Pieces of the Puzzle

Look, it is absolutely insane to assume you're ready for the bedside once you graduate nursing school. There. I said it. All your nursing instructors can come after me all they want. But the truth is, nursing school is only part of the puzzle. In fact, to be honest, I only give it enough credit to call it the table you actually lay the puzzle on! (stick with me here through this metaphor) You have to have a solid, smooth, large enough surface to put your puzzle pieces on. There can't be holes, there can't be soft parts that collapse easily, and it can't be too small. See where I'm going with this? 

If your nursing education was the table with which you relied to place your nursing career puzzle on, then you get where I am going next. That table, as long as it's solid, is a great place to start. So don't skip chapters, don't rely on your short term memory just to pass a test, and for goodness sake please actually go to school (#opperationnightengale). That table could be fancy, and shiny, and huge, but it's still a table in the end. The picture you create that forms when you put your puzzle, or nursing practice into motion, is where the real beauty is. 

You start to put the pieces together of dependability, nursing judgement, integrity, saving lives, empathy, kindness, boundaries, assertiveness, inquisitiveness, and you start to develop a beautiful canvas of meaningful experience and life changing moments for both you and your patients. It becomes the large wonderfully comforting tapestry of your career and it's life altering. Pieces will include patient stories, team building nights out, friendships that last a lifetime, tears you share with patients or colleges, and your reflection and growth from everything that you go through passed down to nurses that come after you.

So, don't beat yourself up if you didn't get a perfect score on a test. Don't feel like the world is collapsing if you got a C in Anatomy physiology. Just remember why you're there in the first place and make sure you get your solid foundation for building your puzzle. 

I can't wait to see how your puzzle will turn out.