Looking back and looking forward

I spent this past week living in two worlds. Inside the halls and meeting rooms of the conference center, I learned of cutting-edge research that is resulting in new interventions, improving patient outcomes, and propelling the nursing profession forward around the globe. Upon leaving the conference center and walking around the streets of Prague, I was transported back in time in a city with a rich history that includes establishment of the first university in Europe.

On my final evening, as I strolled around, taking my last glimpses and reflecting on this journey to commonality between two worlds, it struck me like a thunderbolt. Each came to be through great sacrifice!

Sacrifices made by the Czech people and at great cost are chronicled in artifacts that back to the eighth century. Many Czech families made the ultimate sacrifice during the Black Plague, but they endured their losses, memorialized their loved ones in places like the “Bone Church,” and stoically soldiered on.

Bone Church

To provide for their families, in hopes of giving them a better life, Czech men and women toiled long hours enduring harsh working conditions in silver-producing towns like Kutná Hora.

Kutná Hora

In modern times, they stood tall in the face of oppressive regimes to establish, once again, a society grounded in personal freedoms that values creativity and enlightenment.

Plague at Memorial to the Victims of Communism

Memorial to the Victims of Communism

As I look back on this congress, I would like to recognize all who sacrificed so much to be here. I know that, early on, many attendees had alternative career opportunities. Yet, they sacrificed a more economically rewarding career to become a professional nurse and answer the call to improve the human condition. In following that call, I know that many, because nursing is not valued in their culture or they are on the wrong side of a political conflict, have endured stigma and social injustice. I know that educators and researchers alike have made great sacrifices to ensure that the next generation of professional nurses is armed with the best science. For this, I thank you all!

On a personal note, I want to thank all who sacrificed so I could be here, including: faculty members from my undergraduate and graduate nursing school years (you know who you are); my mother, who is my nursing role-model (the fruit truly does not fall far from the tree); and my loving wife, Emma, who shot all the video and took most of the pictures for this blog and walked more than 10 miles each day so I could give you a taste of Prague.

Finally, I would like to make a request of all who have enjoyed this blog: If you could sacrifice just one Starbucks coffee a week or something similar and contribute your savings to the Sigma Theta Tau International Foundation for Nursing, your donation could help fund a leadership grant that would enable nurses in need of financial support to attend a research congress in the future.

I look forward to seeing friends, old and new, in Hong Kong next year and making new friends there. Until then, be blessed, be safe and, in the words of my Czech colleagues, CHAO!

CHAO!

For Reflections on Nursing Leadership (RNL), published by the Honor Society of Nursing, Sigma Theta Tau International.