Victory!

Today I stand strong, the hero’s light shinning from my brow.  I have reached deep, “eaten bitter” and finished Nursing School.  Nothing in my life has challenged me as nursing school has.  Readers will know that I failed the last semester and had to repeat it.  This was the first time in my life I ever failed to meet my goal.  I had no one to blame but myself.  Through this process I learned a lot about me and I had to learn to deal with failure in a way I have never had to before.  I learned that given the choice between the easy road of mediocrity and the hard road of excellence, I will choose the harder road.  Today not only did I successful complete that last semester, I received the grade of an A and got excellent reviews from my clinical instructors.  I have already been offered, and accepted, a job at a local hospital.  I feel redeemed.  I feel victorious. 

                In “A hero with a thousand faces”  by Joseph Campbell, he describes the hero’s journey.  It starts at status que, then there is the call to adventure.  Along the way the hero meets a more experienced guide who helps them.  The hero faces a serious of traps, enemies, or challenges.  Then the here will face their biggest challenge.  This then changes the hero.  The hero returns to the start with something new.  A new knowledge, magic, technology, idea…something.  Also the hero is changed.  Nursing school has been my hero’s journey.  My call was the need for financial stability, and I think the call of the goddess Bridgit and Lugh, not to mention the call of my ancestors, many of whom were healers.  I had the help of many teachers and instructors, who guided me, and armed me with information and knowledge.  I faced many challenges; tests, with questions that required multiple levels of critical thinking, difficult situations with patients and their families.  I had to confront my own fears, multiple times.  At the end, just when I thought I was going to be done, I was told that I had failed to meet the requirements of level 4 clinic.  I could have walked away at the point right there, but I was given the option to keep coming to class, so I did.  I had to learn how to deal with failure.  I learned it was much like the process of dealing with the loss of a loved one, with stages of denial, anger, bargaining, and acceptance.  At the end, I was given the opportunity to either be graduated with my class, though the instructor felt I would have a “large uphill climb” when I got into the real world; or to come back and she promised me a seat in the next semester, and come out standing on top of that hill.  I had no time to think, a decision had to be made then and there.  It was a poignant moment of my life.  You see I had a lot of pressure to be done.  My wife hates her job and was only waiting for me to finish school and start a job to quite.  My kids could use the extra income to better their lives.  To be done was so tempting.  “to hell with what the teacher says, I know what I am doing, I could be done and get a job…but what if I really don’t know what I am doing…what if I hurt someone..”  These were but a few of the thoughts and pressures going through my head in that moment.  Looking back I feel this moment was perhaps a test from the gods.  Maybe it was Lugh, maybe Brigit, maybe both, maybe none, I can’t say but I know what I choose. I choose to repeat the semester.  I choose the road of excellence.

                Today I stand strong; the hero’s light shinning from my brow.  I have reached deep, “eaten bitter” and finished nursing school.  Nothing in my life has challenged me as nursing school has. Through this process I learned a lot about myself and I had to learn to deal with failure in a way I have never had to before.  I learned that given the choice between the easy road of mediocrity and the hard road of excellence, I will choose the harder road.  Today not only did I successful complete that last semester, I received the grade of an A and got excellent reviews from my clinical instructors. I have already been offered, and accepted, a job at a local hospital.  I feel redeemed.  I feel victorious.