Hello, gorgeous. 

Today, I’m recapping my ~ Summer of Bogs ~ European adventure. With just a carry-on, I visited four countries and six cities over the course of a month - and Eat-Pray-Loved my way through it all. 

This trip allowed me to live out the Brightsiding philosophy in real time - embracing what was right in front of me and being fully present to a broad spectrum of emotions and experiences. They say that “wherever you go, that’s where you are,” which I indeed found to be true. If I took anything from this trip, it was the gift of some deeply profound time with myself to reflect on where I’ve been and where I’m going. 

I’m back in New York now, with no plans to leave anytime soon. If you’re in the city, hit me up! I’m reintegrating into my new routine and totally up for any and all coffee dates, walks, workout classes, etc. 

In today’s newsletter, I’m breaking down the Eat, Pray, Love highlights - but don’t forget to tune into this newsletter’s accompanying podcast episode, where I spill ALLLL the tea on the highs, lows, and in-betweens of my adventure. 

XOXO, Bogs

First of all, the itinerary: 

Mel and Louis' wedding in Northern England brought me out for this big Eurotrip—if not for them, this whole adventure wouldn’t have even happened. During the week of downtime I had in between seeing Taylor Swift and heading out for this journey, I thought to myself, “what if I just stay out there?” and, well, that’s what I did. 

Aside from intentions to visit Daniela in A Coruña for San Xoán, I didn’t have much of a plan for after the nuptials, so every subsequent destination was planned in near real-time. The only thing I did know as I headed out to the wedding was that I wasn’t getting on my return flight. 

When I was in Spain, a friend-of-a-friend-of-my-brothers' Paris apartment fell into my lap, so that decided my next destination. Ally and I had been scheming on a summer adventure, too, so once I figured out my Paris plans, we looked into a few spots in the South of France and ultimately landed on Marseille (about a three-hour train ride from Paris). After 5 glorious days in Marseille, I went back to Paris for a night, then flew to Rome for about two and a half days before finally heading home to New York on July 10th. 

It was my full intention to fly home from Paris after Marseille, but tickets back to New York were OUTRAGEOUS (no, really, outrageous). Tickets were much more reasonable from Rome (I flew Norse, would recommend!) which had always been at the top of my travel list, and it ended up being a pretty perfect place to wind down the adventure. 

The trip unfolded in a way where I was alone for about half of it, in between adventures with friends. It was a great balance.

This time was, in a word, sacred. Leaving Google was the biggest trust fall I’ve ever taken in my life, and giving myself the gift of this time to embrace my freedom felt like the most radical thing I could do. I did some writing, but the trip was mostly about fun for the sake of having fun. 

Giving myself the space to breathe before pumping oxygen into full-time Brightsiding was a privilege and an honor and it’s not lost on me how truly lucky I am. 

Now let’s get into the Eat, Pray, Love of it all, shall we? 

EAT 

My relationship with food is simple. Growing up, my mom’s MO when it came to dinner (like most things in life) was keep it simple. Lots of rotisserie chicken + cous cous, chicken parm, chili; meals that were unfussy but delicious and filling. It’s my theory that because of this, my palette is quite uncomplicated. 

Don't get me wrong, I have an appropriate appreciation for fine dining and love to frequent gems in my neighborhood like Cervos and Corner Bar. Still, I’ll never be the one in the friend group who’s up to date on the latest hot restaurants or inviting you over to test a recipe with niche seasonal produce (although I do romanticize that lifestyle). 

My dream meal is a ham and cheese baguette—bonus points if I’m eating it on the beach. Maybe some fancy chips, but Pringles are fine, too. Add a cold glass of white wine and I’m in heaven. 

So, for the most part, that is the type of food I pursued while traveling. One of the main benefits of solo travel?? You can eat what you want, when you want, and don’t have to cater to anyone else. 

Thankfully my friends are extremely plugged in, and I follow enough blogs (yes, blogs) to turn to for recommendations when needed. So when I was in the mood for a nice restaurant experience, I’d dutifully scour the generously shared Google maps that had been sent my way, or check out where Cup of Jo had eaten in Paris, or what the roundups on Pike were saying. This strategy worked incredibly well! 

On the parts of this trip where I was alone (about 50% of the time), I enjoyed simple pleasures, ate when I was hungry, and didn’t overthink it. In Rome, I ate prosciutto and melon twice a day just because I could! When I was with friends, we mostly went with the flow, deploying a similar recommendation-filtering system or pursuing spots with excellent vibes as we walked. 

I did make it a point to enjoy local delicacies (I’ll try anything once), the standouts of which were in A Coruna. I ate sardines roasted on the street at the Festival de San Xoán at midnight, and octopus prepared with olive oil and salt, eaten with toothpicks and washed down with a cold Estrella. I could easily enjoy a lifetime of a northwestern Spanish diet. 

My restaurant highlights were: 

• London: Manteca 

• Paris: Mamiche, Chez Janou, Frequence for nightcap, Deux Magots 

• Marseille: Epicerie L’Ideal, La Mercerie 

• Rome: Sora Margarita

I came back well-fed and sad to leave behind my mid-day Aperol spritz lifestyle. 

PRAY

If you’ve been around long enough, by now you know I’m a deeply spiritual person who believes in magic with every fiber of my being. So it should come as no surprise that the trip was loaded with spiritual and religious experiences. Some by design, others by complete surprise. 

A big intention for me going into the trip was to open up—meaning—feel my feelings in real-time instead of intellectualizing them, which really started to happen on the second leg of the trip in Spain. The first thing Daniela and I did when I landed in Santiago de Compostela was go to the Cathedral de Santiago, where I got on my honest-to-god knees and prayed to Saint James to help me do just that. 

LITERALLY, you guys, as I was solemnly swearing to do whatever I had to do to open up my little heart, the choir started to sing Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen. Instant tears. Guess Saint James heard me. 

It was extremely moving to be at that cathedral because it’s the final stop on the Camino De Santiago, an incredibly arduous religious pilgrimage thousands of people do yearly. Being around all these pilgrims who had just completed such a monumental journey was extremely profound. Although I hadn’t completed the pilgrimage myself, I couldn’t help but think of my journey up until this point as a pilgrimage in its own rite; leaving my job, trust-falling into Brightsiding full time, giving myself the (maybe financially irresponsible) gift of a month in Europe … it was a moment of deep reflection for me, which bled into the rest of my time in the Galicia region. That part of Spain was unlike anywhere else I’d been, and I was so moved by the architecture and moody weather. Daniela describes it as the “Forks of Spain” (for any fellow Twi-hards), and I couldn’t agree more. 

Paris, in general, was a religious experience, too. I went to Paris on my own, and after having been with friends for two weeks prior, I was quite lonely and in a bit of a come-down (which I talk about in this episode of the podcast). 

I’m used to spending time with myself, trust me, I’ve had plenty of time to practice that in the past three+ years of living alone. But this part of the trip hit me with a wave of feelings that I’d been avoiding up until that point … fear of the future, the discomfort of the transition into this next chapter, some major imposter syndrome … super fun! I’m also constantly haunted by the scene in Frances Ha when she goes to Paris for no reason, and I was like, OH MY GOD IS THIS MY FRANCES HA MOMENT? 

In the spirit of Brightsiding, though, I did the only thing I could do in that moment: surrender my experience to the universe. After years of this practice, by now I know that “the only way out is through,” so I just had to let it happen. I let myself feel it all, I slept, and took long walks. Paris is a pretty good backdrop for an existential crisis, I can tell you that. 

To curb my loneliness, I threw up a “who’s in Paris?” story on Instagram, and ended up having some incredible company. I met up with some old friends that I’d studied abroad with in Dublin (Louis, Rory, Paul, you were godsends!), my hair stylist/guru Brianne connected me with her best friend Jordan (who showed me an incredible restaurant called Juggad and shared his amazing life story), and I even made a new friend while eating alone one night at Deux Magots. I was eating outside on my last night in town when a fellow American girl (hi Courtney!) landed at the table next to me - we quickly bonded over our improbably similar circumstances; she’d also just left her job and was traveling in Europe for a month. 

This all to say - the power of connection is REAL! And the power of the internet, as much as we all love to hate it, is REAL. Embracing that is spiritual in it’s own regard! 

The spiritual experiences kept on rolling when I got to Rome; nothing could have prepared me for seeing the Vatican. Standing inside the Sistine Chapel, looking up at Michaelangelo’s frescos … it moved me to tears. I emphatically squeezed the hand of my high school self who hadn’t yet learned to dream big enough to imagine seeing that in person one day, and sat in awe + wonder. 

That night, I watched Roman Holiday (because of course), and decided my last great spiritual act of the trip would be cutting my hair just like Audrey Hepburn did. I found a stylist named Leonardo who had an appointment right before my flight, and I said perfect, and sent it on a brand-new look (bangs and all!). Let me tell you … the power of a fresh, dramatic hair cut cannot be understated. 

On my last day in Rome I called my mom in tears, overwhelmed with gratitude for my time in Europe and facing the bittersweet reality that the time was winding down. It felt like the end of summer camp; after meandering weeks and long summer days, everything was ending so abruptly. 

LOVE

Reader, I kissed some boys on this trip. That’s all I’m going to say about that. ;) 

But considering love from a broader, more expansive perspective, the trip was supercharged. From celebrating Mel & Louis’ magical wedding to seeing the home of one of my best friends to spending sacred time with myself in enchanting cities to traveling with Ally (my first roommate in New York turned sister/eternal emergency contact), to striking up conversations with strangers … the love was felt one hundredfold. 

I was also giving MYSELF a lot of love on this trip. I’m so proud of how good my relationship with myself has gotten over the years - and during the time I was flying solo on this adventure, as lonely as it was sometimes, I was fully “on my own team” and never beating myself up for feeling any kinda way.

Some of the other things that were happening behind the scenes were the To Be Magnetic Summer Challenge, which was amazingggg (more on that in a future newsletter) - it provided some great structure for reflection and journal prompts that had me digging deep. On days that I needed to get back into my body, I reached for my trust Melissa Wood Health workouts, which never fail to turn my day around.

The REAL-LIFE Moments

No trip would be complete without its hiccups, and trust me, I experienced plenty on this trip. In the spirit of Brightsiding, I invited them in when they happened with as much grace and laughter as I could and righteous fist-shaking when necessary. 

Some of the lowlights include a random fee on a car I rented, sleeping through a tour of L’Orangerie in Paris, and missing a catamaran trip that Ally & I had already paid for (that one was on us … we stayed out until 4 am). I missed my original flight out of Paris and almost had a full-on mental breakdown while wheeling my suitcase through the ANCIENT, rickety-ass streets of Rome trying to find my Airbnb. I bought too much French skincare that I didn’t need, made some stupid packing decisions (why did I bring four notebooks?), and, as mentioned, weathered a few existential crises. Oh, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the BIBLICAL amount of bird shit I came home to clean up on my patio in New York, lol.

All of these seem like fair prices to pay for a summer I will never forget, and, in true Brightsiding fashion, I didn’t let any of it stop me from being fully present to the adventure at hand. 

WHAT NOW?

Now, my friends, it’s time to get to work. For real, lol. 

It’s time to roll my sleeves up and book some corporate clients for the fall (if you have an offsite coming up, I’d love to chat!), and infuse the magic of this trip into some Brightsiding plans. 

CIAO BELLA, 

Bogs 

Oh man. Something random that I’m coveting is this small filing cabinet (in yellow!) from The Container Store. I have the big one, and it needs a sister!!!