For those of you who don’t know me, I played hockey as a kid and all throughout college. Recently I was speaking with a friend about my experiences coaching kid’s hockey. I mentioned how it gives a kid some grit. There’s no other activity that I can think of where it knocks you on your butt time and time again.

When learning to skate, you can’t help but fall. Falling down while playing isn’t something that ends either. When you get more advanced in your playing, someone is going to check you. Eventually, you will end up in a fight. No matter how good you are, there will always be someone bigger and better than you waiting to send you flying into the boards. Let’s not ever forget the moments where you take a wrong step, find the chip in the ice, or are just standing there and you end up on your butt.

I’ve been searching for a job for the better part of the last year and a half. When I started I was just wanting to switch jobs, so I switched jobs. Then I quit that job and now, I have a job that will just help me pay my bills. Here we are a year and a half later and I’m unsatisfied with what I’m doing. Job searching has punched me in the stomach, pushed me down, and there have been instances where I would have preferred a physical altercation instead of what happened.

I have no other option but to get up and go after what I want. I still have goals. I can see them in my dreams and I’m not giving up on them. Just like in hockey, I’m going to use the moments of defeat and turn them into lessons. I’m going to take the things I’m not good at and I’m going to practice them. Early mornings and late nights are going to be when I thrive. No excuses are going to be made about sore muscles or tired eyes because when it’s game time nobody cares!

My interviewers aren’t going to care what it took to get in front of them. They want to know that I am capable and that I have that I have the potential to improve. I’m going to show that to them.

Today, I don’t feel like working on my Google Analytics Certification and I’m tired of searching for new jobs, but I’m going to do it anyway. I’m going to accept encouragement from those close to me. I’m going to sit here and force myself to learn because I have to believe that if I put in the work it’s going to pay off. I’m going to believe in my future. I’m going to believe that I will get to spend more than nine months in any given city. One day, I will get to lay down roots because I’m going to have an incredible job that allows me to do so.