L and I no longer celebrate New Years Eve, the abridged reason is I can't be bothered and L just wants spring to arrive. He would rather we went straight to summer but he acknowledges there is a natural order to these things.
Every year as New Year's Eve approaches I start thinking about all the things I am resolved to do - chiefly what I want to achieve and this year was no different. My birthday, on the 29th, was hardly over before I was looking to the new year and creating a 'to do' list: 1) get a teaching job, 2) regularly earn money, 3) lose 10 lbs, 4) stop stressing so much, 5) stop living so much 'in my head', 6) stop being sensitive, 7) stop comparing myself and my achievements to others, 8) stop doubting myself, 9) stop letting fear govern me....I couldn't stop thinking and listing.
Was it any wonder I felt stressed?...Not really. I'd like to say I then resolved NOT to have any New Year's resolutions, to just let go and see what the year was going to bring me but I didn't.
A new year represents both everything and nothing, everything because EVERYTHING is possible and nothing because NOTHING is yet known: it has yet to be experienced.
Showing posts with label challenges. Show all posts
Showing posts with label challenges. Show all posts
Sunday, 5 January 2014
Wednesday, 9 November 2011
Every Day is a New Day
I've been working as a Learning and Teaching Assistant in a secondary school for just over a month now, for 3 weeks of those I had about 8 pupils to help. Then two weeks ago they gave me solely to a year 9 boy, a very difficult pupil. In fact I've been informed that he is 'one of the hardest and most troubled pupils, if not THE hardest and most troubled pupil' in the school...
He has a range of problems from Attachment Disorder, to ADHD and has had the worst possible start in life.
It breaks my heart to think of all that his has suffered in his young life and to know so many adults have just written him off.
He frustrates me, he stresses me out, he challenges me, he ignores me, he runs away from me (frequently), he is stroppy to me, he is sulky and sullen, he is unfathomable, he tests my patience...so I know how they feel.
What works one moment won't the next. There are times when I feel like I am at a complete loss and I'm failing him by not being able to think of ways of getting through to him or talking him round. I feel useless, deflated, frustrated and exhausted. I'm ashamed to admit that at times like this I think longingly of the 'good boys' that used to work with, especially when one of his class mates asks me to sit next to and help them or I pass them in the corridor and they ask why I'm not with them any more.
Yet every day I still go back and I still want to teach...I tell myself that every day is a new day.
He has a range of problems from Attachment Disorder, to ADHD and has had the worst possible start in life.
It breaks my heart to think of all that his has suffered in his young life and to know so many adults have just written him off.
He frustrates me, he stresses me out, he challenges me, he ignores me, he runs away from me (frequently), he is stroppy to me, he is sulky and sullen, he is unfathomable, he tests my patience...so I know how they feel.
What works one moment won't the next. There are times when I feel like I am at a complete loss and I'm failing him by not being able to think of ways of getting through to him or talking him round. I feel useless, deflated, frustrated and exhausted. I'm ashamed to admit that at times like this I think longingly of the 'good boys' that used to work with, especially when one of his class mates asks me to sit next to and help them or I pass them in the corridor and they ask why I'm not with them any more.
Yet every day I still go back and I still want to teach...I tell myself that every day is a new day.
Tuesday, 23 November 2010
Someone want to help me up here?...
Rejection of any kind, in any circumstance, is always a challenge to deal with.
Picking yourself up can be more challenging though.
I applied for a job as an Admin Assistant for a private medical group.
Had the telephone interview, during which I was really nervous to the point of being guilty of all the usual things; getting a little tongue tied, rambling a little, going off on a tangent and may be once forgetting what point I was trying to make.
BUT...they were however, impressed enough to offer me a face-to-face (I know I'm surprised too!)
The face-to-face interview was...different. My interviewer was running half hour late, personally I dis-like lateness because I believe it equates to tardiness, however that is usually a rule I apply to interviwees (yeah, yeah I know strict and harsh). Then she made me go through my CV BACKWARDS, as in EVERYTHING that I've done from the age of 18 - 32.
Any one who knows me knows that I have an extraordinary memory, I can remember being in the pram, I can remember precise and very fine details of just about...the oddest things. No short term memory but I have been drunk once or twice (okay ALOT) and I did used to smoke weed - yes this intense control freak, who needs 8 hours sleep a night not to wake up grumpy and with the immune system of a butterfly used, that is USED, to be a bit of a wild child. You can stop laughing, I don't think its that funny or far fetched.
Hhhmm it seems I have the attention span of a butterfly as well as it's immune system. Noted but moving on...
...so this reciting of everything I've done wasn't a challenge in any way, shape or form. I was in there for the better part of an hour and it went well. It wasn't great but it did go well. I liked my interviewer, she struck me as a 'take no prisoner' type of woman; focused, driven, firm but fair up to the point she fells like you have tried to abuse her trust and then its a case of humbly apologise profusely and then hide. Don't draw attention to yourself, keep your head down and work your butt off to regain what you so carelessly trashed. Can't argue or find fault in that.
They were meant to call me Friday to let me know. Friday came and went... and nothing. Maybe instinctively I knew this was a bad thing because suddenly getting it/not getting it didn't matter so much. I was okay with 'what will be, will be' and had accepted that the world wouldn't end.
I chilled out with friends over the weekend and put it out of my mind. Stressing about it and worrying wasn't going to achieve anything, so what was the point?
Monday came...and again nothing. Then this morning I checked and I had an email...I didn't get the job.
Am I gutted?...Well, yeah I am for a myriad of reasons. I did truly think I would be good at it and that they would soon see how much of an asset I am. I'm a really hard worker, I like challenges and I like to roll my sleeves up and get stuck in. I like organising, I like feeling like I am on top of things, I like pre-empting other people's needs, not to please but because I think it shows my ability to think well on my feet and because it shouts perfection to me (yes I have serious control issues). But mostly I'm gutted because my confidence needed this job more than my ego.
Things have been tough and I just needed a little boost. I needed to regain a little faith in myself and my capabilities and my worth. So yes I am gutted.
And I am trying not to let it knock me off my feet so I don't have to pick myself up. Again.
Picking yourself up can be more challenging though.
I applied for a job as an Admin Assistant for a private medical group.
Had the telephone interview, during which I was really nervous to the point of being guilty of all the usual things; getting a little tongue tied, rambling a little, going off on a tangent and may be once forgetting what point I was trying to make.
BUT...they were however, impressed enough to offer me a face-to-face (I know I'm surprised too!)
The face-to-face interview was...different. My interviewer was running half hour late, personally I dis-like lateness because I believe it equates to tardiness, however that is usually a rule I apply to interviwees (yeah, yeah I know strict and harsh). Then she made me go through my CV BACKWARDS, as in EVERYTHING that I've done from the age of 18 - 32.
Any one who knows me knows that I have an extraordinary memory, I can remember being in the pram, I can remember precise and very fine details of just about...the oddest things. No short term memory but I have been drunk once or twice (okay ALOT) and I did used to smoke weed - yes this intense control freak, who needs 8 hours sleep a night not to wake up grumpy and with the immune system of a butterfly used, that is USED, to be a bit of a wild child. You can stop laughing, I don't think its that funny or far fetched.
Hhhmm it seems I have the attention span of a butterfly as well as it's immune system. Noted but moving on...
...so this reciting of everything I've done wasn't a challenge in any way, shape or form. I was in there for the better part of an hour and it went well. It wasn't great but it did go well. I liked my interviewer, she struck me as a 'take no prisoner' type of woman; focused, driven, firm but fair up to the point she fells like you have tried to abuse her trust and then its a case of humbly apologise profusely and then hide. Don't draw attention to yourself, keep your head down and work your butt off to regain what you so carelessly trashed. Can't argue or find fault in that.
They were meant to call me Friday to let me know. Friday came and went... and nothing. Maybe instinctively I knew this was a bad thing because suddenly getting it/not getting it didn't matter so much. I was okay with 'what will be, will be' and had accepted that the world wouldn't end.
I chilled out with friends over the weekend and put it out of my mind. Stressing about it and worrying wasn't going to achieve anything, so what was the point?
Monday came...and again nothing. Then this morning I checked and I had an email...I didn't get the job.
Am I gutted?...Well, yeah I am for a myriad of reasons. I did truly think I would be good at it and that they would soon see how much of an asset I am. I'm a really hard worker, I like challenges and I like to roll my sleeves up and get stuck in. I like organising, I like feeling like I am on top of things, I like pre-empting other people's needs, not to please but because I think it shows my ability to think well on my feet and because it shouts perfection to me (yes I have serious control issues). But mostly I'm gutted because my confidence needed this job more than my ego.
Things have been tough and I just needed a little boost. I needed to regain a little faith in myself and my capabilities and my worth. So yes I am gutted.
And I am trying not to let it knock me off my feet so I don't have to pick myself up. Again.
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