Deciding to Go on a Mission and Filling Out the Application – Interview with Hannah Smith – Podca...

This video is an interview with Hannah Smith, a young woman in the process of submitting her application to be a full-time missionary for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Hannah talks about what made her decide to serve a mission and gives information about the process of filling out the paper work and the online mission recommendation system. The transcript of the interview can be found below and an audio version can be found at the bottom of this post (#bottom) as it comprises Episode 16 of the Latter-day Saint Mission Prep podcast (https://mormonmissionprep.com/podcast...) .



Jimmy Smith:

Hello and welcome to our latest episode of the Latter-day Saint Mission Prep podcast. My name is Jimmy Smith. I’m the founder of the Latter-day Saint Mission Prep website and podcast, and I’m pleased to have with me today, my daughter Hannah Smith who is on the on the call or on the on the video call with me if you’re watching this on video podcasts, you’ll hear the audio.



Hannah is my daughter and she’s here today to talk about her decision to serve a mission and the process she’s gone through in applying for a mission (https://mormonmissionprep.com/call-pr...) . She’s in the middle of that process right now. Hannah is a freshman at BYU (Brigham Young University). She recently turned 19. She’s been working on her mission application with her BYU Bishop for the last couple of months.



We’re recording this in January of 2022, and she has scheduled her final interview with her Bishop and stake president, and that’ll happen in about a month, and then she’ll get her mission papers turned in. So welcome to the podcast Hannah. Thanks for being with us today. Is there anything else you’d like to say about yourself by way of introduction?



Hannah Smith:

I don’t think so. Thanks for having me.



Jimmy Smith:

Alright. Thanks for thanks for being with me today and I appreciate it all right. I think, what you’re going to have to say and what we’re going to say to the audience today is going to be interesting and beneficial for a lot of missionaries. The process you’ve gone through with applying for your mission, it can be long and complex and as I’ve run the Latter-day Saint Mission Prep website for the past 12 years, that is one of the biggest areas of questions and concerns people have is about this application process, so you’re really going to be helping a lot of people by just telling them what you went through, what your experience has been. And so that they can help maybe avoid some pitfalls as they go through this process.



So the first thing I want to talk about before we talk about the application process is how you decided to serve a mission. Obviously in the church, young men have an expectation to serve a mission as part of their priesthood duties. Every church president in my lifetime has said that all worthy enable young men should prepare to serve a mission (https://mormonmissionprep.com/motivat...) . Young women have also been invited and welcomed in serving a mission, but there’s not that same expectation for young women like yourself. So if you could, let’s start out by talking about your desire to serve our mission, why you want to go? What made you decide to serve a mission?



Hannah Smith:

Well so, I guess the main thing that like made me decide to want to serve a mission, I was just I was like I don’t know. I was thinking about it a lot and like oh it’s like this could be an option for me. And like the more I thought about it I was like wow like putting aside like a whole year and a half, so like just serving the Lord and serving other people and like you know, being able to grow your testimony. I was like that. Seems like a really cool opportunity and like it seems like a really good thing. And so that’s kind of where like started.



There was a point. I think it was like during my senior year in high school. There was a girl in our ward that came home from her mission and she like gave her homecoming talk and they had her give like a little fireside. Like after she got home. Just like telling about like her mission experience and like they like allowed the youth to ask questions and stuff door and I think just like a lot of the things she said about going on a mission like. I don’t know, it just like it sounded really exciting to me, like even if it was like partially like, oh wow, that sounds like a really like cool adventure like, you know going and just putting yourself out there and teaching the gospel for 18 months. It just sounded like she really enjoyed it and that it, like, really helped her grow her testimony.



And so I was like, thought it was just really inspiring to me to, like, hear all of that and then also like just talking to like one of my friends who’s preparing to serve mission and like his reasons why you want to go. That really helped me figure...