My first year

My first year on the job was an experience I wouldn't repeat.  I just wouldn't.  It was a good thing I truly didn't understand what I was getting myself into, otherwise I probably wouldn't have started down this path I'm now on. 

I was way over my head in every aspect and yet I came through the other side.  I was starting a program from scratch with the little knowledge of it coming from a chapter I read in college and a small paragraph I got from my boss of a brief outline of what the program would look like.  I had little to no guidance through out the year.  It surprised me that any progress was made.  I stayed hours after everyone went home to just avoid complete drowning, I was in no way getting ahead.  It was this year that I learned that if I ever hoped to get ahead or at least on the ball I needed to become organized which when I started the year was not a skill I had.  I also learned that I had to learn from my mistakes if I had any hope from improving and there were many, so I learned a lot.  I didn't and still don't know if other jobs were like this.  This was my first serious job and when I agreed  I knew the first year would be hard so I promised myself to give it three years before I made the decision of continuing on or moving on.  Wouldn't you know after my third year I didn't return.

What I do is intense, it's never boring.  No two days are the same.  It's always changing, just as you getting the hang of something it's replaced with something new and better (supposedly).  You get critiqued constantly.  What I do is never good enough, because if I've met a goal the bar is raised.  I'm on a time crunch.  You have things thrown at you, I'm talking actual things.  There are 20 things at least going on at once and that's on a easy day.  You handel various emotions all at once, all day long.  You must be flexible, because the day changes and you've got to roll with it.  You have to be consistent, comforting, strict, confident, demanding, sociable, etc.  I'm all those things or can fake fairly well, but at the end of the day I'm exhausted.