good week

​Ciao famiglia! This has been a good last week. My performance of Joseph Smith's First Prayer went well. I was so grateful for that opportunity to perform again. Also, today in the temple I saw Dallyn Bayles and was actually smart enough to shake his hand. Haha 

This past week we had TRC and we got to teach an actual guy from Italy over Skype!! I LOVE Italians!! I could not stop smiling during our lesson. Haha Our only Italian challenge didn't not last the whole six days sad to say. Haha after the first day it was pretty miserable. We definitely made an extra effort to speak in Italian for the week though and it helped our Italian so much! 

I've thought a lot about trials lately. During the MTC there's been difficult times, but I've tried my best to rely on God and they've turned into amazing learning experiences. One night last week after a harder day I just sat in my dorm thinking. As I sat there, to my surprise I didn't feel frustrated, stressed, or tired like I had early that day. Instead I just felt happy and grateful. It was a weird feeling, but honestly I just sat there and thought how cool it was that even though there had been hard things in my day, I had turned to God, and I felt so good now! That night, I didn't feel like praying that my trials the next day would be easier. I just wanted to pray that the next day when trials came, I would rely on the enabling power of the Atonement and that I could feel this cool again! Fast forward several days, there was a morning where we were stressed becuase we didnt have very much time to plan a lesson and for some reason me and my companion were just not on the same page. We needed the spirit to be with us before we moved on so we decided to just stop and pray. I started praying by naming off things I was grateful for. I started to say a phrase I had said so automatically in other prayers. It was, "Thank you for the opportunity to serve a mission." This time, however, I paused. It was a very real moment as i just sat there and thought. Why was a grateful? Was I really actually grateful? Why would I be grateful right now when things were stressful and not necessarily happy? As I thought, I knew the answer. I was grateful for this opportunity to learn and come closer to the Savior. That IS something great and that IS something to be happy about. After that, I prayed with total sincerity as I thanked God for this opportunity. I'm so thankful for trials and how they help me grow. I am so excited to share that knowledge with the people of Italy in less than one week!! 

I love you all so much! Thank you all for what you have done to help me grow and be better. Anziano Stucki.