Great and Difficult Things: My Mission

In preparation for the interviewing that I will be doing over the next few weeks and for my own records I wanted to write a little about my experiences that I will be talking about from my life.  My mission was one of those primary experiences that is more true to life as it is a time of great growth, difficulty, and joy; a myriad of experiences mostly hinging upon the people that one teaches.

The good:  During my mission I found that my pickiness for food died quickly and effectively.  I decided early on that I wanted to eat anything that they put in front of me, out of concern for offending them partly, but it was something that I felt I lacked growing up and something that I wanted to overcome; and so I did.  There were only two occasions that I found it difficult to eat the food, and only one of those did I turn it down only having eaten part of it.  But everything else I ate: every part of cow or pig, every vegetable or hot food, anything.

A weakness:  Looking for the good in those closest to me.  I could sometimes be unloving towards others that would criticize me or be hateful towards me.  I wish even now to improve upon this in my ability to be patient and tolerant towards all.

Inteview Practice: So, tell me a little about yourself

I'm about to graduate in Applied Mathematics with an emphasis in computer science.  I have worked most recently as a mathematics tutor, and just finished an internship at a local software company as a QA tester working with enterprise software.  During that internship I learned Ruby and built a program to interface with the database and test for bugs being reported by the clients.  I work on the side as a photographer doing weddings, events, and portraits sessions and thoroughly enjoy the time it gives me to interact with and serve people in a unique way.  I enjoy difficult problems and developing new ways to solve them. 

Consistency in Marriage

One of my classmates brought up a good question today in class, asking about in what things should we be consistent in marriage and family life.  I thought about it and responded with those things that I have seen my own dad do during my whole life, and realized I had never told him those things I most respected him for and looked up to him for.

My response was that he was always consistent in the spiritual things that really mattered:  Going to church every Sunday, he was always a full tithe payer, we always read scriptures and said family prayers at night, and he was always respectful of my mother and then my step-mother later, never raising his voice at either and never making the divorce a subject.

I am grateful for a father who has always been and will always be an example in my life of righteous fatherhood and Priesthood.

Life recently

Just to catch everyone up on the recent goings-on in the Beckman Household, we have been fairly busy:  Stepheni has been working hard as ever, and keeping us going financially by working at Jefferson Elementary as a preschool teacher!  She does such a good job, which is evidenced by her great love and patience for the little devils.  I've made token efforts at bringing home a paycheck, but $8 an hour doesn't compare to a salary =P  I'll make up for it when I have a real job.  Speaking of which:

The other stuff going on is my job search right now.  (For tips and tricks on such ventures look at my most recent posts on my other blog, here.)  Really I've been applying just about everywhere it feels like; I'll go in little spurts making and entering 3-4 applications a few times a week.  It's working out pretty well though so far, as I've had two interviews and both of them went very well.  I'm in the middle of interviewing with USAA and Epic right now, and both have been super great about communicating and talking with me about the process and any questions I have.  Both also happen to be involved in Healthcare, interestingly enough.

Big recommendation:  Keep you LinkedIn up-to-date and active!

Also:  Stepheni is pregnant!  Yeah, we all already know this, but I haven't announced it on here.  It has become much more real, now that we know that it's a little baby boy growing in there.  We are both very excited though, and have been looking at baby clothes much more often now =)

So, all in all, things are pretty awesome!  Thanks for reading.