What can nurses do to be more happy in their career?

J-Swish · Sep 25, 2012

Video games.

thecool1Nscrubs2no · Sep 25, 2012

For myself it was returning to school and pursing a MSN-Nursing Informatics...Learning is a powerful tool. I figured if I'm going to continue in nursing to keep goals that are reachable. Focus on your own health, I know we have patients to care for...But don't forget to treat yourself well. Just a few of my favorite things in my down time rest, travel, movies, going out to dinner with a few close friends, laugh often. Reward yourself often.

NursesRmofun, ASN, RN · Sep 25, 2012

I'm not working currently...but I think sitting and talking to my loved one relaxed me some, when I did work. Sitting outside where I could breathe fresh air and look at nature was good too.

AssociateDegree · Sep 25, 2012

What can nurses do to be more happy in their career? The answer is simple: stop looking at nursing as a job and look at it as a career. If you're not happy with what you're doing, do something else. Nursing is one of the few fields that offers so much diversity in practice, location, hours, education, etc. A career is a life and a life well-led implies change and growth.

joanna73, BSN, RN · Sep 25, 2012

Work less. I don't enjoy working full time hours, so I don't do it anymore. I need a good balance between work and home.

Guest343211 · Sep 25, 2012

What can nurses do to be more happy in their career? The answer is simple: stop looking at nursing as a job and look at it as a career. If you're not happy with what you're doing, do something else. Nursing is one of the few fields that offers so much diversity in practice, location, hours, education, etc. A career is a life and a life well-led implies change and growth.

Yes and no. I agree with you main idea. The reality is, you have to be able to work. Thus, as I have suggested in other threads, it is wise to have another position, whether it be per diem or PT. You really do have to protect your ability to work. I have seen the goofy stuff within nursing politics. It never ceases to amaze me--never, and that is after 20 years.

But I would say, in looking at nursing as a career, yes. Do things that will move you toward your advancing goals in your career.

Thing is, you have to do this, while also staying active and making some sort of living. In say, going back to school in order to advance, you may have to take a position or two that isn't your ideal position, but it keeps you active and helps pay the bills. You can deal with it b/c hopefully it gives you flexibility in achieving the academic goals, even if you end up making little less money or are doing what you ideally want to do in nursing. It's about the big picture.

You have to stay current, make a living, and continue to work on your goals. So if that means finding to positions that meet these criteria, that's what you must do. It may not be your ideal setting or area, however, since you are actively taking courses to move toward your goal, it's alright. You make the most of it specifically b/c it allows to work toward your goal, whereas working in other settings and with problematic schedules and needless stress would interfere with say your study time and GPA, thus affecting your future goals.

You are right. You have to look at it as a career, and you must continue to strategize, all while combining your work-life balance. It's tricky.

I remember throwing everything into my higher paying, highly specialized nursing positions that sapped up so much of my time and energy--and sucked the life out of me. I loved those places--the actual clinical work I did, but the more specialized, often times, the more politics--and the positions were often demanding and stressful enough by their own nature, without all the added political BS. I remember having to make a choice about doing what I loved, which meant working environments and schedules that were not conducive to a balanced life and top academic success versus getting better work/life balance and maintaining academic success. I truly missed what I did in those environments, but I did not miss the stupidity of the scheduling or the inane nursing/hospital/unit politics. In order to move ahead, however, there are times where you have to make a choice. In terms of long-term survival, I think it's about maintaining your ability to work as a nurse as you move toward your overarching goals.

So it's yes and no. It's a career, but it's also a job. How you balance and counter-balance that depends upon what is most important at the moment in order to help move you toward your future goals.

tewdles, RN · Sep 25, 2012

I like a little wine.

I walk and ride my bike...sometimes I snow shoe in the winter.

I play the guitar.

Online play money poker helps me to destress.

Prayer helps me maintain my perspective.

Mostly, I love nursing and desire to work...so I pay attention to work/play balance.

maelstrom143 · Sep 25, 2012

Leave work at work. Once the day is over, leave and be grateful that a, b, or c are in no way related to you and therefore cannot go home with you and remember...tomorrow is another day.

I love my job, but encounter enough people during the course of my day that make me go, "really? What were you thinking? and you still wonder why you are in the hospital???" so that at the end of the day frustration can set in.

Walk away and be grateful for the small blessings in your life.

IdianaCNA1993 · Sep 25, 2012

hot baths, sleeping and doing nothing that deals with other human beings on my first day off unless I go to get somthing to eat at a drive through cause on my first day off im lazy as all get out to cook anything to eat! facebooking and going for a dive in the country, getting my fix of coca-cola and shania twain and insperational music always helped too, to start the shift off right. sometimes even seeing what my friends have done on the days I had to worked helped to and hanging out with friends on my days off helped make going back to work in a better happier attitude helped alot to cause durring my three day strech I got somthing to look forword to do on my days off..

anotherone, BSN, RN · Sep 25, 2012

think of it as my job not my life. i like to exercise at the gym, drive, read mindless books, watch reality tv , and shop shop shop and online shop

pinkfish333 · Sep 25, 2012

work in a setting you truly feel passionate about !

CapeCodMermaid, RN · Sep 25, 2012

I've been a nurse for (yikes) 30 years. Every few years I ask myself why am I still in the business. I'm a DNS in long term care. Between the shrinking payment system, the plethora of less than stellar nurses (in the hospital too), the ever growing piles of regulations, and the DPH, I'm about ready to call it quits.Then I go in for one more day and see the man who was close to death when he was admitted and now has an order to be discharged back home with his wife of 70 years. Or the resident who was extremely anxious and screaming is now sitting calmly because we assessed her needs and figured out what was so upsetting to her. Or the 94 year old long term resident with dementia who blows me a kiss every morning and tells me I should make more money than those "rotten Red Sox players" because I'm cute and really help people.If all this fails to lift my spirits, I go home, drink a rather large glass of wine, put in a CD and sing at the top of my lungs.We all need to take care of ourselves if we're going to keep taking care of other people.