Honest Blogging

It's time for some honesty people. :D

Honesty is what I am honestly blogging this honest blog about. The only thing I ask is that everyone who reads this to endure the length and read it all.

Honestly, I love our family! I love you all so much. I love all the diversity that is found in this family. For some reason, everyone tries to be the same as everyone else, but if we are honest with ourselves, then we know that James is nothing like Joseph and Nicolina is not the same sister as Linda Lee. That's OK though! That is the reason we need each other. We need each other to be able to make it to heaven right? I mean God wouldn't have put us all together if we weren't there to be different and help each other progress. :)

So this brings up some things that we need to be more honest about with each other. I'm sure I am not the only one that has noticed that even though our family is amazing and we are so strong in the church and we are so good for each other, there are some things we can work on to help us progress to that heavenly family state. And that's OK too! But us Ericksons are often really good at pretending not to be vulnerable. We like to hide our weaknesses from each other and I believe doing that is holding us back from being a heavenly family.

So here are some of the things that I have honestly thought about for an honest amount of time that I want to tell everyone about so that I can be a better member of this awesome family.

So I STRUGGLE around the family. A lot. I am not sure why, but I know I am not the only one. One of the most frustrating things since coming home has been my family. I have been home 10 months now, and the two most frustrating things is that I am as single as ever and I STRUGGLE around the family. I have learned a few things though!

Let me be vulnerable, a little unorthodox Erickson, and show my weakness for a second. I felt like a completely different person coming home from the mission. But when I get around the family, I get sucked back into pre-mission Jared. I become COMPLETELY absorbed in my phone when I am around the family (wayyy more than usual) and then I get around the brothers, and I just feel a lack of respect, and honestly a completely drowning, sub-par, you're not good enough sort of feeling which is a lot of the same feelings I felt before the mission.

Before the mission I felt pretty worthless all the time. I had a few girls break my heart (silly right?) and I convinced myself that I was never good enough because I could never live up to the expectations of my family and the standards that my brothers had set. I am SO grateful for that now, but I wasn't grateful for it then. I was sort of an emotional wreck before the mission too. I wouldn't cry too often, but there were times in my room where I would be alone and I would convince myself that I was such a failure that I would start crying. For days and weeks and months I would do this. This led me down a slippery slope. This lead to a lot of sexual sin because I didn't have worth in myself and so I had to find it in feeling other feelings.

Well, something everyone should know about me is I am a very bad liar and I don't do well with holding on to feelings of guilt. So I told bishop and Mom and Dad and cleaned up and went on a mission. But emotionally I still thought of myself as someone who wasn't good enough. "None of the brothers struggled with this!" I thought to myself. "They didn't struggle with sexual sin and those guys are practically perfect in every way!" I don't know if they did or not, but Satan is a really good liar for those of you that don't know.

So I got to a certain area in my mission and met this recent convert named Karl who was a recovering sex addict, He had overcome his struggles and had recognized his divine potential as a Son of God. He taught me so much about loving yourself and recognizing that the difference between guilt and shame is the difference between "I did something wrong," and "I am wrong" which have two totally different meanings.

I also was writing a girl in that same time frame who helped teach me that I didn't have to be the same as my brothers in order to succeed. I just needed to be myself because that is what my family needed. All of that combined with learning that Heavenly Father loves me for who I am and that I am LITERALLY a child of God, helped me to change. I felt like an indication of that change was that I was confident and hard working and even became an Assistant to the President. I am not throwing that out there to say that I am better than anyone else because I hate when people do that, but for me, I knew that president wouldn't have chosen a ninny to be his AP or someone that was questioning his worth and potential in a negative way.

So then I get home and I don't know if it is me, of if it is y'all, but all of those things get thrown out the window and I feel like my pre-mission self again. And honestly, I don't want that again. But I have learned that I need to face my old self and overcome those feelings in order to truly be confident rather than hide those feelings which helped me become confident on the mission.

Me and Esther were actually talking about this. Quick shout out to her, she is my homie! Dang, I love that girl. Us younger kids may know a bit more than a lot of you think,

We feel it is time that people in this family actually took time to get to know one another. It is kind of spoken and unspoken in this family that there is this problem with not letting people become who they are truly meant to be because we are picturing them as who we thought they were when we were kids (which is one of the things that I am struggling with around the family). And again its probably part me and part the attitude but honestly, that has got to stop.

It seems like we just look at people in a certain light, or hold them to a standard or to a thought or to a circumstance from one moment in the past and that is who they remain to be forever. We as family members often don't even take the time to learn who people in our family are now and to understand them and who they are now.

I am going to throw out into the open a few unspoken honest examples of this.


For instance, I don't know if anyone has thought about this, but maybe Joseph doesn't want to be known as the sibling that motivates everyone to actually do something and make decisions when we are together as a family like vultures saying "I don't know, what choo wanna do?" I think a gift that Joseph has is being a good motivator. A spiritual gift even! But maybe he just wants to sit back and take a break and let someone else do that for once. Or better yet, we could actually voice our HONEST opinions and come to an agreement together instead of just folding to the popular opinion. Maybe he doesn't want to be that guy!

And I don't know if any of y'all have thought about this, but maybe John is sick and tired of people talking about how much he can eat! Maybe that is not the legacy he wants to leave when he dies. Haha not that it would ever be that extreme, but does anyone know what motivates John? or what makes him tick? What does John dream about at night? What does John want more than anything else? What are his desires, his loves, his fears, his passions, and his dislikes? Does anyone know? I can't say that I do. I can't say that I even know John's favorite color!! Maybe John should be known for WHO HE IS rather that how much he can eat. (thanks John for letting me use you as an example)

Another example is my homie Esther! (who I am definitely getting to know better), She is such an awesome person, but she has a few emotional months with the move and then everyone pins her as this ornery, disrespectful to Mom and Dad, we never would have gotten away with that when we were kids, how is she ever going to find a husband, type of girl, when that is not who she is AT ALL!!!

Esther is a smart, beautiful, amazing, and talented girl. She has a head on her shoulders let me tell ya. And she is wayy smarter that you guys think. Did you know that she acts the way she does and goes on Instagram and is just super non-social around the family because she knows that is what everyone expects her to be? and that she makes sure she is EXTRA sassy around the family because that is what she thinks you guys expect?

Well let me tell you guys. Underneath that sassy cover is a wonderful girl who has an amazing understanding of the Gospel. She is a little scared of the future, but she has a TON of faith. Y'all were worried about her and her future marriage, but she has SO got this!! She is so great! and I learned this by spending just a few hours juan on juan with her, threw out all previous thoughts I had about who I thought she was, and sought to understand her. And I did a little! I still want to understand her more, but I know who Esther is better than most of y'all.

So here is my honest proposal. Lets all get to know one another better and let go of all of out previous thoughts of who we all thought we were. This comes in two parts. The first is that we must all be willing to let go of our initial thoughts of who we think other members of our family are, and the second is we must be willing to show other people who we really are. Take time to get to know people and I know that our family will be so much closer to heaven as we do so. :D


So I'll start. I still want to go juan on juan with everyone, but I am just going to tell everyone things about me that y'all might not know.

Did you know that my love languages are physical touch and words of affirmation? (By the way, do you know any of the family members love languages? like for real? I can't say that I do)

I love music and I love dancing a lot. My favorite dance so far is the waltz, but tango is really fun too.

I am really comfortable with girls. I talk to a lot of girls and hang out with a lot of girls. There isn't a girl that I can't talk to and be uncomfortable. I can ask them on dates too, but haven't figured out how to date them seriously yet. "It's a work in progress! It's going to get better"

I love to hang out with friends, To most of them I am sort of a leader. I can captivate the entire table at ward activities with a story or an opinion. I feel most myself around my friends because I have a lot of respect and people respect my opinions and I can captivate audiences.

I love to teach too. Especially the Gospel. I find passion in teaching people about Jesus Christ which is why my ultimate goal is to be a seminary teacher or a religion teacher at BYU-I. I sort of felt like dentistry would be a good back up, but I am not as sure anymore.

I love to improve too. I love to learn and grow. If I get a quiet moment with you, I will usually try to ask you what I can do to improve.

Well, this was good! I feel a lot better, but now I am going to play with my nieces and nephews. I would love to talk to any of y'all at any time and get your opinion on what I said or even just get to know you better! You can call me at anytime, but the best time to get me is between 5 and 9 eastern time :)


Love you all! Seriously.

Jared Erickson