Regaining Some Perspective

It's easy to loose sight of why you're going through the drudgery that one encounters in nursing school. I'm only three weeks into the new semester and I've been bitching up a storm already about curriculum and confusing expectations, tediousness, common sense material thrown in our faces over and over again, and worst of all asinine test questions asked in order to test our "critical thinking." I've been really disappointed in my nursing program so far and pondering if maybe I should have gone to medical school instead.

With all that being said, I have realized that I forgot why I'm going to nursing school in the first place. I have overlooked all of the sacrifices, tens of thousands of dollars, and hours spent studying in order to achieve my dream. I ignored the fact that thousands of men and women would trade places with me in a minute just to have a space in a nursing program. I forgot just how long, really a lifetime, that I have waited for this opportunity, and here I am bitching about it.

I'm an excellent bitcher. Really if there was a Nobel Prize for complaining I would surely get it. In a way complaining is my way of understanding what's going on in the world around me. I need to bounce concerns off others, get their input. Sometimes just hearing myself talk about something hlps me to process what's going on and how I feel about it. But it's a shame, a sin really, to have let my bitching get so out of control that I started taking this opportunity, the opportunity to get my nursing degree, seem more like a pain in the ass than a blessing.

A weird happenstance made me turn it all around. I go to allnurses.com a lot. It's this really great forum for nursing students and nurses from all around the country to talk with one another, get support from one another, and bounce ideas off of each other. Sometimes when I'm bored I go there and read what people are saying. I found myself in the Flight Nurse portal, because Flight Nursing is always something I have been interested in. There was this thread with amazing flight nurse stories. And reading these people's stories of what has happened on their shifts just brought it all home for me. There were these unbelievable stories that helped me reclaim my passion for the nursing profession. It was like the swift kick in the ass and attitude adjustment that I needed, all in one.

Nursing is something that I have such an intense passion for. It's indescribable really. I feel blessed to have found something in my life that I love so much. But it is so easy to get caught up in the doldrums of every day nursing school, and to get so frustrated with nursing school bureaucracy to forget what the big picture is. So today, I am so incredibly happy to have found this gift that those flight nurses gave me. I know the tedium and many frustrations that I will encounter in nursing school will challenge me to not take for granted this amazing opportunity. I need to, nay I must, not forget why I'm here, why I so badly want to be a nurse. This was a significant lesson for me. Maybe it's time to grow up a little in this aspect and learn that complaining isn't all it's cracked up to be, that being grateful and mindful is a much more powerful way to live one's life and pursue one's dreams.