Friday, March 18, 2011

Bloggers on Strike?

I think all my blog friends are on strike! All the blogers I follow have been MIA. Not that I can say too much, since I have post what, three times all year? At any rate you are all missed!

Monday, March 7, 2011

Gut Feelings


The morning of January 13 I woke up feeling like my life was about to change. I just had this feeling that something big was about to happen. I, of course, knew what I wanted that big something to be. I had a feeling about a person in my life and was just certain that person was involved in this feeling of change.

Well I was wrong, at least about what I thought I was having a feeling about. However the feeling was still there and very strong.

I get these feelings from time to time. For a long time when I didn't like what the feeling was telling me I would ignore it. In the end, however, that feeling would always end up being true. After a few really big things happening that seemed awful at the time turned out to be the best things that have happened to me.

What I was right about is that my life was about to change. Five days after that I started my program development class. That same day I went to a Chamber of Commerce meeting. In the class we have a group project that involves us writing basically a proposal to start a program. I emailed the professor and have opted out of the "group" part and am writing it by myself. In reality it's not that big of a deal, one 12-15 page paper and one 10-12 page paper, but I have taken it upon myself. Overall for what I want to do with my life it is going to be better for me to complete this by myself. It is also going to set me up to have the proposal for my non profit ready to go at the end of the semester.

The last two weekends I have been in Tulsa taking a grant writing class. The first night of the class the professor handed out the standards required to apply as a partner with the United Way. I really, really wanted to cry and give up. I thought there was no way I could possibly pull this off. The next day a director from UW of Tulsa spoke and I learned about the Center for Non Profits in OKC. They will walk you through the incorporation and 501(c)(3) process. New Year's Eve I tried to figure out all the 501(c)(3) paperwork. Yeah, good luck. It is complicated and confusing. I am thrilled that there is a resource that will walk me through all the steps. If you give me a list of what to do I can do it, but I was sitting there not knowing even where to start.

So I have that going on, which is going to suck every free moment of my life. I also bought a "how to write a novel" book yesterday, so in my free time I'll start on that one. :) Since I last blogged I also learned that I am going to be the Done in a Day chair next year for JLN. I am super excited about this! It's not what I wanted, but at the same time I am excited that the Board of JLN thought it was a good fit for me, since I am a new member. I am also going to be a representative for our league for an Action Learning Team. I am really excited about that as well.

Overall I am super busy! After next weekend I will be done with 18 hours of grad school (36 total so halfway), but at the end of March that number grows to 21 and the end of the semester means 24. Basically at the end of this semester I have 6 hours of internship (summer and fall!) and 6 hours of class (which I am taking online this summer: Theoretical Foundations and Post Traumatic Stress). For the most part I am done! I am still having the internal debate about whether doing Comp Exams or a thesis and it changes daily on which I am going to do, but today I am leaning towards thesis. It will require some extra research classes, but I think I will feel more accomplished if I do a thesis, plus I have a lot of the research done already, I think. I am completely fine waiting until spring 2012 to graduate, which should give me plenty of time to get it all done.

The next year is going to be a busy time in my world, but I was certainly life, my life is changing, in a big way. :)