A Reflection
I ended up getting way off schedule with my writing over the past month or so.
Instead of trying to write this month’s post on my intended topic – which I actually do have quite a bit of stuff to think about before writing that – I think I’d rather cover some thoughts I have been having over the course of my suddenly extremely busy last few weeks.
My stress level has been up dramatically, but that includes both distress and eustress. I have been much more engaged with life, both in struggles and in delights.
A lot has been going on, and while much of the real content I would talk about goes into my personal journaling efforts, I think a good bit of my thoughts is worth sharing for the sake of possibly helping others be better versions of themselves. At worst, I can encourage others to take a moment to pause and reflect on their own experiences.
So, what has been going on?
More personal stuff aside, work has finally become a great deal more clear for me.
I joined my organization back in July and started learning different parts of the business, but did not quite figure out where I fit in through November. Then, I went to Squadron Officer School, which basically carried my attention through the holidays. Upon my return home, my organization had executed a reorganization, so my role in the organization was freshly unclear.
I found things to do, but I felt no substantial ownership. I would frequently ask how I could help, and I feel that I started trying to find problems I could actually resolve.
Through my different interactions – asking questions, learning processes, and demonstrations of my thought processes and communication skills – I eventually found myself in an interview with my boss’s boss’s boss as a candidate for executive officer.
During this meeting, I offered some of my feedback as to how things were working in the unit along with ideas shared among some of my fellow military members. Keeping it simple, we felt like we were frequently busy, but we did not feel like that meant we were necessarily being well utilized or that our busyness was inherently valuable.
I’m not saying that this discussion led to a sudden apparent urgency from my boss’s boss or my boss, but I suddenly have several clear roles to fulfill.
Whatever the cause, it’s been really nice.
I continue to work through building processes and routines for myself to assimilate this new workload into my weekly work schedule, so a lot of pop-up activities have been stymieing that progress, but overall, I remain pretty pleased with this combination of distress and eustress.
It’s nice to have clear work to set myself to task upon, but it’s also decently challenging – especially since I have at least six different “hats” I have to wear during any given week, and these hats seem to have varying priorities and demands depending on what phase of activities our overall organization is in.
Managing relationships has been a stressor I have had for years. Since moving into my professional career, friendships have transformed a lot for me. Making friends is no longer as simple as interacting with classmates, who have at least one guaranteed mutual interest. Keeping friends is no longer as simple as attending class. Until a short time ago, I never had to deal with losing a friend to suicide or other causes.
An issue I have always had is a certain intensity when interacting with others, but I’ve finally begun offering others and myself grace to be human. Where I may have demanded consistency or aspiration from others, now I am far more amenable to simply enjoying life as it is.
I continue to feel like a jerk and am still often fairly intense, but taking moments to pause and evaluate my own behavior in the midst of the day has been helpful. I have made a few friends in the office – which frankly is almost my only available source of human contact besides my wife, these days – and am even finding myself feeling generally more comfortable interacting with anyone around the office. I don’t have a sense that anything must be any particular way, so long as people seem to feel safe or like they belong; so long as people maintain a safe and welcoming environment for the team members we have.
Along with my new work “hats,” my approach to relationships has been having an excellent synergistic effect.
While I remember and grieve losses – and recognize more will come – I live forward.
I recently took my physical fitness assessment. While I had been lifting two or three times a week, playing Beat Saber, using the stationary bike at home, and playing Frisbee weekly for cardio, I was also somehow convinced that I might not be ready for that assessment.
I did just fine, which is nice.
…I still hate cardio, though.
Finally, I recently submitted my draft Officer Performance Report.
Per usual, it felt somewhat disingenuous to write out bullets, especially reflecting on my past year of work in this new organization.
First, it’s amazing that I’ve already been here an entire year. That went by extremely quickly.
Second, I scrambled to identify anything I’d done that had clear impacts, but given a bit of time to pause, I really did support quite a lot of activity going on around the office.
Third, quantifying things was a struggle, but even that turned out to be easier than initially expected on account of many people meticulously tracking many things.
I have yet to see the final product – and the Air Force is transitioning to a new online application to conduct the OPR process – but this stressful thing is becoming another feature of the past soon.
It’ll probably be nice, but we’ll see.
That’s all I’ve got for this round.
I’m just looking forward to the next week, month, year, and decade with a positive attitude…
I think that overall, it’ll all be nice.
72 Airman's Writings 
One thought on “April 2022: A Reflection”