“What can you do to prepare yourself during your college years for the tests and trials of your life?

1. You must learn to work hard toward your goals, to pray for strength and guidance in your daily decisions, always acknowledging “Thy will be done.”

2. Study the scriptures, history, biographical literature, and psychology to give you an insight into how others have met life’s challenges and, with a testimony, endured to the end.

3. Select friends and an eternal companion from whom you can seek counsel and who will lift you and make it easier to live the commandments by just being together.

4. Learn to be of service and of help to others in their tests no matter how busy you are or how much you are hurting from your own tests and trials of faith.

5. Learn that even in a perfect life the tests and trials will come, but remember that you can bring affliction upon yourself and those near you through your own actions. Be willing to accept the consequences that come and don’t blame them on God.

6. Learn that when you have made a mistake, regrets are not enough. Feeling sorry is not enough unless your sorrow brings about a remorse of conscience and a change of heart resulting in true repentance.

7. Learn that true education is not only test scores and grade point averages, but also gaining wisdom through life’s experiences, listening to sound counsel, gaining an understanding in your heart, and caring for others less fortunate. Then, no amount of temptation, testing, trials, or coercion can make you depart from the straight and narrow path that leads to eternal life.

8. Learn that in mortal probation you are here for tests and trials even though you live a perfect life.

9. Learn to know yourself while you are at the university. You are in a laboratory that simulates the world with individual competition and the inner stress of learning. There will never be a better time in your life to have the contemplation and introspection needed to know yourself. Take time to ponder who you are and act accordingly. General education requirements are given not only to give you a well-rounded education, but also to give you an opportunity to assess your intellectual and spiritual strengths and weaknesses. What are your God-given gifts and talents? (see D&C 46)”
— Robert D. Hales