Sorry Larry, I'd rather be a pickle.

On VeggieTales, people often mistake Larry for a pickle, to which he replies, "I'm not a pickle, I'm a cucumber!"

Today, I learned why it's better to be a pickle.

I really enjoyed today's sessions of General Conference. It's always a challenge trying to choose my favorite - and I almost always end up with at least two or three favorites. My two favorite talks from today's sessions were from Elder David A. Bednar and Elder Jeffrey R. Holland. It's not really fair to have favorites, but I do. And these two apostles are among my top three favorites.

Elder Holland spoke about the importance of words. Most importantly, how we use them. I learned a lot from his talk and I have set some goals on how I can apply it in my life. I also enjoyed a talk by Jay. E. Jensen of the Quorum of the Seventy about the hymns and other appropriate music.

But my favorite talk to day was Elder Bednar's about "The Parable of the Pickle". He talked about the process of changing a cucumber into a pickle and related it to our lives as we change who we are to be spiritually reborn. The three steps are:

1. Cleaning and preparing

2. Fully immersing and saturating the cucumber in salt brine

3. Sealing and purifying the pickles in a sterilized jar

One of the parts I liked the most was how he said that our souls need to be fully immersed in the Gospel. Sporadic or shallow "dipping" or "sprinkling" will not produce a spiritual transformation. Meaning, partial participation is not enough. We need to fully immerse ourselves in the Gospel, be fully active.

I will have more notes that I took from this talk and all the others, tomorrow, after the final session. For now, I just wanted to say that though I do really like cucumbers, I want to be a pickle.

(After this talk, I totally craved pickles! I had to grab a couple of spears before we had lunch! lol)