Camp Trip

So last night a few of the graduated seniors in my ward went up to visit girls camp and it was a lot of fun and it was nice to see my sisters and see how they were doing, even if Camille did badger me about how I smelled good and she didn't! But last night was their testimony meeting and it was really interesting to see how when you are 11/12 like Camille how your testimony is very short, sweet, and you say a lot of the things that your parents tell you to say. Then you have the 14-16 girls who had a little bit longer testimonies and you could tell that they were growing and trying to find themselves in life and in the church. Then you have us seniors who know exactly where we stand and what we stand for and there was a plead from us to the younger girls to keep strengthening your testimony in the church and this wonderful LDS Gospel and that we want everyone to come unto Christ and learn of him like we have grown to do in our short 17-18 years of life.

Also I was, for some odd reason, thinking about love--though I haven't experienced love yet in my life (other than familial love-because I love my family dearly) so this is kind of odd to think about. But, as I sat at that campfire looking at the blazing fire roar in front of me I thought of the stages of a fire like unto eternal love.

Which is that as you start to build the fire it is small and sometimes hard to start which is like when we are little we are learning how to love and to trust and find connections with people and as children that's sometimes hard to do because we only want to trust our mom and that's it.

Then you have when it is starting to build but there still isn't much happening; that is like when we are young teenagers who have not a care in the world and just want to have fun but as for the love status they are looking for more friends than a lover so there is a lot of playing and teasing that is more for the attraction of friends than of something more.

As the fire builds it becomes hotter as it builds and much more intense. This is where we are in our upper teens to thirty's where we want love and companionship. Just like the fire, as it grows it gets more exciting and often very showy and playful. I think of love at this stage much the same way that as we find love and romance and we start looking for a companion, our love is much more strong and intense which is why this stage could be called the honeymoon stage because we are still young and want to have fun but we want to love and the love at this point is extremely passionate.

But as time goes on and the fire starts to calm down, so does love as we get older. We learn to love deeper and with true love, we care and yearn for the other person's safety and well being. And though the fire shrinks and appears as if it is dying it really isn't. It really is gaining heat because in the last stage it becomes embers and the heat is what is intense-- not the show of the fire-- and so just like the fire love is the same way but in the sense that you are so loving and understanding of one another that you only want to see them happy and comfortable as the passion may not be so strong but the sense that you have been married for 40,50,60 years you were able to see that love is more than passion and more about caring for one another.

And that is my analogy about fire to love, I hope I explained it well but again i do remind you that I am only 17 and I haven't even been on very many dates so please forgive me if I didn't get all of it explained well or not very good. Plus it was really random anyway but I hope you enjoyed it!