Había Una Vez (Once Upon a Time)‏

Hola todos,

That's one of the few phrases I knew in Spanish before the mission. I read ''Your Happily Ever After'' by President Uchtdorf and also ''Forget Me Not'' by him too. Those are two of my favorite conference talks of all time. EVERYONE needs to go look them up. It's alright if you want to call me girly too, I actually told myself I was a girl a couple of times as I read them. I wrote all over them as my thoughts just got flowing too. Wow, I really am a girl. But I'm also a man too!!!!!!!!!! Alright, maybe don't tell me I'm girly, I might feel a little insecure, but I loved those talks so much. They were EXACTLY what I needed to read. It was so awesome to read about how important trials are in all of the good stories and gave me tons of hope and strength. Life really is good right now and I'm forgetting not to love myself. Wow, for real though. Such great talks. I don't know why I just got so excited about them. Man, it was just so amazing!

I really liked a couple of scriptures I found in those talks too. Well one in particular was Philippians 1:3. Then I was also reading in El Libro de Mormón (it's cool reading in Spanish and my goal is to finish for Christmas again). I'm pretty sure I wrote about this before, but once again it surprised me how ''in the space of not many years'' so many things can change. Alma 46:8, Helaman 6:32;7:6;11:26; and my favorite 12:2. It just reminded me of how we all need to do our best EVERY SINGLE DAY to stay on the straight and narrow. I'm so grateful for all of you and your great examples for me to follow.

My spiritual experience to accompany what I learned:

Thursday I was ready to conquer the world and we had a day full of plans to do it. We had 2 people to go with us too and it was gonna be perfect. Then the plans started to fall through as the members couldn't accompany us. We passed by some good people and they weren't there. It was really strange, but I just kept on with the hope that I had in my heart. I don't know why, but I just knew everything was going to be great. It was probably one of the days that I most trusted God in all of my mission. I knew He had plans for that day and maybe they were different from mine. It was absolutely amazing as we were both able to see God just start to put everything together. We had some really special and spiritual lessons that day that weren't really planned and we really tried to focus on just listening to the investigators and then helping them. It was so amazing.  I know Heavenly Father is over His work. His plans are way better than my plans and I'm learning to accept and follow His will for me. I'm so much happier as I do that.

Another cool thing that happened this week was how yet another person said I'm happy. Since being in this area quite a few people have commented about how I'm such a happy person. That's been really cool for me to hear because for the last year I was more accustomed to the usual ''tiene una carra de serio'' (or your face is really scaring me/serious). So it also helps when people say you're happy to help you be happier. I think I'm gonna do a science experiment and when people are sad I'm gonna say they look happy and confuse the sadness out of them. I'll let you know how it all goes down when I finish my experiment. But for real, complimenting people helps me stay so happy.

A quick food update. I finally ate cuy (guinea pig) this week and that's the picture I sent. It was all right, but I'm not sure why everyone rants and raves about it. It was kinda like a mix between chicken and fish, but apparently it's super healthy for you. Unfortunately there is not very much meat on them, so don't be thinking about going and buying a pet guinea pig just to kill it and eat it. I repeat, it's not worth it!

Also, apparently I've been rockin' the liver for some time now. I actually didn't know it was liver, I just thought it was weird tasting meat. Then my companion was like it's higado. So yeah, all those old people in the stories that eat liver are now joined by a joven (young guy). It's really not that bad so if the doctor prescribes it you should just do it. But other than that, not recommended by Elder Wheatley.

Really the coolest thing this week was learning to let Heavenly Father do the work. I'm learning a bunch about patience.  He really is over His work and I know what I am learning here will bless me for my entire life. I'm really trying to humble myself without being compelled to be humble cause I'm not a super big fan of trials. I'm gonna do my best, but really I'm grateful for trials that help me learn and grow and humble myself before my Maker.

Good luck Brianna in your concert!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'll be thinking about you and praying for you!!!!!!!!!!!!! Maybe I'll even do a last clap contest (classic).

I'm so happy to hear that Oma is doing better and am happy she can be back with Opa and that you all will be taking care of them. Please send the whole family my love and some big hugs and kisses to Oma and Opa as well as Nomi. Well, pretty much just everyone. And for you brethren in the mission, a bro hug is good enough.

I love you all so much and am happy here in Perú. It's not perfect, but we're all getting a little better together each and every day.

Have the best week ever and know you are all in my prayers! Thanks for all of the love and support. And just go crazy go nuts. Oh yeah, Go BYU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love your girly/manly son, brother, and best friend,

Elder Aaron Micah Wheatley