LETTER #11 . . . YOU ARE AS HAPPY AS YOU THINK YOU ARE!

Hello all, i miss you all very much and am constantly just playing back stories with you all in my head and just laughing so hard. i know that my comp thinks im the biggest weirdo but it's ok! 

October, 2018

Saturday night super late my comp told me that i was speaking in sacrament which was awesome haha. i spoke about prayer and how big a part of my life it has become and no matter what we are going through (challenges, problems, hard times, or you just need someone to talk to) that we can always turn to prayer (Alma 37:37)! 

This week all the branches from all of the Island of Chiloe came together and all represented countries in the world and had a big culture festival which was super coo. One of the Branch's "countries" was Hawaii?? IDK if they think Hawaii is a country or not but regardless I had a good laugh. 

We had our part in our first Baptism this week which was soso awesome and even though he wasn't directly our investigator and it was kind of a large group effort, it was soso cool and makes this whole mission so worth it! Other than that, the highlight of this week was waking up super early and going and doing INSANITY work out videos with my zone leaders.  It's so hard and I just drip sweat and also trying not to laugh at the videos the whole time but seriously it is the only way to burn off all of the bread that we eat here!!! 

It rains just about everyday and a lot of times for a good portion of the day but it makes it so much sweeter when the sun shines through the clouds and also when rainbows appear all the time!!!! 

Something i learned this week . . when i truly try to love the mission, the time goes by so much quicker and i am so much happier and it is the same with trying to love people! Try loving everyone you talk to for one week and your life will be so happy! Also final thing, i have been talking in broken english and spanish over the phone with a Haitiano named Endly and he lives in a part of Chile kinda far off from everything but he now wants to start taking the discussions and i love being able to speak in English!! 

Lovin' those slim jims we sent him in a package!

Remember to pray and remember that no matter what you believe that we are all given this opportunity to pray!!!! Also write in a journal so that people can learn from your life no matter how boring you think your life is! YOU ARE AS HAPPY AS YOU THINK YOU ARE .... YOU DECIDE! LOVE YOU ALL!

Elder Townsend 


Excerpts from family letter . . .

Hello family,  hello mother and thank you so much for keeping me updated on the family. Mission is sometimes super happy and sometimes super duper hard but overall super worth it and i'm learning tons. I spend most of my extra time studying and reading even on PDAY and it makes me sad that i didn't take the time to read and study things i'm passionate about more before the mission. 

The weather here is slowly starting to warm up but still rains and is cold almost every day and i end up wearing a rain coat and a lot of times a sweater a lot of days! My Spanish is getting better than my first week here even though it is still not very good! I understand what people are saying much better than my ability to speak with people! I have had a few conversations by myself with people in Spanish though! 

We give a couple Book of Mormons out and have some really cool conversations every single day but its just hard to talk to the investigators again after the first visit! District meetings are every week but we see other missionaries usually everyday and also there are i think 10 other missionaries on this island!  We try to go do cool stuff on p-days but it's always raining hard so we cant! 

From what I've heard and seen packages take a monthish to arrive.  Yes hahaha please send me a cake. And honestly no just the little candy and juice mix stuff is very good and especially mints and those little werther candy things! 

Jammie time!

The family seems crazy busy wowzers. How in the world did sarah and brady do Disneyland with 3 babies????? Woah that makes me incredibly happy for david k and YES ANOTHER CHILE MISSIONARY. Tell his mom that the Spanish here is absolutely crazy but the people are amazing. 

Keep me updated where all these people get called to and yes i am so happy and excited for all of them. I didn't know Kai was going, yay!  

My comp knows about as much Creole as he does English which is very little but we are making it work, and we spend about an hour a day teaching language. Also my comp never got his wisdom teeth out so in the next couple days we will be going to do that. We have been going to the hospital the last couple days and surprisingly i haven't gained weight since the MTC woohoo! I do lots and lots of pushups and situps! We have to say yes when they ask if we want more but i just say yes, just a little please! Also i try my hardest to never eat the bread cause it is cooked in fat! i eat tons of fruit!

Bobo's bestie for these first few months! :) 

I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH! TELL EVERYONE I LOVE EM. KEEP READING SCRIPTURES. did dad finish the bom? have you read jesus the christ mom? love you all!