Grateful

I have been at BYU for a long time, and I am ready to leave. But I know that despite all its flaws, BYU really does exist for a reason, because there are lessons I have learned here that I would not have learned at any other university, and I am better for it.

I just broke down in my advisor's office about my building frustration with my data analysis this morning. I know what I am supposed to do, and I know I am capable of doing it, but I cannot get myself to do it because I don't understand how it's all going to fit into the big picture, I cannot see how everything is going to tie together in the end. And as I tried to explain my frustration and my voice started to crack (and I just hate crying in front of people), my professor reached for the tissues, then looked me in the eye and said, "What you need to do is get down on your knees and turn the big picture over to God."

And then I felt myself getting even more teary-eyed because as he talked, I knew that what he was saying was true, and that it answered my prayers because I didn't even know how to turn it over to God and here was someone who has been through the process and knows how to call upon God's help in this particular situation, and no amount of talk about the process of doing research and writing papers would have helped me out right now because this is what I needed to hear. And I'm just grateful to be in a place where we all know that there is more to it than academics, and where we know that almost everyone around us knows it.