Peace

After a long day of classes, a headache, case prep (3 cases worth and a billion pages of reading), a company briefing that went way too long, a hurriedly scarfed down supper and then learning team, I came home to print something off and walked back to school. My hope was that the piano room would be empty, leaving me the opportunity to do something that completely refreshes me - make music. As luck (or splendid planning!) would have it, the room was empty. I guess that's probably a safe guess for 10:30 at night.

After spending half an hour playing the piano and singing, I feel at peace and completely refreshed. It's amazing how much I crave playing when I am not around a piano often enough. I've determined that I have to figure out a way to bring my guitar back with me at Christmas.

Many people think I'm crazy when I tell them I take one day off a week. But what I have discovered is that those times of rest are vital in a busy schedule. Taking half an hour to play the piano when I could be prepping the cases for Wednesday is actually the best use of my time. I've found that going to bed by midnight every night does more for class participation than staying up an extra hour or two to review.

I know I've blogged about this before, but I'm learning how incredibly important it is. There is a lot of discussion about choosing a career and having work/life balance. What I'm finding is that you can make time for that renewal and refreshment no matter your schedule. The times that you go hard are the times when the end is in sight. When you've got 4 months between August and December with very few breaks, you can't afford to run yourself ragged every day and every week. Of course, all this said, I have a big list of things I am planning to do next week during my free evenings that should have been done throughout the quarter. Oh well... you can't win 'em all.