Summertime!

Woo! Life sure moves along :) It's exhausting and wonderful :)

I have a new job! (Internship.)

I'm interning at a residential treatment center and I'm amazed.

The students here have been through hard things, and they are working on making hard changes.

They are in an environment specifically designed to help them understand themselves better and recognize changes they need to make. WOW!

Really, we are all in such an environment. It is just usually more subtle. Feedback and consequences in the "real world" aren't always consistent or obvious.

Watching the students look at their issues makes me really think about how I react...to everything. To other people, to myself, to everyday situations.
When something isn't going how I would like it to (whether because I'm not acting correctly or because the details around me aren't ideal), what do I think/feel/do?

Withdraw? Shut down and think it isn't worth it to work through the situation? Smile and nod but seethe inside? Feel frustrated but decide to make that hard, good choices? Take my feelings out on others? Choose to look at what I can change about what is going on? Hmm!

I am so impressed by people. People go through rough stuff! But we can do it! That is why we are here--refine ourselves and love others. Awesome :)

:)