Living is a Team Sport

I imagine my friends were quite amused seeing me arrive home from the hospital after surgery. As I came up the street where I lived, I saw many of my friends outside waiting for me. I tried to wave but only ended up wiggling my fingers. My friends came and opened the car door and I got out to talk with them. Between the painkillers the doctors had me on and my slow movements I was very entertaining to be around. Strange comments and delayed responses kept my friends laughing for hours.

While I was not feeling very well the day I came home, the fact that my friends cared enough about me to be there and stay with me meant the world. My friends were a crucial support system for me after my fourth heart surgery. They spent a lot of time with me doing anything they could to help. On good days we would watch movies, play video games, enjoy board games, or just talk. When I was having a bad day my friends would bring me a treat or write me a card. The little things they did really made the difference for me. I am forever grateful for those trying times in my life when my friends and I were able to strengthen our friendships.

Friendships are some of the sweetest associations we will ever have in our lives. The happiest families will describe themselves as friends. The closest couples say that they married their best friend. Time and time again it always comes back to friends! When it comes down to what brings us the most joy, for me I have learned it is all about friends. In tough times or easy times, friends are what make experiences worth remembering. Friends enable one to really live; after all, living is a team sport.

Live Like you are Dying

The other day I was thinking about what it was like walking into an operating room to have open heart surgery. At 10 years old while in the preoperative waiting room the nurses offered me medication to make me drowsy, but I refused. I didn’t want to be asleep because I wanted to spend the time with my family. Many patients are nervous before surgery for various reasons. They do not know what the outcome of the operation will be, or are afraid it is going to hurt. But not me. No matter what happened, I knew that everything would be okay. This assurance, as I came to discover later, was the result of living my life as if I were about to die.

Now this does not mean that I thought I was going to die. Nor does it mean that I was ready to die. Rather, because of the way that I had lived, my conscious was clear.

When people think about how they would live like they were dying, often thoughts of all the things they want to do before they die come up. Travel to Paris, swim with a dolphin, attend a Broadway show, or stay in a five star hotel. While all these things would be wonderful to do, I have come to understand that they are not the things that constitute living like you are dying.

Throughout my life I have come up with my own definition of what it means to live like you were dying. The definition is really more of a question that you can ask yourself. When you die, what is it that you would like others to say about the person you were? I want all those who know me to describe me with similar terms. Kind, loving, faithful, trustworthy, and disciplined.

Living like you are dying is not about cramming in life experience at the very end. It is about becoming the kind of person you want to be so that you leave behind the kind of legacy you want to leave. It’s about the lives you touch and the help you render. With this definition in mind, we should all be living like we are dying, because life is short.

When the World is Pushing you Down

As I learned how fragile life was, I became aware of how I could better control my life. As we learn what is in our control, we will see more clearly what is not in our control. Focusing on the things that are in our control will let us push off the worldly matters that are pushing us down and thereby enable us to succeed by doing what we can.  

I remember when I was 10 years old. Most adults would make comments that kids thought they were invincible, and they did. Kids thought they they could never die and so they would act like maniacs. That was not me, I knew that life was fragile. Going through so many medical operations changes a child’s  perception of life. Because I had been so close to losing my life, I knew that I could easily die. There were nights where I went to bed wondering if I would wake up in the morning because my perspective on life was that it is short.

It's all about perspective.

Another perspective on life develops when we feel a responsibility for our success. While it is true that we are responsible for our success, the outcomes of our life are not solely dependent upon our behavior. With all the things we need to do and many more things we should do, life can often become overwhelming. Calendars, to-do lists, and reminders help to keep us on track but still we can often feel that there is still so very much left to do. This is another perspective issues.

Because God has a perfect plan for us, all we need to do is the best we can. Once we have done everything in our power, we need to leave the rest up to him. In life, when we feel that life is pushing us down, we should remember that we are only required to do that which we can. What is out of our control is just that, out of our control.

Learning to be a Patient Patient

At 20 years old, I found myself sitting in a hospital bed waiting to have surgery the following week. Two days earlier I was doing what every normal missionary did: teaching, working, and sweating. Now, I was laying in a bed with a monitor strapped to my chest to measure every beat of my heart. Seeing my heartbeat was usually a good thing. It meant I was alive. But this time it gave me concern. This concern came not because it was beating but because of how fast it was beating, 300 beats per minute. At that rate, my energy level went down substantially.

As a missionary you are expected to live by certain rules. These rules make sense and help keep you safe and focused. They guide and direct the way you live as a missionary. On the flip side, when you are not a missionary, living all the mission rules prevents living what most consider to be “a normal life.” Since I was technically a missionary but was not doing what missionaries typically do, I found myself faced with some difficulties.

I was not allowed to watch t.v., listen to music, read non mission approved literature, or play any kind of video games. Normally this would not bother me; I kept busy with missionary life, but being confined to a bed, I found that I could only read the few books I had access to for only so long. I became incredibly bored.

The thought of having to wait like this for five days at first killed me. How was I going to make it without any entertainment? As I sat there thinking a thought came into my mind. “Patience is made.” With that thought in mind, I began looking for ways to productively entertain myself without relying on technology. I sought out people to talk with so that I might learn their stories, and I found that not only would they share their stories, but I could also share mine. Opportunities for “unusual” missionary interactions came flooding in!

In the course of mutual sharing, I learned that being patient doesn’t mean waiting without complaining; being patient means filling the time you have with productive activities. In life, patience is required of all of us, whether we are “in-patients” or “out-patients.” Learning how to be a patient patient is truly one of the most important things any of us can ever learn.

A Living Hope

While I was serving as a missionary in Washington D.C., my heart problems began to act up. Without warning my heart would abandon its calm pace of 70 beats per minute (bpm) and begin to race at 300 bpm. This unusual pace or “arrhythmia” as doctors call it, almost entirely incapacitated my ability to do normal missionary work. After my heart went into an arrhythmia, I would travel to the hospital where they would (1) admit me, (2) talk with my doctors, and (3) shock me (cardioversion) to fix my heart. Two to three hours after I was shocked the hospital would release me. This pattern happened three different times. The fourth time my heart went into an arrhythmia, this pattern broke, and the greatest missionary opportunities I had during my mission occurred while I was a patient at Children's National Medical Center.

One of these great missionary opportunities came as I found myself wandering through quiet hospital halls. Because I was a missionary, I couldn’t watch television or listen to music, so I spent a lot of time walking around the cardiac unit. As I rounded one corner, I saw a young Hispanic couple sitting on the floor crying. My eyes went from the couple into the room they were next to where I saw the cause of such sadness, a newborn fighting to live. I continued forward until I reached the couple. Without saying a word I sat down next to them. It must have been odd to have a young white guy wearing a hospital gown, who you have never before met, sit down next to you. After a few moments I looked at them and said, pointing to their child, “That used to be me, but look at me now.” These parents began to open up to me and talked with me. As I explained my story to them I began to see a hope developing in their eyes.

I am convinced that this experience was no coincidence. The opportunity I had to share my story of struggle and triumph with this family that was just embarking on a lifelong journey brought me so much joy. I couldn’t help but pray that they would be able to feel God’s love through their trials; I think they could. As I walked away from this couple, the mother shouted, “Eres mi esperanza!” Which translated into English is, “You are my hope!”

The Timing of the Lord

When I was 16 years old, I was scheduled for open heart surgery at Primary Children’s Hospital. The surgery that was to be performed was quite risky. Due to the high level of risk, I was to be the only cardiac patient having surgery that day and the only one coming into the CICU. On top of the three pediatric cardiothoracic surgeons from Primary Children’s Hospital, a fourth surgeon was coming in from another hospital. Needless to say, this was going to be a big deal. The day before the operation was to be performed we received a phone call from my cardiologist informing us that the lead surgeon no longer felt good about performing the operation and had cancelled the surgery. As I listened to my doctor my heart just sank. I began to think, “If this team of surgeons feels that my surgery is too risky to perform, will anyone else be willing to do the surgery?”

A few days after my surgery was cancelled my cardiologist called us to tell me about the new plan. He said they had referred my case to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. We were told it would most likely take a few weeks for them to get back to us and that hopefully we would be able to schedule surgery roughly six months later. The next day we were contacted by the Mayo Clinic and within two weeks we flew out the Minnesota to prepare for surgery just fourteen days after the operation at Primary Children’s Hospital was cancelled.

I never have nor will I ever believe in coincidences. This experience testified to me personally that Heavenly Father is well aware of what we need when we need it. If we trust in Him, no matter what His timing may be, everything truly will work out for our best in the end.

Peacefully Powerful

I flew into rochester Minnesota on a beautiful Friday morning. The weather was almost perfect. It was pleasantly cool and sunny outside. I would have enjoyed the climate more had I not been so preoccupied with what was to come the following week. I flew out to Minnesota to have open heart surgery at St. Mary’s hospital, the hospital associated with the world famous mayo clinic. This was not my first open heart surgery. I have had a few surgeries prior to this one, but this one was different. This time, I was old enough to understand all of the risks associated with the operation.   

While my days during surgery prep were not bad, I found the nights were a new challenge for me. My anxiety and nervous thoughts kept me up at night. After taking sleeping meds, drinking warm drinks, and listening to soothing music, I still could not fall asleep. Finally I had a thought, I thought that I needed to listen to the Book of Mormon every night until I fell asleep. When night came and it was time to sleep I began listening to the Book of Mormon. As usually happens when I read the Book of Mormon, a peace came into my life. This peace gradually began to work on me and with the accompanying warmth of my bed, I quickly fell asleep.


I have heard it said that it’s not the experience that teaches you, it is a reflection on the experience that teaches you. As I think back on this experience with listening to the Book of Mormon I am amazed at the effect the spirit had on me. Though the feelings that came as I listened to the Book of Mormon were not intense or grabbing, they subtly calmed me down. Before I knew it, sleep that was not obtainable in any other way came by the peacefully powerful effect of the spirit.