Back on Track

After SURVIVING my first college exam season, here I am, back on my dusty corner of the Internet!

I'm very happy to announce that I passed all my exams! Even though I lived pretty much isolated from the world for a little over a month, thankfully, it was worth it!

Here are some of the things that have happened while I've been gone:

- Christmas: my FAVOURITE day of the year, and this year was no exception! I got to hang out with my dear family: we sang, ate, talked, drank tea... and my older cousins, my sister and I dressed up as Santa and his reindeer when the time came to give the presents. It was so much fun!

my seat at the Christmas table!

- New Year's Eve was kind of a rough night: it was REALLY cold, and because the transports were a mess, I couldn't arrive downtown in time to give my boyfriend our first new years kiss. It made me really sad that nothing went as planned, but unexpected things happen and we have to bear with them!

- In January we threw a surprise party for my best friend. Her face when she arrived to the restaurant and saw us there with lots of balloons was EPIC!

- I started to take driving lessons and I found out I LOVE to drive. Seriously. I've loved cars ever since I was a kid and I'm very happy to get to drive one!

- After weeks of study I had my exams week: it was nerve-wrecking, but everything turned out just fine!

- Now I'm on holidays and it's a season of rest. Most people are still taking their exams, so I spend most of my time alone watching movies, TV shows (Gilmore Girls being my favourite) and reading books (I'm reading Alan Turing's biography right now).

- However, last week I had a great day! My college buddies and I had lunch at a vegetarian restaurant (which I had never tried) and then rode bikes by the sea. It was amazing and we saw the sunset like I pictured it in the first picture ;)

How have these past few weeks been going for you?

love,

Mariana

Taking Time

In my actual season of life, it's been really easy for me to feel overwhelmed with anxiety. So much to do and so little time.

The solution I found may seem kind of weird, but it works!

I find it necessary to take more breaks and enjoy the moment. It may sound like a contradiction: 'so you're feeling overwhelmed? taking time for yourself doesn't sound like a wise option'.

But taking a break doesn't necessarily mean procrastinating for an hour, sleeping on top of my books, or lying on my bed staring at the ceiling and wondering what to do with my life.

Here are some of the breaks I get to have, and that make me feel better when I'm feeling stressed or depressed:

- Having lunch with my friends from college at the mall.

- Seeing my high school friends, who are 'the family that I chose and that chose me too'. They can always make me feel like myself again.

- Marveling at nature: near my faculty the trees have such beautiful colours and I can't help staring at them, trying to capture the moment. I also get to see beautiful rainbows sometimes, like in the picture below!

- Fridays, after my WORST class of the week (with my terrible Anatomy teacher who terrorizes me and makes me feel completely anxious and stupid) I have the BEST time of the week with my boyfriend. We get to do lots of fun together and it feels like home to be with him! (I won't get extra cheesy, even though I could)

How do you take time for yourself during stressful times?

love,
Mariana

Community

The prompt for the first Peony Project link-up is Community. It's kind of a 'free' linkup, there aren't many rules, so I will basically start by defining what community means to me.

Community happens when people come together and unite their efforts towards something. It allows us to experience new perspectives, to learn new lessons, and most importantly, to create relationships which will make us feel less lost in this big world.

Friendship, for example, is a form of community - and, now, I will share the story of how finding a group of friends I could relate to changed my life.

I've mentioned that my early teenage years were a difficult time. I spent a lot of that time inside a funk and without considering getting out, but my two best friends kept throwing me a ladder and offering me their help to pull myself together. 

Things changed for the better when I started high school. You know the book The Perks of Being a Wallflower? (It's my favourite of all time, by the way). I was a wallflower myself, but a very lucky one, because, like Charlie, I found the most amazing group of friends ever. 

Even though I already knew some of those people (including my best friends), I finally understood that I was not the only one who was hurting. I started having REAL conversations with them, about the good and the bad, and feeling like somebody thought like me helped me a lot. Despite all the fights and tears, I felt like I belonged somewhere. 

I learned so incredibly much about myself and about the good and the bad there is in people.

I learned to hug and be hugged, to have the courage to express my problems, and to do my best to help out my friends in the hard task that is growing up. 

I am so incredibly grateful for that experience of community.

Now that I'm in college, it's way harder to stay in touch with these incredible people. But it's necessary to me; so I try my best to call and have meals with them whenever I can!

I'm also meeting a lot of new people at school, and I'm starting to form a really nice group of friends. We usually meet at lunchtime and have amazing conversations. Hopefully we'll also be able to form a  lovely community together :)

In the online world, I am also a part of a community! 

"The Peony Project is a community for women who love Jesus, love blogging, and are looking for a common space to share ideas, encourage one another, and make real, honest friendships with one another."

I was barely a blogger when I joined The Peony Project. I'm still a baby blogger, but these ladies have been helping me a lot with making my blog a space to express my thoughts and beliefs! But The Peony Project goes way beyond just blogging: those amazing women pray for each other, share their worries and concerns, and I feel close to their hearts even though I live so far away from them.

If you relate to the sentence above, please click the link and join; I'm sure you won't regret it!

What does community mean to you?

love,

Mariana

Stuff I'm Thankful For: Strength for Tuesdays

Tuesdays are the hardest days of my week - eleven hours at college, and the only break is lunch time!

(this is my second home right now)

My average Tuesday starts with waking up at 6:40 and rushing to college to start with Anatomy at 8... and it ends at 8 pm, with me landing in bed, exhausted, after my nerve-wracking BIDS class (it's basically building data bases and stuff like that)

It's obviously not my favourite day of the week, and every Monday night all I can think is 'I can't believe I'll go through a Tuesday tomorrow'. But then I remember: that's not good. There are good things in Tuesdays and I know I can make them great days!

Every Tuesday, I'm thankful for:

- another day when I have the chance to study what I love the most. I am so very much in love with my degree, even the hardest parts of it!

- lunchtime, when I get to eat delicious food at the mall nearby and spend two hours hanging out with my new friends! 

- getting to know people at college better. I spend a whole day around my class, so there's a lot of time to figure out those new people!

- going home feeling physically and psychologically drained, and knowing that I'm giving all of me so that I can be a doctor someday and help people.

What makes you thankful in your hardest days?

love,

Mariana

About Depression

This is the kind of post I'm never sure if I'm supposed to put in my blog. 

But aren't those the most important posts?

I've never talked about this to many people. It makes me quite uncomfortable to be honest, and I always fear that people are going to think I'm an attention seeker.

But. maybe, that's the main reason why I ought to talk about it, as openly as I can, in my blog. So that people who are struggling know that they're not alone - even though they may feel as if they're stuck in a dark and deep pit; so that they know that it's okay to ask for help to climb out of it.

Stuff I'm Thankful For: Autumn Love

Autumn is, by far, my favourite season. 

It's a season of change, which brings me great joy and excitement!

from Tumblr!

I'm going through some MASSIVE changes in my life right now. 

I'm trying to adapt to a completely different way of life. There's just SO. MUCH to study from 2000-page books - yes, Gray's Anatomy, I'm looking at you - so many new people to meet, so much effort to preserve my previous friendships, and to get to spend time with my lovely boyfriend in my free time!

However, sometimes I feel the need to stop, look around me, and give thanks for the beauty that Autumn brings.

Here's a list of things I'm thankful for this Autumn:

- golden trees

- sunlight (we hardly got any of that this summer!)

- libraries

- being in love

- gaining my independence

- having meals with new friends

- stepping on the fallen leaves

- random acts of kindness

- cups of tea

- coffee!!!

Well, these are just a few. Eventually, more will come!

love,

Mariana

New Beginnings

Here's to new beginnings, to scary challenges and to breaking out of our safe bubble!

I'm sorry for the lack of posts through the last week, but starting college can be overwhelming - thoughts and prayers are appreciated!

Day Three: When I Grow Up

'"When I grow up I want to be...." Feel free to answer as your 5-year-old self or as of now.'

I was a dreamy 5-year-old. My dream back then was to train dolphins at the aquarium, because I loved (and still love) being around water and dolphins are cute (I know, those were really 'elaborate' arguments!). I also wanted to be an elementary school teacher because I loved bossing the other kids around and helping them with homework!

Now, at the age of eighteen, I can say a lot more about what I want to be. As I have said numerous times on this blog, I want to be a doctor. I feel called to help people, to be a healer. But there's more to it. I want to be a mom and to have a family. I want to give my contribute to society. I want to make the world a better place. I want to go on mission trips and volunteer to work as a doctor wherever I'm most needed. I want to stay involved with music in any ways I can, and to write at least one book. I want to cook and have a pet turtle.

I will fight to do it all, and I won't let nobody on earth stop me.
I will find strength in God to make a better person of myself.

One more post for the Blog-tember Challenge!

love,

Mariana

September Goals and Expectations

The month of August has flown by, and September is knocking on the door, bringing fall, college and new responsibilities my way...

but I have to embrace them and evolve, because that's just how life goes. New challenges come to defy us; friends come and go. It scares me and excites me, I go from feeling fascinated with the idea of going to college and building my own life, to sinking in the deepest funk, feeling lost and worthless.

However, I know where I want to go. I shall renew my strength and carry on, working towards my dream, God's plan for me.

So I decided to write down some goals and expectations for September:

1. To organize myself
2. To stay positive
3. To finish driver's theory
4. To be able to manage my timetable
5. To have fun with my friends until college starts, and after that, to stay in touch
6. To be consistent with the Blog-tember Challenge, a link-up hosted by Bailey Jean from Brave Love. Hopefully it will allow me to put a little bit more of myself in this blog!

Well, let's see how this goes!

What are your goals and expectations for this month?

love,

Mariana

On Coming Back

After almost three amazing weeks that I spent traveling, it's time for me to come back home and pick up my everyday life from where I'd left it!

beach in Fonte dei Marmi, Italy

It's kind of hard to leave the exciting and unpredictable traveling life and to return to the same old routine, especially when most of my friends and my boyfriend are gone on holidays. I must admit it makes me pretty anxious to make plans right now - I don't know if that's good or bad.

However, it's an amazing time for me to organize myself, a month away from starting college! That involves some shopping, working more in this blog, renewing my wardrobe (!!!) and restoring my old bike, and probably kind of a makeover... because everything is changing and so am I.

Change makes me feel extremely anxious and excited at the same time. I know I'm one step closer to my dream of becoming a doctor and saving people's lives; but, on the other hand, it means I'm about to step out of my safe bubble, my comfort zone where I kept myself throughout high school. It means that I'm going to start working harder than I ever had, being the only one responsible for myself.

I've been reading many, many blog posts and searching Pinterest for tips on surviving my first year of college, and if any of you can give me any help, please feel free to do so :)

In the next few days I will post pictures and stories of the many places I've been to!

love,

Mariana

Stuff I'm Thankful For #1

I've found that, no matter how good or bad things seem to be, there is always something to be thankful for.

(consider yourself hugged and a good day for you)

That is why I'm introducing my weekly "Stuff I'm Thankful For" section, in which I will share the moments and things I've been blessed with each week, hoping that these happy things will also bring some kind of joy to my lovely readers!

This week was a great one! Even though some of my friends were away, and the weather wasn't always great, I did a lot of fun and even important stuff.

Scared

Being on the verge of having so many enormous changes in my life isn't easy.

(School is Out by Regina Spektor) 

I'm pretty sure that most people experience this: the end of high school comes and, all of a sudden, you're an adult and have to make responsible, life-changing choices. Bam.