Faith to Grow Your Tree of Life

When Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden, there were two trees: The tree of knowledge of good and evil, and the Tree of Life. When they were cast out, the Lord put Angels and a flaming sword to guard the Tree of Life to ensure that Adam and Eve would not partake of these blessings prematurely. Compare this to Alma 32.
Alma tells us that we must plant a seed in our heart and nourish it with our faith. Then, if we nourish it, it will grow into a tree with the fruit of eternal life. I like this image of us growing our own Tree of Life. This process requires faith. We must believe in the Savior Jesus Christ and trust that His atonement will allow us to repent of all of our sins and become clean, so we can partake of the fruit and live eternally as a perfect being. Planting a tree requires nutrients and water. We must have faith to open up the scriptures and act on the principles and doctrines that we learn in the book. We should go to church each week and having faith that if we pay attention, we will learn something valuable and have our testimonies strengthened. This requires us to put our phones down and open up our scriptures and listen with our hearts to what the speaker and the Holy Ghost are saying to us.  We have to have faith to pray with a sincere heart, and not just talk to the Lord, but ask Him how we can change and then have faith to act on that prompting.
I struggle with this one a lot. I know that it I pray to be patient, the Lord will give me a trial that will teach me patience. But sometimes I don't want to have another trial in my life, I don't want to be taught patience, I just want to magically acquire patience. But have faith that the Lord will not give you a trial that you cannot endure, you will be tested and it will be hard, but rely on the Lord who is all-powerful and His Son who knows exactly what you are going through and can comfort you perfectly.
As we go through life making the effort to nurture our tree, it will grow big and healthy and it will indeed provide mature ripe fruit that will lead us to eternal life. The journey requires faith. There will be trials, there will be suffering, but there will also be miracles and tender mercies. And if we endure with faith, we will be able to partake of the fruit and live with our Heavenly Father forever.
It requires faith. And faith requires action.