Perks of the job...

I thought I’d intentionally try and be less overtly spiritual by changing the post title….at first I had put ‘Double Blessings’

One thing I often say to people about my job is that there are two sides, one good the other bad. One is hard / draining / tiring / scary / upsetting / overwhelming / emotional / annoying and crap...the other, is the Young People.

What I mean by that is the fact that I get to invest time in young people, sometimes just hang out with them, do fun programmes, each week Is different and occasionally you get those once in a lifetime opportunities...which is all, needless to say, amazing!
The past few weeks at work have been quite a mixture of both sides. My co-worker felt the same and described it as ‘Heaven and Hell’all in one day .You just don’t know from one moment to the next which side of the fence you will be sitting on, such is the nature of working with young people :)
But anyway, out of that we realised that it’s important to hold onto those good moments and never to let go of the fact that when things are bad ‘heaven’ can literally just be a moment away.

On that plus side there are two pretty cool things happening that I’m looking forward to. The first is happening tonight in half an hours time. My music night programme will be holding its latest gig at the Youth Centre. The place has been decorated, a stage has been set up and the posters have been out advertising our two bands and a guest band coming to play. The two bands that come to the programme are really talented; both have won competitions, gigged around Belfast and have recorded CD’s. local newspapers will also be down to get some snaps.
These gigs we hold are kind of the ‘fruit’ of the programme. When the centre is transformed into a new unrecognisable venue, the crowds gather and the boys get up to play it all makes sense and it’s all worthwhile.

The second thing is next Sunday when I’ll be heading off to the Lake District for 5 days with a group of young guys to do Outward Bound. This will be a week of Rock climbing, canoeing, hill walking, camping, tunnelling etc. Pretty cool.
No doubt it’ll be a hard week but one filled with endless possibilities.