A learning experience

I truly believe that learning experiences can help in defining you as a person. They are both rewarding and frustrating at the same time. They can break you down then turn around and build you up in the same setting. It's interesting how people handle learning experiences. By definition, they are just that "an experience where you learn something new or something different." How you handle your learning experience is your choice.

That being said, I welcome learning experiences for the most part. I know I am far from "knowing it all" and I like to learn different things. Being as though I'm very impatient I like to learn them yesterday as opposed to a natural learning curve. In fact, I'm very hard on myself if I'm taught something one day and I can't nail it the next day. It's like I'm disappointed if I'm not great at it right off the bat.

I had to give two presentations at work yesterday and the first one sucked more than the second, nonetheless, they were both pretty pathetic. Granted, it's new material for me at work, but I have been doing presentations for my company for about 15 months. I just froze up, I didn't have answers for questions and my speech was rapid and my thoughts disorganized. I am laughing now as I recall the presentation.

So I will chalk it up to a learning experience and attempt to do better the next time. The good news for me is the next time is tomorrow. This brings me to one of my favorite quotes my baseball player Mo Vaughn, "Pressure comes from fear, and fear comes from no preparation." That quote speaks volumes and so tonight I will prepare as well as I can!

Wish me luck!

My Chi Town Pad

I happen to be in my favorite city this week for work. I arrived in Chicago this afternoon feeling both excited to be returning to this city and anxious about the massive amount of work to come. All in all, the good definitely outweighs the bad.

I am staying at a different hotel that doubles as apartments that can be leased on a month to month basis. It's odd but in staying here, I feel as though this is my apartment in the city. Since I have been coming here for work I have envisioned myself having a condo here. I could honestly see myself living in this city and embracing the Chicago Lifestyle. Chicago is addicting, the magnificent mile is inspiring, and the hustle and bustle of city life is enticing.

So for this week, I will pretend I am a resident of downtown Chicago and all that goes with it. I realize this thinking is juvenile and silly but dreams have to have a starting point, right??

So I will continue to play the dream in my head and eventually these dreams will turn to reality. We will see how things play out, and time will tell what story will come next.

Enjoy your view, I certainly am!

"Making Mountains out of Mole Hills"

Bill always tells me, "Autumn, you make mountains out of mole hills." I think the statement is always so funny because I over analyze everything and stress and worry about everything. On the contrary, he doesn't analyze, stress, or worry about anything. That's why we are a good match. I'm sure a good portion of him thinks that things will be fine because I will take care of it and I usually do (whether I want to or not!) He also takes care of me which is really important.

I want to get the chores done in 1 or 2 days, he says "they can wait." I have a never ending list of things I need to get done on my days off and he prefers watching tv or college football on his day off. I worry about how much money we have, how much money we spend, and what bills are due when. I budget everything. He has money, he will spend all of it, period. He doesn't worry about about budgets or expenses. I truly believe he feels being the "banker" is my job and I willingly accept it.

He's handy, I'm not. I worry if something breaks how we will fix it? He says, "don't worry I will fix it, don't make mountains out of mole hills." He thinks I stress too much about everything and wonders why the hell I can't "slow down." He wonders why I work so much and why I just can't relax and lay down when we're at home watching tv. I don't know we are just so different we are alike and it's great.

It's both interesting and frustrating to see how we handle different things on different levels. Differences aside, we do have a lot of fun together.

Variety is the spice of life.