Sono arrivato a Roma!

Sono arrivato a Roma!!

I flew to Frankfurt, Germany, first, which was a 9 hour flight. It was quite the adventure. The gentleman to my left watched 4 movies on the way there and cried during 3 of them. Who would've thought a German could be so sensitive? And then the lady to my right had about 6 glasses of wine so she was feeling pretty good by the 3rd hour in.

And then there was me, stuck smack dab in the middle. The lady to my right told me that she was so surprised I could crunch up with my legs on the seat and sleep. I jokingly told her, "That's what happens when you share a house with 7 people, you learn to make do with the room you have." It seems she took it pretty seriously and felt bad for me because she then gave me her extra blanket out of sympathy and continuously offered me food that she wasn't going to eat...

Finally after arriving in Germany, I hopped on the next plane to Rome. After we landed, I got my luggage and walked out to see a 6 foot Italian man holding up my name written on an iPad. He carried all my luggage out to a fancy car and called me "madam" approximately 50 times. He then took me to my apartment and bid me farewell as I went up the elevator to meet my host mom.

My host mom, Lucia, has made me feel so welcome and I have only been here for a day. She tries her best to help me understand Italian, and I already feel like I am getting better.

We went walking around to see my school, the Colosseum, stopped for some gelato, and then stopped at the Supermercato. I have never seen more Fiats and cats in my entire life. Fiats and cats, cats and Fiats, cats on top of Fiats...seems like such an odd combination, but it's Rome, so va bene.

Day 1 of Italia- SUCCESS!

Arrivederci!

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Never-Ending Bliss

As I am sitting here in a coffee shop, my green tea to my right, a whole-grain muffin to my left, it all seems a bit too cliché. My life is not nearly interesting enough to write a blog, yet here I am, and here goes nothing. My primary goal is to not bore anyone to sleep during the process, so fingers crossed.

While I try to prepare myself mentally, emotionally, and spiritually to embark on a three-month journey that will take me halfway across the world, I thought now is as good of a time as any to make some use of the thoughts prancing through my head.

My first post is all about one word, a word that is also the inspiration for the name of my blog.

Bliss- noun. - perfect happiness; great joy.

This word could possibly be my favorite word in the English language. Its simplicity rolls right off the tongue so effortlessly.

But what exactly is bliss? What does it even mean to be perfectly happy?

I've been searching for an answer to this for a long, long time. I started to believe it could be achieved by a large friend group, a perfect home-life, a perfect boyfriend, but after experiencing all of these things, I never found what I would call "bliss". Yes, all of these things gave me great happiness, but I always imagined "bliss" to be something a bit more.

Then it hit me.

There is one place in the entire world where I have never been sad....wait for it...wait for it....

Church!

Ironic, huh? The one place that gives me the most happiness is a place that isn't all about me. All along I was searching for happiness solely for myself, and how selfish is that? I spend so much of my time asking for favors from God that I take it for granted. That one hour in Church is finally a time where I can say "It doesn't matter what I receive. Now let's see how much I can give." The only way I will obtain a great state of bliss is by giving. And this brings me to the first half of my blog title Never-Ending Bliss.

It's as simple as this, we can never ever give too much.

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