March 8, 2014

This past week has been uneventful as it has been since the concerts. I have endured many mental exertions. I feel very mentally exhausted tonight. They come in two; of course. I got my first speeding ticket, and Facebook is trying to rip apart the Mormon YSA Blog Spot, which is a conspiracy theory.
I learned that being completely obedient to the will of God is important. You may ask what does speeding have to do with the will of God. It is to witness that you are a representative of Christ. I am one of those people that drives within the speed limit 95% of the time, but driving on Highway 17 people usually drive with various speeds, since the speed limit is usually 65 miles an hour, but the speed limit changes, ranging from 50 to 65 miles an hour. I usually don't worry about speed just as long as I don’t drive over 70 miles an hour; furthermore, I am one of those drivers that sticks to the speed limit at all times, driving to work in the morning, whenever one else is speeding. Highway 17 is just the one place that I justify speeding. I usually don't fear cops because I drive within the speed limit, so when the cop went to pull me over I took my time to get off the road. Highway 17 rarely has a shoulder, so there is no good places; plus, I can be a little slow mentally. The cop said that I could be put in jail for making him follow me for so long. I figured that it messed with many other people mentally too. The cop may have feared that anything could happen because he doesn't know me. All he knows is that I don't follow the law. He asked me where I was caming from, and I said from the Oakland temple. Now he may think that Mormons don't sustain and honor the law especially how I spoke to him as if I don't fear him. I felt like everything was telling me about ways that I am not completely obedient the next morning at work. I was working at the flowrapper. I have not worked at this production line until the past few weeks; although, I have worked at the factory for a couple years. I feel that this line has the most cool people work there, being exclusive. I figured that I could do just fine working within my responsibility by my past experience, declining the need to be trained. This line demands a high standard of obedience, and they were telling all of these particular expectations. I also figured that the person palletizing before me was doing it correctly. I learned that following after the example of the person ahead is not good because you are following the traditions of men, which is probably incorrect. The person palletizing before me was not following the guidelines of the institution, and I showed my colleagues that I was not teachable or obedient. Another thing that told me to be more observant is an email from my university. I used my personal email address, and they want me to email them with my BYUI email address in order to for them to verify me as their student. I figured that my independent ways are not always right; although, it is simpler for me. I should ponder why policies are established before I continue with my ways, when working with an institution. A last principle that I learned plague my mind for half of a work day much like the other precepts that I learned. I realized how fragile life is, when I am not completely obedient, for I should be receiving my ticket in a few weeks and the mail and I need to make a court date, accomplishing everything before I go back to school next month. What if I go to jail as the police officer said that is a possibility, since it took me so long to pull over? My whole life could be derailed because of this small traffic violation. I felt deeply depressed, and, praying for relief, I was blessed with a simple revelation, for I emailed, a dear friend, serving a mission, Hermana Joanna Salas in the knick of time when she was emailing family and friends. She asked to send me pictures of the branch, and as I was doing that. I realized that I should forget myself as he told President Hinkley, when he was struggling on his mission. I came in to work for my break with a completely different attitude from depressed to joyful. I am actually grateful for this ticket, for it is a rebuking from God telling me to return to him.
Additional revelations and repentance that I have done has to do with prayer. In BYUI, a general authority said that we should pray in the morning after we get dressed and are ready for the day rather than a routine thoughtless prayer right as we wake up. I applied this in my life, and I usually had my first prayer at my first meal; however, this did not work well for me because I justified not praying before my meals because I might be eating with someone, and I did not want to interrupt our social interaction. So prayer became rare for a while. I felt these two concepts were errors, but I never humbled myself until I committed myself to be completely and exactly obedient. When I prayed to start my next day properly, I felt so joyous. Another principle of prayer that I am practicing is one that I feel that I have been avoiding because it requires a change in habit in speak in prayer alone. When we pray to God, we should speak to him with respect using the words thee, thy, thou, thine, and so forth. I changed my language to avoid the synonymous words of you, your, and yours in the past. My prayer have become more sincere and mindful to come to God, having a real relationship with my Heavenly Father. I have been feeling that praying should be my new pass time, for there are so many things that pray about. I feel that prayer is a special principle set aside from the commandments. Prayer is our means to communicate with God. We should not lloo at it as a commandment, but a joy as every communication requires great effort.
My second mind exhausting situation is that my Mormon YSA Blog Spot blogging model transgressed Facebook's model of networking, which is to befriend the people that you know outside of the social network only. Most other social networks are set up to not take this so seriously, but Facebook is taking this seriously for some reason. I was chatting with many people, inviting them to blog with us, adding bloggers as friends on Facebook until Facebook told me that I have been reported to be sending friend requests to people that I don't know like a spammer. I did not do this, so I just complied with their accusation; although, I have been sending a bunch of friend requests to my bloggers. Isidro Zapata, a blogger, said that they received that same accusation. I feel sorry for him because it seems to be a side affect of my blogging effort, especially since he was blocked from the social network; therefore, I quit recruiting on Facebook. He was so loyal even sending posts from his brothers account. I am not sure if he was hacked. He may have send all the friends requests, for I asked him if he advertised his first article, since I saw that was a key to his success to his first article. At first he denied that he did, and after I explained he agreed that he did advertise it sharing it on his friend networks and so forth. I apologized to all of the people that I was not supposed to be in contact with unfriending them,  for I felt that I needed to in restitution to Facebook. This is the reason for why the blogging has slowed down a lot this past couple weeks, since the blog was mainly based on Facebook. My last blog was mainly based on Twitter, and I had no problems for years; however, Facebook threatened to block me from Facebook as they did Isidro Zapata. About ten days later, I received a second warning, despite my repentance. I didn't understand how this could be because I quit adding friends that I didn't know. Facebook never gave an option to say that I have been hacked in any of their accusations. In this second accusation they even gave me a list of all the people that I sent friend requests to. Most of them were old, and I did know them outside of Facebook. Some of the friend requests were to people that I believe that I didn't do. I felt that this was suspicious. This had me think that Isidro Zapata may have been hacked. If we were hacked, we should have been warned. This had me thinking that Facebook could have sent all those friend requests without hacking in to the account the normal known way with a password. I thought that Facebook may be targeting the Mormon activists to stop a movement within their social network because it is changing or not following their model of networking.
I call this a conspiracy theory, but my father agrees with me that Facebook targeted us. Another one of our bloggers commented on a blogger recruiting post of mine, saying that he is banned from chatting with people for 25 days. I feel that keeping Facebook local, yet seeking to grow it's network around the world is difficult for them. If I was completely dedicated to the Mormon YSA Blog Spot, I could have grown my audience so quickly. Facebook is very powerful, yet they don't want people to become activists. Adding people that you don't know outside of Facebook messes with their algorithms, which find potential friends that you might know too. Blocking people for this accusation can be easily justified too. I should repeat what I said previously to keep the point of this paragraph within it. This had me thinking that Facebook could have sent all those friend requests without hacking in to the account the normal known way with a password for Isidro Zapata and I. I think that Facebook may be targeting the Mormon activists to stop a movement within their social network because it is changing or not following their model of networking, which is to befriend only family or friends that you know outside of Facebook. My father thinks that Facebook is suppressing activism because it is too much for them to deal with.