mission-is-the-best-thing-you-will-ever-do

At the close of the call where Natalie decided to serve a mission, Kaitlynn signed off with two pieces of guidance to her younger sister. The first was to keep a written record of how she felt during the prayer (affirming Jason's earlier counsel). The second was her own testimony, given directly: "The mission is the best thing you will ever do."

Brief by counsel standards, but delivered from a sister mid-mission to a sister at the moment of commitment. The kind of thing Natalie may carry into the lead-up weeks when doubt arrives.

write-your-future-self-a-note

Right after Natalie's prayer-driven mission decision (and before the call moved on), Jason gave her one specific instruction: write a note to her future self about how she felt right now. The reason: the adversary's pattern is to plant doubt in the weeks that follow a clear spiritual answer, and the written record is the anchor she can return to when that doubt arrives. Kaitlynn affirmed the point: the lead-up weeks to a mission are some of the hardest in a person's life.

The framing was concrete and time-sensitive: capture the feeling at the moment of certainty, because by the time doubt comes, the feeling itself will be harder to access.

Natalie's response in the moment was not transcribed verbatim. She had just said out loud that she would serve a mission and not go to college; the future-self-note counsel landed on top of a yes.

first-temple-endowment-advice

Advice for Your First Time Through the Temple

The night before Natalie's first endowment at the Oquirrh Mountain Temple, Jason asked Kaitlynn whether she would give Natalie any advice. Natalie was not on the call; Kaitlynn delivered this for Jason and Kristi to carry to her. Three parts:

The temple is sacred for a reason. Everything that happens there is sacred, and Satan makes fun of what is sacred and tries to turn it bad. Go in expecting that and don't let it land.

Focus on what you feel. Kaitlynn said it was really different the first time and she didn't understand everything, but she felt good, she felt the Spirit. Recognize your feelings and focus on them rather than on understanding it all at once.

Go last if you can. Her strongest piece: if the family can arrange for Natalie to go last, then when she walks into the celestial room she gets to see everyone waiting and smiling at her. Kaitlynn said walking in and seeing her family was the crowning moment of her own endowment.

be-kind-over-being-perfect

Kindness Over Being Perfect

In the car outside the Provo MTC, shortly after Kristi read the passage on sacrifice, she said it is good to learn how to think of what other people are going through and not just try to be perfect, and that this is one of the values in the family: just to be kind.

Notes

• The recipient is inferred. Kristi does not name anyone, and the whole family was in the car, but this was minutes before Natalie's MTC drop-off and reads as send-off counsel to her. It could instead be aimed at Alexa: a few lines later Kristi says "part two with Alexa. Think about what you're saying," while correcting an uncomfortable joke. If this was directed at Alexa, move this note to Alexa/Counsel/. See the Cleanup Notes on the source for the speaker-merge caveat.

the-measure-of-sacrifice

The Measure of Sacrifice

In the car outside the Provo MTC, in the last minutes before drop-off, Kristi read a passage aloud:

"The true measure of sacrifice isn't so much what one gives in sacrifice as what one sacrifices to give. Faith isn't tested so much when the cupboard is full as when it is bare, and these defining moments - the crisis doesn't create one's character; it reveals it."

Someone in the car said "Boom. That's really good." Kristi agreed it was good and said it was from her lunch. She went on: the widow of Zarephath chose to let go of everything, and because of that choice, miracles happened.

A short follow-on exchange about the widow of Zarephath did not survive the audio.

Notes

Both the giver and the recipient on this note are inferred, not stated. The source's speaker labels are badly merged (six people, one microphone, in a car), so neither is as solid as the frontmatter makes them look:

• Giver. The capture labels the passage "Kristi Heywood," but that label is unreliable throughout this source. It holds up here on elimination: the male "Speaker 1" answers the passage rather than reading it, and Alexa (14) and Mason (12) are implausible readers. That leaves Kristi, Natalie, or Bryson, and Kristi is the best fit. Not confirmed.
• Recipient. No one is named as she reads it, and the whole family was in the car. Natalie is inferred from the setting: read minutes before her MTC drop-off, on the subject of sacrifice.

See the Cleanup Notes on the source for the full picture of the merge. - Kristi attributes the passage only as "from my lunch," which did not resolve. The passage has not been verified against churchofjesuschrist.org and no author is established. Do not cite the attribution.

dont-look-backward-embrace-the-work

Jason told Natalie not to waste one ounce of time wishing she were somewhere behind her, because she is going forward.

He set the instruction inside a prediction of the whole mission arc: the 18 months will fly by, and leaving the mission will be just as hard as going was in the first place. He listed what he expects her to come to love, the work, the closeness with the Savior, her companions and church members, and her areas. He closed the thought by saying that when she comes home she will probably be reminded within the first ten minutes what home is like, then wonder why she missed it in the first place.

The letter pairs this with an acknowledgment of the cost at home: it is hard without her, but the world still turns, and the family still wakes up and does their best each day.

give-your-trials-to-the-lord

Jason closed his first letter to Natalie at the MTC with Mosiah 24:14 and his testimony of it.

He framed the scripture first: it speaks of the Nephites under Lamanite bondage, pleading for deliverance from their burdens. The verse has the Lord promising to ease the burdens on their shoulders so that they cannot feel them upon their backs even while still in bondage, so that they may stand as witnesses for Him and know of a surety that He visits His people in their afflictions.

His testimony on it: when we are going through tough times the Lord will strengthen us to rise to the challenge; the Lord is stronger than any trial we will have; and as we give it to Him, He will lift us up and do it with us. He told her he knows she can do it, and to give her trials to the Lord and watch Him work a miracle in her life.

Note that the promise in the verse is not removal of the burden but the easing of it while it remains, which matches how Jason applied it: strength to rise to the challenge rather than the challenge being taken away.

its-only-new-once

Jason told Natalie she would go through many new things and that it may be hard, but that it gets easier because "It's only new once." Once a thing has been done, it has been done before, and it is not going to be as scary.

He made it concrete against her actual situation rather than leaving it abstract: she had already spent one night at the MTC, so she knows what it is like, and by that night she is "basically pro."

keep-a-mission-journal

Jason instructed Natalie to write her feelings and experiences in a journal, and gave two reasons for it. The first looks outward to posterity: her kids may need her courage and strength one day. The second looks back at herself: she may need to remind herself one day how amazing she is by reading the things she has done.

This extends the counsel he gave her at the moment of her mission decision, 2026-03-02_write-your-future-self-a-note, from a single anchor note against anticipated doubt to an ongoing record across the mission.

the-mtc-is-a-spiritual-place

On Natalie's first full day at the Provo MTC, Jason opened his letter by retracting how he had previously described his own MTC experience to her. He said he had regrets about how he had expressed it, that he had not changed his mind but had forgotten, and that the MTC was one of the most spiritual places he has ever been.

His correction was specific: the quirks and weirdness he had emphasized before were mostly his own, and the real experience was "being bathed in the spirit of truth," which he felt every day, including in class while learning. He asked her forgiveness for having painted the MTC as "a 'L in the chat, bro'" and said it is instead "a 'Ws in the chat'."

He returned to the point at the close of the letter, telling her to enjoy the spirit she will feel there and calling it a wonderful place.

Your self-worth does not diminish, even when you can improve

In his July 19 email to Natalie (her first weekend at the Provo MTC), Jason built counsel on Mosiah 21:33, where King Limhi and his people want to be baptized but "Ammon declined doing this thing, considering himself an unworthy servant." Jason said he had never before thought of Ammon as unworthy, and that this is often how it is with us: "Sometimes we deny ourselves blessings, which then denies others blessings, because WE CONSIDER OURSELVES unworthy, whether we are or not."

His point to Natalie: she can always go to the Savior whether or not she feels worthy. In his own long talks with Jesus, 90 percent of the time he finds he is being overly critical of himself; 10 percent of the time Jesus agrees he is right but reminds him he is not alone and they will solve it together. Either way, "100% of the time I can improve and 100% of the time my self worth and value does not diminish."

god-loves-us-in-our-imperfections

Near the close of the first MTC P-day call, after Natalie relayed a districtmate's worry about whether it was okay to hug a set-apart missionary boyfriend at the airport ("Jesus won't kill me"), Jason offered a closing principle.

He told her: "Your life moves forward. Any time we make mistakes, our life moves forward, and he's going to love us in our imperfections." Natalie said thanks, that is nice.

Pairs with his earlier letter counsel to go forward rather than backward, 2026-07-16_dont-look-backward-embrace-the-work; here the added point is grace, that God's love holds through our imperfections and mistakes rather than pausing for them.

learn-to-love-a-hard-companion

On her first MTC P-day call, Natalie said she was glad she has an easy first companion in Sister Dillingham because she knows there will be one or two along the way she wishes were dead or wishes she were. Jason answered with counsel for when that happens.

He told her the challenging part of a hard companionship is that you have to learn to love them: you have to change your heart from "I wish I was dead too" to "I love you and I'm proud of how hard you're trying," and, for a companion who is not even trying, to loving them anyway. The principle he was naming is that charity toward a difficult companion is a choice of the heart you make regardless of whether they earn it.

Natalie agreed. She said she already sees a version of it in her district, where she often feels like the older sibling and sometimes wonders why someone did something, and called it a daily learning experience with much more to come.

embrace-the-last-of-the-mtc

At the close of Natalie's last call from the Provo MTC, three days before she flies to Iowa and after she had spent most of the call packing and listing what she still had to do, Kristi turned her toward the time she has left rather than the departure.

She told her to embrace the last of her MTC time: "really embrace it, be present," and "Make the most of the MTC every moment of it."

Natalie said "Yeah. It's about to get real."

Pairs with Jason's earlier letter counsel that it's only new once and don't look backward, embrace the work. Those were aimed at entering the MTC; this one is aimed at leaving it.

heavenly-father-reminding-you-of-your-blessing

Natalie reported that she and her companion had fallen asleep for two hours and accidentally slept through a workshop, and defended missing it on the grounds that the workshops are "stupid" and she already knows the material. A joke about being smitten for her wickedness followed.

Jason reframed the nap rather than the rule-breaking: "I think that's Heavenly Father reminding you of your blessing that you got."

Borderline as counsel: it is one sentence delivered inside a run of joking. Filed because the reframe is portable. It reads an unplanned two-hour collapse not as a lapse but as the blessing she received doing its work, which is a lens she can apply again when her body overrides her schedule in the field.