Love it or hate it

I remembered back to my days as a Year 10 student on work experience, when my "employer" said to me, "With this, you either love it or hate it. It's very difficult to do it day in and day out dreading to go to work".

I have to admit it has been a whirlwind of a first month at my new job and I can only see it getting a harder rather than easier. The problem with each day is that it is rather full on and time management is critical - I barely have enough down time or personal time. Perhaps it is trying to get up to speed with everything which has been happening.

A typical day would be between 7:45am to 6pm. Those around me would be able to attest to me being traditionally a late night person (playing computer games until 7am and then going to work anyone?) rather than an early riser, but in order to get on top of things, I have had to adapt to very different working hours than before. The problem is that once I have trained myself to get up early I find it difficult to sleep in on the weekends so now I am nodding off at 10pm (I have now earned a "grandpa" status).

Furthermore, the day is so jam packed with activities and interruptions that I hardly have time to do anything or concentrate on the things which I need to get done (which is a sure source of frustration). I admit that I have been struggling to catch up with all the readings I need to do.

On the flip side, there have been some real positives with this transition.

It was great to get to know the team last week. Although I was only in Chicago for three days it was a great team bonding exercise as well as a great way to put a face to the email address. Only sour point of the trip was that our bags arrive a day after we did, but luckily it was on the way home.

Meeting new people has always been a rather daunting task for me (being an introvert). However, it is something I have been doing rather regularly over the past month and it has been quite a challenge trying to remember people's names. One of the most interesting persons I have met over the last month was on the plane from Sydney to L.A. (He was previously a criminal lawyer in Melbourne before moving on to the pub industry which were later sold off to a large brewery. He moved back into pubs, but in regional area, and is now in the film industry - I believe that he worked with Mel Gibson on The Passion of Christ. Talk about a career change!).

Being more of a fence sitter, I think that it is forcing me to become more decisive - hard to believe, I know.

It's also strange to see things which I learnt being applied (since I have not applied much of my schooling to my job). However, I can really see how applicable my uni and post graduate studies have been. I think it's time to dig out some notes!

This week I had orientation and meeting people around the organisation has really been quite interesting and inspirational in terms of their passion. My only fear is that six months later, will the gloss wear off and I can't stand waking up early and going to work? Who knows?

But for the moment, to quote a famous phrase, "i'm lovin' it"