I need a 6th gear.

Ok, so, that’s a pretty terrible reference to driving a manual car. But, I am kinda OK with being a big dork and doing that.

Anyway, the point is that I need to somehow kick my butt into a faster gear. Sometimes I think internship allows you to run in 4th or 5th gear for most of the time, at least compared to school. In my opinion it’s not nearly as intense as classes are and allows for a lot more time flexibility than we had with classes. Now, don’t get me wrong, it’s not all cupcakes and puppies (how I wish I could have both right now!), but it’s also not nearly as time or energy intensive as the normal school year.

(No more manual car driving references from here on out…)

And, internship is even different than a full time job. When I worked at NG, I was pretty easily working 50 hours a week. On a light week. And, it was sometimes stress city because I had so many people asking me for help and wanting me to get involved in new things. Since your internship project is typically something you own yourself and might not allow you to fully integrate with the organization since it's short term, the level of involvement is naturally much less.

BUT, there may come a time, as there has for me this week, when you realize that the laid back summer is over and the Fall is here – full-time job recruiting and finishing your internship project are upon you. This might mean a lot more intensity than before. Not just at the internship but also in the evenings. In July, I worked my 7.5 hours (I’m in Europe after all; I was just trying to blend in!) and accomplished what I needed to; I then went home, maybe played tennis with Drew or ran, cooked dinner, learned German on Rosetta Stone and still had 2 or 3 hours to stalk, err, catch up with people on Facebook or read my Google Reader articles. Times have changed. Now, I am not only working a lot harder, but when I go home I have to motivate myself to write cover letters, practice for interviews and really do some serious soul searching about what I want to do when I grow up.

So, with the new stresses (and possibly the fact that I turned a year older last week), I seem to be noticing more grey hairs. But, the bottom line is, I need to find that 6th gear again and push through the next 2 months (ok, I lied about no more driving references), cause come this time in December, I will hopefully have accepted the “perfect” job offer and will be enjoying the Christmas holidays and a 6 week break.

P.S. Our car actually doesn't have a 6th gear. It's sometimes a bummer.