my life. 
        In high school I did many different things. I was captain of the cheer squad, and was apart of that team for two years. I was involved in the dance program for three years and was able to be VP for the dance company my junior year. I was the student president of HOSA (Health Occupation Students of America) for two years and was able to compete at a state level with that as well as organize and hold over six blood drives for my high school (Provo High). I had a really fun time in high school because of the environment, people, teachers, football/basketball games, and school dances. 
        A lot of people ask me why I went to BYU considering it is less than ten minutes away from where I live. Well I didn't originally want to go here. Growing up in the shadow of BYU and it's high expectations made me not want to come here and instead go somewhere far away. Both of my parents went to BYU and I felt like I had to or else I would disappoint them, so automatically that was another reason I did not want to come here. I also knew how extremely hard and vigorous the courses were and I wanted something that I knew I could handle, and that was not BYU for me. As I was applying for colleges knew that I would no in November of 2011 I did not even think of applying to BYU because I was afraid I would not be accepted because of my ACT score, and plus I was not interested. However I was convinced otherwise and when it came down to it, the Spirit told me to come here. So the answer I give people when they ask why I came here is "I have no clue." I hope that someday I will realize why it is that the Lord knew it would be best for me to come here. For now I am just here and trying to survive the craziness of freshman year.