I gotta blog, I gotta blog, I gotta blog. Ok, whew, now that I have gotten that all out. It has been a few weeks since I have been able to blog for various urgent matters that I personally had to manage and resolve. Which leads me to this topic, interruptions…don’t you just hate those dam things!!!!
Photo Credit: Steven Ritts
Unfortunately life just happens and as much as we want to have control over our lives, there is something there that seems to take that control out. After 10 years of wondering around in the professional dessert, in the past six months, I finally decided to go find a mental compass and guide myself out to better lands. Granted, over the past 10 years I have had many great experiences and met some great people, and then of course I have really met some individuals that I’m happy to say we don’t really communicate much any more as well. I’ve had some experiences that I’d rather forget about as well. (Be honest, we all have these things in our lives!). Amazing, I look back and see all of these interruptions as part of life building me up to who I am today and moving me towards the things that I want to accomplish.
I was recently asked by a friend of mine why it has taken me so long to apply to grad school, get a certification, or do anything! Naturally, that question kind of caught me off guard and took a few moments to respond. Of course, I’m the type of person that can come up with any type of rational answer, but this question, I had to think a while for a good response that would no subject me to numerous hours of being “drilled”. For each year of delaying my return to “anything”, I have been able to supply a rational reason to why I delayed moving forward. Here is my rationale:
- Not comfortable in my own skin – I spent the first part of my life doing what everyone else thought I should do, and I forgot who I was. Discovering that took a long long time!
- Enjoy life – in an effort to get to know me, I needed to explore what I like and did not like in life and find those with similar interests. Was that ever an adventure I’d have to share later!
- Walked into reality check – I for one knew that I could not process another accounting journal entry with out loosing my mind, it was totally against my personality. I enjoyed management and leadership, but didn’t know quite what to do with them.
- Figuring out the natural me – on this journey to understand me, my strengths, my leadership skills, and to positively reinforce the things in life that seem to naturally fit. Time to start ripping myself apart (even with the help of a few pros).
- Experience in the field I wanted to study – before I run up the debt equity ratio with more college loans, I wanted to work in the field this time to confirm that it would be a worthwhile investment of my time and money; it has been very rewarding to see the positive impact that I have had on others this far in the change process. I have discovered the area of management, project management, as yes, I get board with routines! I have always been a leadership study guru, somehow I plan on mixing the two by teaching necessary skills to upcoming leaders.
- Energy – it has taken me a while to recover the lost energy from working in a field that has drained me and I needed to make sure the new field would provide me sustainable energy. No, I’m not a party animal, I just love socializing!!! (It pays back that people deficit).
- Networking – when I looked at the people that were around me, I naturally found that networking with those in this new field came naturally, unlike my last one, and has been a great source of support in my transition.
- Finding a program path – for the past several months, I have evaluated what path would best assist me in accomplishing my final goal, I’m creating my own towards leadership studies.
- Courage and Change – the best way to make change in your life, teach a class about change; obviously, it took me four years to get over a fear of leading a group discussion, now it is one of my better strong points!
- Cost-benefit analysis intersecting at frustration and boredom – I believe that every person has a frustration/boredom threshold limit and until that limit is reached, change will not occur; after 5 years of this, I finally reached that point!
Finally, 10 years later, I’m on the right freeway that I should have taken 14 years ago. If it has taken you several years to return to school for an advance degree, please share as to why you have also waited many years to accomplish this goal!
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