So much to do, so little time. I always feel so inadequate at my job. I can never do enough. We will always miss something, always fail somehow. There are SOOO many ways to improve our policies and there have got to be ways to keep the animals safer, healthier, happier, and more adoptable. Wauys to screen for people who really shouldn't be adopting. Ways to be better, closer to perfect. We are always treading a thin line between lying (through omission of direct facts) to potential adopters, and scaring them away. If I tell someone, well, the cat bites, plain and simple, they are less likely to adopt the cat than if I say "the cat is friendly and playful and affectionate, however, she can get a little nippy sometimes if you pick her up" I have to make the people understand the animasl, and yet still be interested if the animal would do alright in their home. We need to keep better medical records, we need to spend soo much more time socializing and training both cats and dogs. We need to be better at interviewing people who are surrendering animals, and people who are potential adopters. We need to be better at training our staff and our volunteers. We need to be more on top of ordering supplies and equipment. We need to not get tired, and not get run down and burnt out. We have so much room for improvement. And yet, I feel so bone weary just thinking about everything we need to do. Everything that we can't do, because there are days when not everyone works as hard as everyone else. Where we all feel that someone else isn't pulling thier weight, and so how can we possibly take on more on top of it. If we could get our heads out of our ass's, and all work together a little better, I think we could do a bit more. And we work together fairly well. We get along well. We don't fight, we don't bicker, we don't harbor ill feelings towards one another. And yet, we could do so much better. If only we could pull it together. If only we had more time, more training, more energy, less stress. I feel so bad and so overwhelmed with trying to organize everything, with wanting to organize everything. And I wish I could get everyone else to feel the same... well not the same. But to have the same visions of greatness that I have. The visions of being not a mediocre shelter, not a decent shelter, not a good shelter, but an amazing shelter. They do exist, amnd I want us to be one of them. We have the potential, and for some reason we just aren't reaching it. I want it so bad I can taste it sometimes... and yet, with no support from family or friends, even on just an emotional level, and some lack of cooperation from coworkers at work, I just can't do it. I hurt too much to do it. And for that, I feel guilt. I can't have people in my life who refuse to support my job. The symptoms of burn out are alwayus strong enough on their own, without having someone telling me that I should quit, or I should work less, or I shouldn't have done this or that, because its not fair, or where is someone else to do it, or because they don't think its right. How am I supposed to stay even remotely sane if someone is constantly making me feel bad for what I put in at my job? Hell, that a good part of why I had to move out. My aunt used to get mad at me, mad at the shelter, even when it didn't really affect her. I don't like to think bad thoughts about other people, and very rarely do I think bad things about others unless someone else puts the idea in my head first. Even if its completely justified, I will not benefit from thinking that someone else is not working hard enoigh, or that the shelter owes me. All these thoughts do is run me down more, and run down my coworkers more, because they then have to deal with whatever bad feelings I can't cover up. Life is too short to be angry all the time. Anger wears us down, makes us tired over time. Anger is usually very passionate, which can be very exhausting. And you can only do so much good being angry all the time. And in the end, what does it matter, if you didn't enjoy it? One more, Happiness is not getting what you want, its wanting what you have. hmmm very interesting. And very true.