Batmanifestdestiny

To quote a seminary teacher I had once: "The Atonement happened for a reason. It wouldn't happen if there was no one to save." Just go ahead and talk to the bishop (I know, easier said than done). I carried the burden of something I did for 2 long years before I finally cracked and told the bishop what I had done, during an interview for a patriarchal blessing. His response? "Do you feel bad about it? Did you repent? Is it still an issue? Yes, yes, and no? Forget about it, you're forgiven." When I expressed my confusion, he just said "Yeah, it's done." I felt so good after that I wanted to cry. It's terrifying to go in there, kind of like having to tell your dad you got an F on a paper you were supposed to write. Luckily, unlike getting an F on the paper, the bishop will just work with you to help you, and he won't even take away your cell phone!

Thanks guys. skippy, I hear what you're saying about the whole physicality thing. I feel fortunate that I'm awkward at the current moment, because that's been a sure-fire way to prevent any of those situations (even when we were sitting in a car in my driveway talking for a few minutes, the thought of doing anything repulsed me, not only because of what it is, but because I was terrified she would be scared away). I guess low self-esteem is good for keeping worthiness, since worrying about "if I make a move, will she hate me forever?" is a good way to not make a move. zuko, thanks for the advice. I told myself when I first realized that a mission was coming up that, if I ever fell in love with someone, I wouldn't tell them to wait, because that's a controlling and unfair thing to do. mrmarklin, I know what you mean. Part of me sees a beautiful future, part of me sees me getting "Dear John"-ed, and yet another part of me sees her waiting, only for it not to work out after all that time. Either way, now I'm focusing more than ever on a mission and, as a strange side-effect, now my friend is actually trying to make time to see me more often.

Well, I've given it deep thought and prayer. I know it sounds dumb that I never spent a long time praying about it before...From conference and from more personal sources I feel like I need to just prepare for a mission in any way possible, reading the Book of Mormon, bible, D&C, Pearl of Great Price, "The Miracle of Forgiveness" and whatever else seems pertinent to an upcoming mission. For the past couple of days I've felt that, by preparing for a mission, everything will just fall into place. So yeah, thanks for the advice, I guess I'll keep you updated with my progress toward a mission and whatever that entails.

A few months ago, I fell in love with a wonderful, beautiful woman. We aren't anything official yet (we started out as just friends for a couple years, so I don't want to rush anything), but I really love her. I think she could be the one, which fills me with amazing joy, but there is still one problem. I'm working on going on a mission, which gives me extremely mixed signals. For one thing, my friend mentioned to me (on a very sad day) that the reason she wasn't really trying to be in a relationship with me was my lack of RM status. All heart-breaking aside (there were lots of factors in that day, with some unfun months, but now I think she's starting to like me again), I could understand her not wanting to hold me back and not wanting to feel bound to someone who's not even around. Still, I love her very much, so I asked some people for advice. My bishop said that serious dating before a mission is a bad idea, though he mentioned that he's a bad example since his wife was his highschool sweetheart and she waited for him. Asking some RM friends, they said to go for it in the hopes of having someone to write to. I've also had an RM friend tell me that it's nothing but trouble, that she'll leave me and I'll end up as a husk of a person unable to successfully carry out my mission, and coming home to shattered dreams. Asking myself about it, I can feel the need to not be too attached, and I made a vow with myself that, if she finds someone who will truly make her happy for all eternity, I'll be mature about it and be more than happy for her (after all, I just want to see her happy). At the same time, there's the side of my brain that says "What if she beats the odds? What if she waits? What if I can come home, sweep her off her feet and be the happiest man in the world?" Trying to infer what my friend thinks about it is hard. She is ecstatic about my decision to go on a mission, and for a while was considering a mission herself (meaning that she would leave when I get home, leaving ample time for me to wait for her and guaranteeing that she wouldn't marry someone in my absence), though she recently kind of set that aside with a tone suggesting that she was advised not to go. She still spends time with me when our schedules line up just right (even when they don't, we squeeze in some time to talk or study), and she recently started seeming more happy to see me (as opposed to a painful period of a month or so, that's a story that I'll only tell if you want to hear it), but that could just be the fact that we're some of the best friends in the universe, as opposed to her loving me (though, really, isn't love just an extension of friendship? I tell myself that). So, what I'm trying to say it help. I have no idea what I'm doing, and I have no idea if preparing for a mission can happen alongside being in love. When I pray about it, sometimes I feel like what I'm doing is right, sometimes it feels like a "it's not hurting any" and sometimes I feel empty inside, so I don't know what it all means.

Hey guys, some of you might remember me. I'm Batmanifestdestiny (people on the chat tended to call me batty, can't quite remember who came up with that). I'm not new, per se. I just haven't been on the forums in a long time and, even when I was frequenting the site, I spent most of my time in the chatroom shooting the breeze with prisonchaplain, among other people. So yeah, what've I missed? I was shocked to see the live chat gone though, to be honest, that's understandable. It's impossible to mod a chatroom 24/7 efficiently, and people complained about the chat's bed-time, anyway.

I'm so excited for the Provo tabernacle temple! That building is beautiful, and I'm glad it's being put to good use instead of just knocking down the ruins.

The title says it all, what are you doing right now(and don't just say "on the boards") Right now, I'm browsing the web while on about 5 different chats and irc rooms XD

I'm mainly OCD about nerdy stuff: If I'm modding a 3D game, and the textures are one pixel off I must fix them, even if it means retexturing the entire room. When I'm programming, and there is 1 little quark in my program, I can sit around rearranging my code for hours before deciding to live with a small bug. Sometimes when typing posts, I use backspace and type a word over, just in case I spelled it wrong. my icons in folders must always be in order of file type, so that I don't go hunting for a file and end up running over several .ogg files before finding something.deh or package.pup. During the school year, my folders have to be alligned in such a way in my back pack to where for every folder that faces one way, another must face the opposite. Large folders count for 2 or 3, depending on if they're 3 or 5 inch. What's funny is the fact that, as I'm typing this, I have a useless folder open, a real folder that has no use in front of me, a cup that I haven't used in about a day, an empty yogurt from goodness-knows-when, and an empty bag of chips XD (BTW: for all who are curious: .ogg is an open source sound format, .deh is a file for a certain moddable game I have, and .pup is an installation file for Puppy Linux, an Operating System I have.)

I'm not much a fan of that variety of country, but it's still pretty good. BTW: Are you running your computer in Ubuntu?

that's good Right now I feel like a bad person, because most of my posts are IRC propaganda XD

Man, last night was a crazy party; the chat room was bustling with 1 person! XD Seanette and I had the most crazy conversations ever: like wanting a burrito! Serious, though; I'm glad at least 3 people enjoy IRC like I do :)

So.....I'm sitting around in the chat watching tumbleweeds roll...Anyone wanna join me? XD

is it a bad sign when I understood all that?

Plenty of people use IRC! It used for everything from Linux tech support to game modding to programming! Though, mIRC isn't the only way to go, there are plenty of free programs like Pidgin and IceChat that are freeware(and opensource a good amount of the time) IRC clients, or you can use the java based client that nightstar.net(the server that's hosting#lds) uses! Personally, I use it for #lds, general chatting, tech support, and game mod collaborating :)

ooh, what kinds of scripts did you have?