Time to Breathe

"There is more to life than increasing its speed." - Mohandas K. Gandhi

From my last The Real World post, you can tell that work has been absoultely insane (although at the end of the day, always gratifying). A normal day is busy with always one more patient waiting for a bed, a bad day is crazy busy with ten more patients already being treated in the hallway. I had a friend from another hospital tell me she had a bad day because she had one difficult patient, and I wanted to tell her, "Just one? Wow, lucky!"

In times like these, it's always important to remember to take two deep breaths and make some time for yourself. Last week, I bought two books to read: Chicken Soup for the Nurse's Soul (101 Stories to Celebrate, Honor and Inspire the Nursing Profession) by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Nancy Mitchell Autio & LeAnn Thieman (2001) and The Everything New Nurse Book: Gain Confidence, Manage Your Schedule, And Deal With the Unexpected by Kathy Quan (2006).

You can find The Everything New Nurse Book for $3.74 plus shipping on Amazon. Personally, reading the book so far, there is nothing new that I didn't learn in nursing school or that I wouldn't have to learn on the floor myself. For example, Quan talks about time management or handling nursing politics, which I've always known I would have to work on even in nursing school, but those kind of things you'll only figure out once you're actually doing it yourself, no matter what other people tell you. I did really like her explanation on the nursing shortage and baby boomers, and yet there's still no available nursing jobs for the new grad at the moment--something I never fully understood before. Hopefully she has a couple more good spiels in the book, but I suppose overall, it's still good reiteration on all the points a new nurse should remember before starting a new job.

Chicken Soup for the Nurse's Soul can be found on Amazon for $9.85. So far, it is definitely a great buy with great content -- a mix of stories, quotes and comics that can make you laugh, make you cry, or inspire you. I love it! I don't know any nurse that wouldn't. I want to buy one for all my nursing friends on their birthdays now or leave it at the break room for everyone at work when I'm done. They are short stories too, so I can just take a 5 minute break and have something to read, or read several stories at a time.

What are you doing to make time for yourself?