Final Final Schedule

Considering all I had going, I did not expect to spend the last week reorganizing my schedule as I did. It was a fairly simple one to start out with: Spanish, geography, religion, ceramics, mentored research (for El Salvador), and a prep course for Cambridge. However, I then discovered that the mentored research class counts as a capstone course, which means I don't even need the other geography class. It was a GIS course—technically my emphasis for a week or two before I actually looked at urban planning—and it bored me to no end. For two class periods I could not get myself to pay attention to save my life. (Granted, had my life actually been on the line, I may have found it easier to focus on something other than Dinosaur Comics.) Anywho, I made this discovery on Thursday, which started the adventure of finding a fun, relatively easy, 3-credit course to fill my schedule.

At first I thought I'd take Welsh. I'd taken Welsh 101 years back, and this past Fall semester I attended the class once a week, so I was fairly fresh (and recently I've been obsessed with Elin Fflur). Unfortunately, it conflicted with the El Salvador class. Personal finance conflicted with other classes I either could not or did not want to move. Finally it came down to Italian 101 Accelerated and World Religions, both of which I attended Monday. Language and religions are two of my favorite subjects to study on my own. Italian shouldn't be too hard for me as I already speak Spanish and know enough of the separate evolutions of the languages that I can just guess on a lot of words. It fit my schedule perfectly, and it would be really nice to be done with a class halfway through the semester. I already know a lot about World Religions; the class meets once a week, Monday evenings. I am kind of sick of Monday evening classes. However, it seems like a really easy class, and that was enough to get it to win over Italian despite the instructor being much less entertaining.

Maybe it's that it's just the beginning of the semester, maybe it's that last semester pretty much destroyed me, but my workload seems really light. I just have to make sure I actually do everything. It gives me high hopes for writing this semester. However, I need to kick a lot of bad habits, and so far I have not refused to take the steps I know I must to reach my goals. I'm not particularly industrious, and that is essential for me if I am to make a career as an author. Yes, once I get published I will be accountable to others' deadlines, but I won't get published in the first place if I'm not working at it now. Work is a principle of the gospel, though it was only at the end of this last semester that I truly understood that. I've always known that after this life we will be doing a lot of work—Heaven is not about lounging around. Creation is a divine work, and we, as children of God, are blessed with the power to create and produce. Most people, unfortunately, work to live, and live to be happy. However, the correct way is to live to work, and you will get happiness as a byproduct. This is a precious truth which I still need to apply to my own life, because I am still operating under the former construct. Arthur Henry King had it right when he said, "If we aim at self-fulfillment, we shall never be fulfilled. If we aim at education, we shall never become educated. If we aim at salvation, we shall never be saved. These things are indirect, supreme results of doing something else; and the something else is service, it is righteousness, it is trying to do the right thing, the thing that needs to be done at each moment." If we aim at happiness, we will never be happy, especially if we try the way that the world teaches brings happiness. The gospel is so simple; it is the way to happiness, if we live it.